The thrill of watching an international party girl struggle to piece together what happened "last night"...when last night includes a murder!

While a show tackling trauma, murder, and alcoholism could easily be a fasten-your-seatbelts-and-prepare-for-sadness deep dive, the writers and cast of Flight Attendant manage to pull off a quirky and dark comedy filled with intrigue. Kaley Cuoco’s character, Cassie, is known for being the life of the party—that is, until she wakes up with a hangover next to a dead body. As Cassie scrambles to piece together what happened the night before, her own past and her escalating issues with alcohol become difficult to ignore. It’s a show that’s hard to sum up because there are so many facets that make it unique. It has the absurdity and warmth of Bridesmaids, the murder mystery of The Girl on the Train, and the international intrigue of Alias.

I haven’t woken up next to a dead body, but like a lot of people, I know how traumatic memories often come back in fragments and flashbacks, making it challenging to navigate life, work, friendships, and dating. Everyone either knows someone that’s experienced a difficult trauma or has gone through one themselves, and Flight Attendant captures the nuances and layers of that in a bite-sized, funny, absurd, and relatable way.  

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Though it’s ostensibly about Cassie trying to solve a murder—while wondering if she’s involved—the show really shines as it deals with trauma and how it affects people’s lives. The ‘body-keeps-the-score’ nerd in me kept wanting to point out, “See, this is how ______ can affect____!” to my friends, but the best part of the show is that it tells the story without having to explain itself: with Cassie, you’re along for the ride. It’s a brilliant, fun, horrifying, immersive show that I look forward to each week and recommend frequently.

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