The scariest thing about The Horror of Dolores Roach may well be its Blumhouse production credit, the presence of which could easily frighten away viewers expecting (but not wanting) a Saw or Insidious type of schlock-fest. In fact, the Amazon Prime series is a very enjoyable, darkly comic thriller with a few thoughts about class and culture in modern society. Be warned, however, that you may never eat another empanada after watching.

The Horror of Dolores Roach isn’t particularly scary – and doesn’t try to be – but the show does live up to the “horror” of its title with an abundance of murder, gore, and other unpleasantness. Adapted from an off-Broadway play and a podcast (both titled Empanada Loca), the story draws explicit comparisons to Sweeney Todd, Stephen Sondheim’s Tony-winning Broadway smash about a serial-killing barber and his demented pie-making accomplice. The first episode makes a point of name-checking that play and features one of its famous songs over the end credits to let you know the similarities are intentional.

Title:	The Horror of Dolores Roach
Season:	1
Number of Episodes:	8
Release Date:	July 7, 2023
Watched On:	Amazon Prime Video

Justina Machado from Six Feet Under and Netflix’s One Day at a Time reboot stars in the title role. Fresh out of prison from an unjustly severe 16-year sentence for the minor offense of selling marijuana, Dolores returns to her Washington Heights neighborhood in Manhattan to find the place unrecognizably gentrified. With no friends, family, job prospects, or even a place to stay, she winds up taken in by the only person who remembers her. When last she saw him, Luis (Alejandro Hernandez from New Amsterdam) was just a teenage kid with a crush on her. Now grown up, he’s a scatterbrained pothead struggling to keep his failing empanada restaurant from going under. But he clearly cares for her, and can provide a roof over her head, which is more kindness than Dolores has known in years.

Dolores isn’t a bad person, or at least tries very hard not to be. However, when a confrontation with Luis’ asshole landlord (Marc Maron) turns ugly, the man winds up dead at her hand. Terrified of going back to prison, Dolores scrambles in desperation for a way to remove the body, only to find that Luis has already taken care of it for her. Much to her shock and disgust, he has a remarkably terrible and horrifying idea for how to dispose of the evidence.

Of course, people are going to come looking for the missing man, including a private investigator (pop legend Cyndi Lauper) who specializes in finding the unfindable. The more Dolores tries to get back to the straight-and-narrow, the more complications present themselves and the more the situation escalates until, before long, the poor woman realizes that she’s turned into an inadvertent serial killer.

At just eight half-hour episodes, The Horror of Dolores Roach is a quick binge easily completed in a couple of nights. At the same time, I do question whether it really needed to be a series at all when I’m sure the story could have been streamlined into a two-hour movie without losing much. (The original play, after all, told the whole thing in one sitting.) The central plot doesn’t even kick in until the third episode.

For a horror-comedy, the show has its share of grotesque details but may not go for broke to the degree that some horror fans (especially Blumhouse fans) may wish. The comedy side is also more amusing than flat-out hilarious. Nevertheless, Justina Machado makes an appealing antiheroine, and the series is not much of a commitment. I had fun with it and think it’s worth a look.

Video Streaming

Amazon Prime streams The Horror of Dolores Roach in 4K HDR at an aspect ratio of 2.00:1. The show’s photography isn’t especially flashy or stylized. Compositionally, it’s even a little dull. Almost every scene is framed in basic medium shots. However, image quality is solid all around. The picture is quite sharp, with rich colors and nice contrast.

The Dolby 5.1 soundtrack has strong fidelity and dynamic range. Surround channels fill the room with a very naturalistic sense of atmosphere, and the music frequently throbs with a satisfying bassy beat.