The Woods’ Polish producers chose the latter option. They remained faithful to Coben’s novel and skilfully used the threads he outlined. The script by Agata Malesińska and Wojtek Miłoszewski makes good use of all the motifs created by Coben and also adds new, local contexts. However, it is a pity that the motifs introduced by the scriptwriters (the themes of anti-Semitism and class conflict) do not resonate in full and give the impression of being an additional attraction rather than a significant part of the underlying criminal intrigue.
The Woods takes from Coben’s literature, but also has to pay the price for his sins. And the main one is a lack of logic of some parts of the plot – it is not entirely clear why we are following a police investigation from twenty-odd years ago, some threads are not properly concluded, and the criminal conspiracy sometimes seems too meticulous, as if instead of seeking out the answers the characters simply collect crumbs scattered by the novel’s author.
Nevertheless, Dawid’s and Konopka’s series is a pleasure to watch, mainly because of the well-conceived characters who we want to cheer for and whose emotions are easy to understand. The character of Paweł, as interpreted by Grzegorz Damięcki, is convincing as a man possessed by an obsessive need to understand his past, and his partner Agnieszka Grochowska is great in the role of his former lover. The Woods also brings several acting discoveries, for example, Hubert Miłkowski, who plays the teenage version of the main character, shows great talent and charisma, thanks to which we will soon certainly see him again in cinema and TV productions.