You know what the publications reported, and you know the documentary Amanda Knox, but now it’s time for another look inside the events that happened back in 2007 and beyond. The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox gives us Amanda’s look back at the past.
Caution: This post contains SPOILERS for The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox episode 1.
There have been many stories about the ordeal Amanda Knox went through. Hulu has brought a true crime series, offering a look at what happened and a search for the truth, told with Amanda Knox executive producing herself.
The first episode does what any first episode does; it sets the stage and gives us an idea of the form of storytelling. While publications seemed to set up the idea that Amanda and Meredith hated each other, that wasn’t necessarily the case.
Amanda heads back to Italy in The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox
The episode opens with Amanda hiding in the back of her parents’ car as they drive into Italy. Her mom doesn’t like the idea, sure that someone is setting a trap for Amanda. After all, there were attempts to get her back into the country to try her again.
As they wonder if they should turn back, Amanda makes it clear that isn’t going to happen. However, she will go back to the start for us.
Setting the stage for Amanda and Meredith’s friendship
After a brief look at why Amanda headed to Italy in the first place, we get to see how she landed a place in the same house as Meredith Kercher, who would end up becoming the victim she was accused of murdering. The publications wanted to make it sound like Amanda and Meredith hated each other, but The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox sets up a look that the two were close friends while in Italy.
We get a look at how she got along with all her roommates, but also a look at how she didn’t quite fit in with Meredith’s British friends. There’s also a voiceover that tells us that a lot of things that Amanda and Meredith did like about each other was twisted, and Amanda was eventually turned into someone who hated her.
That gets us to the day that Amanda walks home to a silent house. She doesn’t think too much of it, despite the front door being left open, and simply grabs a shower and starts to get on with her day. That’s when she realizes that there are a few things off, such as the bathmat being wet and dirty. As she starts to put it all together, she realizes that someone has been in the house. Rather than go to the police, she grabs a mop and walks to her boyfriend’s house.
Amanda heads back with Raffaele
Of course, she needed her boyfriend before looking around the house. She goes through each of the rooms, landing in one of her Italian roommate’s rooms, which has been broken into. Realizing that she hasn’t heard from Meredith, she rushes to her room, which is locked.
As the two continue to look around, Amanda realizes that the mess left in the toilet earlier has gone. It means someone was still in the house or came back. Raffaele decides to call his sister, who is connected to the police, but another cop ends up showing up instead. They’re postal police with a phone that belongs to one of the roommates, and suddenly the conspiracy gets bigger.
It’s hard not to feel sorry for Meredith, as everyone starts speaking in Italian around her. While she understands some, she isn’t fluent, and it leads to her questioning everything that’s going on. While Raffaele helps, it’s not enough as he is pulled into the situation as well. It’s only as one of the men break down Meredith’s locked door that the conversations stop and the police are called in. There was a body.
While the publications loved to push the idea that Amanda incriminated herself, we can see how that was possible in The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox. She was relying on her boyfriend to tell her everything that was going on, and the Italians realized that they had someone they could cause to slip up with phrasing. At this point, of course “the American” was going to be the easy scapegoat.
A flash to the present in The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox
We get flashes to the past as we head back to the present day. At a roadblock on the bridge, the car is pulled over and the police check for anything awry in there. Of course, this leads to concerns from everyone, knowing that they’re smuggling Amanda back into the country. Meanwhile, Amanda has a couple of flashes of being arrested and locked in a cell.
As they’re waved through the roadblock, we go back to the past storyline of Amanda giving her statement. It has to be in Italian, and Raffaele immediately points out the flaw in this. She’s not fluent. Again, it’s easy to see how she could end up “convicting” herself, because of her broken Italian. It takes way too long for them to decide to get a translator.
We also see just how difficult the situation was for Raffaele, as he points out he and Amanda had only been together for a week. However, we do get confirmation as to why she didn’t question the open front door. She thought the blood was period blood and Meredith had rushed out to get something, and of course, she wasn’t going to clean up someone else’s period blood.
It’s easy to see why the police took one side, but it’s also easy to see how Amanda was ambushed into the situation.
Back in the present day, Amanda and her family—it turns out that it’s her mom and husband, Christopher, and their baby—make it to the church they’ve been asked to meet. With a friendly face, there’s a bit of a reprieve before Amanda has to face the past again and find out if it was all a trap or not.
Amanda’s mom stays outside and starts to her sirens. Is it possible that her daughter is going to be taken in again?
We don’t find out, as we’re taken back to the past. With multiple others having alibis, the suspicion continues to fall on Amanda. It doesn’t help that Meredith’s British friends decide to give the Italian police everything to build a case that Meredith didn’t like Amanda. It’s soon clear that Amanda only really has Raffaele in her corner.
On top of that, the police don’t give Amanda much time to sleep and get some rest. Of course, this is an interrogation trick used to make sure she slips up. There’s a lot that wouldn’t pass in the American police system, but this is Italy, and we get a real look at how phones were tapped and assumptions were made that ended in an ordeal for an innocent woman.
With the police clearly making the decision that Amanda did it, we cut back to the present day. Giuliano Mignini is the one to meet with her at the church, but we still question if it’s a trap.
The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox airs on Wednesdays on Hulu.
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