How do you even begin covering three episodes with as much going on as in Shining Girls Season 1 Episode 1, Shining Girls Season 1 Episode 2, and Shining Girls Season 1 Episode 3?

Well, you don't. You point your readers to the three links above for detailed recaps and to check out the Shining Girls quotes because there is so much depth in these episodes that you cannot do them justice in one article.

That's the peril of three-episode premieres.

But we will soldier on, and once these are out of the way, we can examine each episode individually for weekly drops.

After the premiere, we know that Kirby Mazrachi and Harper Curtis are inexplicably entwined.

Neither of them knows it, but Kirby, at least, knows something changed after Harper brutally attacked her six years ago.

He left her for dead, but Kirby didn't die. That's an outcome neither of them expected, and while Kirby has carried the pain and trauma of her attack with her every minute of every day, Harper has been dancing through time, terrorizing and killing unencumbered.

That hardly seems fair.

Kirby is lucky to have survived the attack, but she's not the same person anymore, leaving a happy-go-lucky girl named Sharon in her rear-view mirror.

Kirby grew up with Harper. He's been a part of her life for so long, she doesn't even remember most of it.

Of course, her memory is faulty after the attack. Metaphorically, you never feel the same again. Kirby fights that feeling on Shining Girls while simultaneously having her physical reality shift on a dime.

As someone who has the before and after of an attack and the scars to prove it, I know how trauma slices your life in half. There's before the attack and after. The same is true with any trauma. Every time you're reminded of it, there is another shift.

Whether it's in your head or how someone who learns about your experience reacts, every reminder is another notch in your post-trauma belt. The number grows and grows, unencumbered as Harper is with his murders.

It's hard to imagine reality shifting physically and mentally. Mentally is hard enough. What Kirby experiences physically is enough to drive anyone nuts.

But Kirby's not nuts. She carries on with a job and a life under a continuously shifting narrative without skipping a beat. If it seems awe-inspiring, it is awe-inspiring every time a trauma victim picks themselves up and carries on living, even if life isn't the same. And it never is.

We get a few glimpses throughout the first three episodes of who Kirby was before, like when she jumped on stage with her mother, Rachel, during a performance.

Kirby was blonde and made up, wearing a cute outfit. She had a life and was enjoying it. By contrast, everything about Kirby is nondescript now. A brown bob, no makeup, and boxy clothing covering her body, likely because of a combination of fear, guilt, and shame, none of which she deserves.

Working at the Sun-Times must be difficult for her. She was pursuing a journalism career when it was cut short. Now, she's in the shadows, cutting clips so other journalists can take the risks and write the stories.

Few people in the office knew her name or how long she'd worked there. It's not surprising that, in one reality, Kirby was married to Marcus. He noticed her and thought enough of her to snap a photo -- little moments matter.

After Kirby was notified of the body of a deceased woman bearing wounds similar to Kirby's, she used the paper's resources to do a little digging. Emerging from her shell, ever so slightly, got her noticed. And once she was seen, Kirby took baby steps to join the living again.

Reporter Dan Velazquez saw her drive and talent, but that's not surprising. If people take Kirby for granted, they expect the worst from Dan. Something happened to him, too, that led him down a dark path that he spent years trying to escape.

Kirby went inward; Dan chose to disappear with the help of drugs and alcohol. Different methods with similar outcomes have allowed them to form a relationship to track the case. What grows is the cornerstone of the series.

Dan and Kirby are making headway in a decades-old murder case, trusting each other and propping each other up along the way. When Kirby trusts Dan with one of her biggest secrets, he surprises her by accepting it and carrying on with their work.

It's impossible not to feel for them or to hope that they can move mountains to stop a heinous killer. Harper is heinous. He's unforgivable. Whether he's ripping the wings off a bee, trapping a girl in a convenience store stockroom, or terrorizing a woman with mind-bending precision, he's a monster.

It doesn't seem like he's aware of his world shifting. He's probably used to it, stepping in and out of time as he does. But his ties to Kirby manifested when his cup of coffee changed before he'd finished drinking it.

Harper has screwed with Kirby's existence with every person he terrorized through time, most likely. But when Kirby met with Jinny, she impacted him. Maybe it was the first time. I wonder if he'll notice.

Watching Kirby deal with her trauma isn't easy to watch. When she mustered up the courage for the coroner to examine her scars for similarities to Julia's wounds, time shifted, and her examination by a kind woman shifted to a male midway through.

Kirby's marriage to Marcus was equally traumatizing, even if it seems like he's good and kind, giving her the time she needs to sort through issues without pressing her on them.

Something doesn't sit well with her. Sure, she doesn't know him or their relationship, but it's more than that. And when Dan offers his opinion that differs substantially from hers, it takes her a bit to process it.

And we know that Dan's onto something when Marcus inserts himself into the working relationship Dan has with Kirby. It makes you wonder if Marcus really understands Kirby because he judges Dan for his mistakes when he should be taking Kirby's word about working with Dan.

The encounter drove Dan to drink and nearly got him killed. It offered a lot of information to Harper, and now, even if he doesn't know it, Dan's got Harper on his tail, too.

Dan's eager to write a story that will restore his good name in journalism. Kirby's eager to overcome her past and not let what happened to her determine her fate. They both want control of their lives again, and they'll need to lean on and trust each other to make it happen.

Listen, Kirby. These other women, they're bodies. When you write about the dead, you write with water. As soon as you put it down, it starts to dry up, and pretty soon, there's nothing, nothing left for anyone to remember. But you are still here. And no one could forget you. And that's what I wanted for the story.

Dan

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Telling your own story is a difficult journey, but it's a hell of a lot better than allowing someone else to tell it for you.

After you read the recaps and quotes and peruse this article, I hope you'll drop below and tell me what you think of the show.

It's one of my favorites in a long time, so I'm excited to take this journey together.

Carissa Pavlica is the managing editor and a staff writer and critic for TV Fanatic. She's a member of the Critic's Choice Association, enjoys mentoring writers, conversing with cats, and passionately discussing the nuances of television and film with anyone who will listen. Follow her on X and email her here at TV Fanatic.