It’s probably no easy feat to pull off a sadistic nickname like the Happy Face Killer. But if you punctuate your many handwritten letters to the media and authorities with that famed illustration after murdering almost 10 victims, that’s one way to achieve the eerie title. A new true-crime detective series hitting Paramount+ this month recounts the real serial killer’s life during a specific period. In Happy Face, we meet Keith Hunter Jesperson (Dennis Quaid) late in his prison sentence while his grown daughter Melissa (played by Annaleigh Ashford) grapples with her own identity amid new developments in her dad’s exhausting case.
If the show’s edgy trailer didn’t already skeeve you out, just you wait until father and daughter come face to face in the various prison scenes across the series’ eight mostly gripping episodes. From showrunner Jennifer Cacicio (Your Honor writer) and director Michael Showalter (The Dropout, The Shrink Next Door), Happy Face certainly offers some juicy true-crime mania to satisfy a certain twisted obsession of ours, at least until the next monumental docuseries drops on Netflix or the like. The overall TV-MA darkness could have been amplified a bit more to make the end result that much more impactful, but it’s enough to get the online forums swirling once again.
Revisiting a Twisted Past
Happy Face
- Release Date
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March 20, 2025
- Network
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Paramount+
- Directors
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Michael Showalter
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Annaleigh Ashford
Melissa Moore
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- Dennis Quaid effectively oozes creepiness.
- True-crime die-hards, step right up.
- Subpar performances beyond two leads.
- Documentary might be more impactful.
The new series is inspired by the real-life story of Melissa Moore and her Happy Face podcast and autobiography Shattered Silence. The soft-approach end result feels a bit like it could have aired on a network like NBC, rather than a streamer such as Paramount+ that can welcome those edgier, more TV-MA productions we’ve grown so fond of lately. But that’s not to say the subject matter of Happy Face won’t shake you at certain points.
At first, it’s all pleasantries in Melissa’s life as the pilot episode opens. Married with two beautiful kids, a steady job as a makeup artist at a TV studio, which is where the trouble brews. The studio that employs her produces an edgy talk show hosted by Dr. Greg (David Harewood). Dr. Greg receives an unexpected phone call one day from the one and only Happy Face Killer (Quaid), claiming there’s actually one more victim he hasn’t yet claimed from years earlier. Oh, and one other thing: He won’t share further details with anyone besides the woman named Melissa at Dr. Greg’s studio. Oof.
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That’s when Melissa feels pressured to reveal her actual backstory to her peers once and for all, that she had previously changed her name after learning as a teenager about her father’s true nature. Her shrouded history was all in an effort to lead a normal life in the years following her discovery — but now, all that appears to be in jeopardy since, if this ninth victim her dad speaks of does in fact belong to the Happy Face Killer, that means there is an innocent man in prison somewhere who has wrongly charged with the crime.
This means Melissa is no longer playing makeup artist and is now a producer on the case with her seasoned colleague (Tamera Tomakili), jetsetting down to Keith’s prison to try and learn more. She also heads to where inmate Elijah (Damon Gupton) is being held, the man who was actually charged with taking the life that Melissa’s dad has now claimed. The increasingly complex case means time away from Melissa’s family, which rightfully infuriates her loving husband Ben (James Wolk). It’s a near-impossible situation for her to manage, and lead actress Ashford reliably nails the part.
It’s the Quaid & Ashford Show
The difficult situations Melissa puts herself in also raise pertinent questions about the pursuit of justice and what other parts of our lives we’ll sacrifice along the way. It seems Melissa cares more about her monster of a father at times, the way she prioritizes his case over her troubled family back home, including her teenage daughter Hazel (Khiyla Aynne), who keeps acting out in vintage rebellious fashion. And on that note — what’s the real reason most of us will tune in for Happy Face?
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Perhaps it’s to see just how nasty of a turn Quaid offers as the eponymous killer, oozing sleaze and gaslight-inducing charm in virtually every scene. One could argue it’s nauseating to watch; others could argue that’s the point and that we should just embrace the madness. This is a true-crime drama series, after all. And as stated earlier, just watch out for the moments when Ashford and Quaid come face to face. The rest, unfortunately, might just go in one ear and out the other.
Happy Face will begin streaming on Paramount+ March 20.
