This was a big swing. Nicolet, the fourth-most successful competitor at a series of international spelling bees (and apparent celebrity for it), is placed under house arrest when another contestant turns up dead. She becomes convinced that someone is sending her messages through the local newspapers’ “word of the day” feature, and things get complicated when the police start sending her ex-girlfriend to her home to make wellness checks.

There were some things I liked about The Word of the Day. The set definitely suggests crazy-person apartment and the lighting was fairly nice, gently steering us through warm scenes about the relationships of these characters, chilling scenes in which we unravel the mystery, and one very red fever dream. Paris Adorno makes a pretty tough role, the ex, Magdalena, who pretty much takes it on the chin the entire time, easy to root for. The show spins a good amount of tension out of a pretty far-fetched premise.

I think this could work a little better in its current form. A lot of the steady drip-drip is us coming to understand the exact relationships between these characters, and while Elisa Tarquinio does a fine job individually as Nicolet, she has very little chemistry with Paris’s Magdalena, which makes some of the early-middle a grind.

For a more comprehensive retooling, I’d reconsider the premise itself—it’s just so complicated, and it doesn’t all quite pay off. I would probably try to simplify it. I also just don’t really think that Nicolet reads as the linguistics savant she’s supposed to be, but, golly, that’s a tough character to write or perform with authenticity.