The Secrets We Bury isn’t your typical slick, serialized HBO Max drama, soaked in prestige and production. Nor is it a standard, gritty courtroom thriller with smoking guns and snappy objections. Ultimately, it’s a true-crime documentary with a side of familial psychoanalysis and basement excavation, topped with a helping of psychic readings and communion with the dead.

Set in Long Island, New York, the story follows the Carroll family’s generation-spanning search for answers to the age-old question: Did Dad really go out for cigarettes and never come back? Mike Carroll and his siblings struggle for resolution, knowing there was never any investigation into their father’s disappearance. And just as quickly as he left, a new man took his place.

The offering leans heavily into familiar true-crime tropes: Someone dies suspiciously, someone’s past may not be quite what it seems, and first-person-interview narration that pushes the story along with hints here and there of what’s to come.

A literal and figurative title

Mike and his siblings doubted the cover story their mother gave after their father vanished in the 1960s, but their devotion to her kept them from probing too deeply for years. Everything shifts after their mother’s death, though, when Mike and his sister visit a psychic who suggests their father never left.

In fact, he might still be in the family home. In the basement. Underground.

With time on his hands, Mike investigates the psychic’s claim. The documentary describes in detail the process Mike and his sons pursue to see what, if anything, is actually buried under the basement of the home where his mother and her husband raised him and his siblings. Mike has lived there since his mother passed, and what he and his sons ultimately discover creates a ripple across generations.

After the credits rolled, I found myself wondering if my only reason for finishing the show was the amount of time I had invested to see the reveal. Upon a bit of reflection, the selling point, as with all good true-crime offerings, was the cast. The Carrolls provide just enough charm and quirkiness to keep the film grounded yet engaging.

I’ll give one spoiler: The excavation I alluded to earlier does, in fact, turn up something literally buried. Regardless, the last third of the documentary deals more with things that are figuratively buried.

Crime and the passage of time

Though presented as a true-crime documentary, The Secrets We Bury veers more toward familial drama, emphasizing the pain and anguish of long-held silence and resentment instead of crime scene investigation. If you’re looking for a polished procedural heavy on the law, this isn’t the show for you.

I still think true-crime junkies will walk away satisfied, though. The appeal lies in the raw, real interviews with the Carroll siblings and the slow unfurling of how generations of secrets tend to warp relationships.

After all, The Secrets We Bury finds footing more so in the uncomfortable autopsy of a family and their decades of denial than in the actual mystery they’ve been denying all these years. Watching the documentary is like reviewing a witness list full of individuals who refuse to speak with you prior to trial: Sure, you can issue subpoenas and drag them into court, but their stifled statements breed caution as to what they might disclose if push comes to shove.

That scenario unfolds on screen to a degree as the production creeps along. Some siblings disclose abuse they suffered as youths in their home, suggesting their systemic silence may stem more from reluctance than reticence. It’s something we see often in real practice: Not every crime is disclosed, and even when it is, the revelation may take years, if not decades, to surface.

Still, the disclosures are emotional. I found myself wondering how the family interacts face-to-face in the realization of years of trauma. The question was never answered, but I understand if the Carroll family chose to keep that for themselves. In the end, not everything is meant for public consumption.

Mike Carroll. (Photo from Warner Bros. Discovery)

Missing people who aren’t ‘missed’

Although family dynamics take center stage, The Secrets We Bury does still focus on, well, a secret. Despite their mother’s account that their father simply left one day, the siblings recognize the oddity of the explanation. Why did he leave? Where did he go? Why didn’t he at least pick up his last paycheck?

One of their concerns revolves around the fact there was never any formal investigation into the disappearance. Now, to be fair, there could be various explanations for the lack of diligence. After all, if their mother simply believed their father left the family on his own accord, she may not have viewed him as missing, per se. Additionally, not every missing person gets reported, regardless.

Nevertheless, law enforcement does maintain various databases of individuals reported missing. However, in many agencies and jurisdictions, the decision whether to report a missing adult to any database is completely voluntary. In most situations, individuals and agencies are only required to report missing children under the age of 18. With that in mind, it might make sense why the Carrolls’ father was never reported missing. Or it could be due to other, more nefarious reasons.

At the end of the day, The Secrets We Bury is enjoyable if not spectacular. While the documentary offers just enough tension to keep you hooked, it lacks the originality to secure a lasting place in the annals of true-crime history. Verdict? Worth the time, but likely forgettable.

Adam Banner

Adam R. Banner is the founder and lead attorney of the Oklahoma Legal Group, a criminal defense law firm in Oklahoma City. His practice focuses solely on state and federal criminal defense. He represents the accused against allegations of sex crimes, violent crimes, drug crimes and white-collar crimes.

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