The Killing: "El Diablo"

Season 1, Episode 3

As the pieces continue to fall into place, the results are mixed in tonight’s episode.

The facts of the case (as revealed in this episode) are these:

·         A video is being passed around the school, which reveals that both Kris and Jasper raped Rosie on the night of her murder

That’s it. That is technically the only fact that the murder investigation unearthed tonight. Yet despite the simplicity of this fact, there were a lot of clues that led up to it. The police found drugs and booze around the mattress, which seemed to indicate rape. Tracking down the janitor Lyndon Johnson Rosales (as one of only two people with key access to The Cage), a possible pedophiliac, led them to Kris Echols (who we briefly met in the pilot), who the janitor indentified as wearing a devil mask at the school dance.  Yet we saw Jasper wearing the mask in the video, not Kris, which means there must be some deeper chicanery at play, because as Sarah deduced, Rosie would follow Jasper, but not Kris, into the basement.

A herein lies a problem with this drawn-out mystery. As engaging and well plotted as all of this clue-chasing was, it all ends up feeling like a wash in the wake of the big, end-of-the-episode reveal. Unless the show is going to pull some sort bullshit reveal where a passed over clue ends up being the break in the case, the show’s format means that technically every clue that the cops follow up on just serves as a McGuffin for the overall narrative.

And that’s how I feel about this current rape angle. Yes, the reveal took me by surprise, and yes as a storytelling device it is well handled and holds interest. Yet given how early this angle has been revealed, it’s quite obvious that Kris and Jasper, despite the horrendous nature of their actions, aren’t the killers. (Or at least, both of them can’t be the killers. Although even if it ends up being just one of them, it would still feel like a cheat for one them to rape her and then turn out to be the killer.) So even though this development feels powerful now, it will soon be almost irrelevant, and for the show to make light of (as it were) an instance of rape in the interest of the story just seems cynical/heartless.

Given the show’s insistence on keeping the Richmond Campaign as part of its focus, each week I will be covering the developments of this plotline in a separate section, at least until it becomes apparent what purpose it serves in the overall narrative. Until then, just assume that I find the campaign storyline to be a waste of time, for the reasons that I outlined in my review of the pilot.

The Richmond Campaign:

·         Though councilman Cantaneaz pulled her support due to Richmond not letting her know about his involvement with the Larsen investigation, Richmond gets her support back through something resembling blackmail.

·         Leslie Adams uses Richmond’s link to Rosie’s murder against him in the campaign

·         Richmond is pushing the All Star Initiative , a key to his anti-gang campaign

·         Nathan, Richmond’s PI, uncovers proof that Jamie is the leak.

Admittedly, the only pertinent points for the ongoing narrative (at least for now) are the first and last. (The middle two, and all future “irrelevant” campaign developments, are/will be recorded in the case that they do become relevant later on). And though there is little to suggest that the Cantaneaz plot has anything to do with Rosie’s murder, it does hold some importance for Richmond’s character development. Though perhaps not illegal, Richmond’s “blackmail” (or whatever you want to call it) of Cantaneaz is certainly underhanded, and such a move seems to go against the clean-cut image of his campaign. The real question now is whether this marks the beginning of Richmond’s moral decline, or just another in a series of sleazy actions.

The far more important development (at least insofar as the campaign storyline ties into the murder case), is the “reveal” of the campaign leak. Now, clearly Jamie isn’t the leak (it’s too early and too easy), so the show wants us to believe for now that it’s Gwen. But is it really her? If so, then how long are they going to drag it out, what else do they have in store after they are done with the leak plot, and (most importantly) why would Gwen be the leak in the first place, given how she seems romantically involved with Richmond? And if she’s not the leak, then who the hell is? It all doesn’t seem to add up, and though all this will (hopefully) lead to some sort of break in the murder case, for now its messiness and general lack of direction means it doesn’t jive so well with the rest of show.

Character Development:

The most engaging part of the show continues to be the remaining Larsens. Watching as the family falls apart – as Stan is forced into the role of caretaker, and Mitch is staving off depression/thoughts of suicide – remains highly engaging, as the show has tapped into the slow, boring nature of grief. Even better – i.e. more tense – are those scenes wherein the family is confronted with reminders of Rosie’s death – her voice on the outgoing message, the brother setting a place for her at the table. The best of these scenes saw Sarah returning to the Larsens place to let them know – officially – that she was discovered, drowned, in the Richmond campaign car, only to face down Stan, who’s angry to have already learned this first from the paper.

Less engaging are the bits of Sarah’s personal life. Though the lieutenant’s line about having Sarah stay on until the end of the case should (hopefully) prevent the show with having to produce even more reasons for why she’s staying in Seattle, it’s still a bit ridiculous that she’s being forced to stick around. Even worse, I don’t care that much about the dissolution of Sarah and Rick’s marriage. At this point, it just seems so rote as to be boring, nor does it help that we don’t really know Rick as a character. One the other hand, we finally got to see the oft-mentioned Reggie, who may or may not have romantic feelings for/a past romantic relationship with Sarah. (That’s just a theory, seeing as I don’t see any other connection that would cause these two to act as they do around one another, and I have yet to hear any talk of family ties.)

And then there’s the fallout at the school, where the student body (and perhaps faculty) seems to have been deeply affected by Rosie’s death. Most affected is Sterling, but the question now stands: Is she just sad for her friend’s passing, or did she have something to do with her death?

What did everybody else think?

Additional Thoughts:

The Killing had great premiere numbers last week, making it the second highest premiere in AMC’s history, behind The Walking Dead. Not good enough for immediate renewal, though a second season is highly likely.

So the title of the second episode was “The Cage” and this one’s title was “El Diablo.” Doesn’t really feel like the show’s trying too hard in the title department, does it?

Current Killer Theory: Holder. This episode when out of its way to make sure we noticed his mysterious phone call, and though it will feel like a bit of a cheat for him to be a mole within the investigation (and I hope that it doesn’t come to that), he’s currently the only suspect I fell like pining my theory on. Plus, he keeps being creepy around young girls.

Cheesy line of the week: “We? There is no ‘we.’ We are over.”

If you dress like Justin Bieber and eat pork rinds for dinner, then you obviously lack a BS Detector.

Nothing like 5 straight hours of Halo to put a teenager right to sleep.

Reporters: The real source of America’s ADD epidemic.

So that fake weed Holder supposedly smoked: Is that a real thing?