“Nothing beats dead Indians. Didn’t you see Poltergeist?” – Jamie
Now that the business with missing Jack (Liam James) has been wrapped up, the show can get back to what it does best in “Beau Soleil.” And by “what it does best” I mean sending the viewers down a path that is at once predictable yet oddly disconnected from the other wild goose chases we have already witnessed. Unless the show is able to pull off something incredible in next week’s finale, it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which The Killing could be viewed (by me at least) as anything other than an abject failure. There are two ways in which a show like The Killing could work: either as a “play along at home” whodunit or as a in-depth examination of the devastating ripples caused by a single act of violence. Unfortunately, the show has, for the most part, been unsuccessful at connecting with viewers (or at least this viewer) in a meaningful way in either capacity.
“Beau Soleil” finds Holder (Joel Kinnaman) and Linden (Mirielle Enos) hot on the trail of their newest lead in the Rosie Larsen murder. The detectives discover that Rosie had been making large cash deposits into a bank account opened under her aunt Terry’s (Jamie Ann Allman) name, and after a few lucky coincidences and one or two outright contrivances Holder and Linden connect Rosie and Terry to an upscale escort website called Beau Soleil. The cops interrogate Terry and another escort and learn that a few weeks ago a man who goes by the alias “Orpheus” scared the bejeezus out of a call girl by driving her down to the waterfront and asking if she ever thought about what it would be like to drown.
The episode tries hard to point the finger at Tom Drexler (Patrick Gilmore). But if the past 11 episodes have taught us anything it’s that the person the show heaps suspicion upon will ultimately be found innocent. “Beau Soleil” stays true to the pattern and by the end of the episode both Holder and Linden discover (separately, yet simultaneously!) that the man who goes by “Orpheus” is none other than Darren Richmond (Bill Campbell).
For weeks I have feared that eventually we would discover than Richmond is indeed the killer and barring any last-minute twists (by the way, I fully expect the finale to be full of last minute twists), it’s probably safe to say that my fears have come true. Darren was our first suspect all the way back when Rosie’s body was pulled out of the trunk of his campaign car, yet he was cleared of suspicion soon after. For The Killing to circle back and designate Richmond the killer would make all of the hoops we have jumped through between Episode Two and Episode 13 feel like a colossal waste of time.
Here’s why if Darren is the killer (and even if he isn’t, for that matter), The Killing is a failure: So, first the show establishes that Darren is a suspect. Then it goes out of its way to tell us that he isn’t a suspect. After that, the show’s job is to make us like/empathize with Darren so that when Darren becomes a suspect again the audience will feel some kind emotion – anger, betrayal, shock, etc. While the show is making us like Darren, it should also be placing little clues that hint at some kind of dark secret or a means/motive for committing murder. This way when it is finally revealed that Richmond is the killer after all, the audience says, “Man, I should have known it all along. I can’t believe The Killing tricked me into rooting for a child-killer- how clever!” Except The Killing doesn’t make us like Richmond – instead it bores us with countless, uninspired scenes of political horse trading.
Nor does it plant the seed of doubt in our minds about Richmond’s innocence. From what we have seen, there is no reason to believe that Richmond is a sexual deviant, much less a cold-blooded murderer. The show has entered “no-win scenario” territory. If Darren is the killer, it insults our intelligence as viewers. (We have been waiting for weeks for a connection between Rosie and Darren to appear out of thin air. And when no other connection materializes, we are forced to assume that the connection has to be that Darren is the killer). If Darren isn’t the killer than this whole “Orpheus” business is nothing more than another red herring. And that would be extraordinarily annoying.
I get what the show is trying to do here. It’s trying to say, “Hey, aren’t we clever. The killer was right in front of your face the entire time!” Except The Killing has gone so far out of its way to withhold information and prop up red herrings that making the killer the guy who was the first real suspect isn’t clever at all – it’s a betrayal of the audience’s trust.
Some stats and info about The Killing, “Beau Soleil”
TV SHOW – The Killing
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 1 Episode 12
AIRED ON – June 12th, 2011
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – AMC
GENRE – Drama, Crime Dramas
CREATED BY – Veena Sud
CAST – Mireille Enos, Joel Kinnaman, Billy Campbell, Liam James, Michelle Forbes, Brent Sexton, Kristin Lehman, Eric Laden, Jamie Anne Allman
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.