Summary
Murder in a Small Town Season 2 reaches its silliest and most overblown point in “Masterpiece”, with Karl’s serial killer hunt chafing pretty awkwardly against the small-town stakes and setting.
I know I’m always moaning about this show for reasons that it sometimes can’t even help, but “Masterpiece” – a provocative title in itself, I think – doesn’t really feel like Murder in a Small Town, you know what I mean? The return of grandiose serial killer Tommy Cummins heralds a showiness that feels a little bit at odds with the insular drama of Cassandra feeling bad about her town council budget debacle.
Karl’s still annoyed about that, by the way, as well he might be, but he loves Cass, and the show doesn’t have any real time for their relationship to develop, so he decides to pretend as if the whole thing never happened. This episode, by the way, was the first time that I clocked the Gibsons PD had been taking on other small-town crimes, which not only explains why the department’s staff shortages are such a big deal, but also kills some of my previous jokes about how many murders seem to happen in this one small town. That’s annoying.
But not as annoying as Cummins, who in “Masterpiece” compels Karl, through assistant district attorney Lanni Soo, to visit him in prison so that he can reveal the burial sites of his first victims. Karl knows it’s all a ruse, part of a bigger “exhibition” – serial killers are generally show-offs, after all – but he goes along anyway, stumbling headfirst into an escape attempt partially facilitated by an admirer named Madeline.
With Tommy on the lam, Karl has to work the clues, which reveal the most inspired twist of the episode – that Madeline is actually the sister of one of Tommy’s victims and is only posing as a conspirator in order to trap him. I like this because it plays off the usual twist of people being associated with former victims becoming sycophantically obsessed with their killer, and it also makes sense, given Tommy’s ego, that he’d fall for it.
While this helps in the long term, though, it doesn’t apprehend Tommy in the meanwhile, which leads us to a big flaming confrontation modeled around Dante’s Inferno, which is mostly what I was referring to when I said Murder in a Small Town Season 2, Episode 8 feels a little bit off-brand. What is this, Se7en? Karl rushing into a lair of flames and bodies in barrels – after giving Cass an obligatory “If anything happens, just know I love you” call, spare me – feels a bit too much.
This is the latest in a long list of chaotic incidents for Karl, including an officer-involved shooting that comes up again here. Laila continues to feel neglected, though; her girlfriend might consider her shooting someone slightly unconscionable, even in the line of duty, but this is wedged into the episode’s margins. The same can be said about the outcome of Sid’s car wreck. He survives, and his daughter thinks now would probably be a good time to start working on their relationship, but I fully expected this to yield much more drama rather than be something that just happens in the background of other stories.
And what’s Cassandra up to? Well, aside from worrying about Karl’s life due to his dramatic phone calls, she’s mostly still refusing to budge on the budget issue. This matter is made a little more complex due to two reasons. The first is the arrival of her mother, who is being treated by Mayor Christie for what she claims is nothing to worry about, but is definitely a serious illness, and the second is the sudden arrival of a bunch of leaked information from an anonymous source. So, Cass is not only wondering if her mother is dying – while smarting about her clearly having been dispatched by Christie to talk her out of her opposition to the budget – but also debating whether she can compromise on her ethics to get a political victory.
I don’t for a moment think she will. But maybe for the show’s sake, she should.
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