Prodigal Son 1.3: Fear Responseby Wolfen MoondaughterReviews may contain information that could be considered 'spoilers'. Readers should proceed at their own risk. Network
Credits Grade: 8 Malcolm and company investigate the murder of a professor of psychology -- a murder involving a lobotomy, LSD, and the handwritten ravings of a mentally disturbed person seeking vengeance for illicit experiments. Meanwhile, his mother Jessica is adamant that Malcolm cease visiting Whitly.Again the case was kind of weak, with getting to know this killer even less than in the previous two, the focus instead on someone involved with the case -- which is fine by me. There are some eye-rolling fantastical elements in this ep too, but one is at least fun, if absurd. The other seems unnecessary, save for being theatrical; granted, it does offer an explanation as to why the killer would be familiar with a location, but that could have easily been explained by more believable means -- and with a potentially revealing statement still being made without the unbelievable part. But as I've said before, the mystery is really just a vehicle for exploring Malcom's mental state and relationships anyway, which it does well. This episode also sheds quite a bit of light on Jessica, making me rethink any sympathy I had for her, at least for now -- especially after a bombshell delivered at the end! And there was focus on developing Malcolm's relationship with JT (insights were given, but progress between them wasn't really made -- which is fine, just an observation). And Malcolm and Edrisa's geeky-awkward interactions managed to dial back the cringeyness of her being a Ditzy Genius, / Lovable Nerd trope. (The awkwardness and flirtation were still there, mind, just not painfully so; she seemed more like a person than a caricature this time.) The show was lacking in the comfort side of hurt-comfort, but I still enjoyed the half we got, (twisted soul that I am). Spoilers now, as I talk specifics. Still with me? Okayl Gil, how could Edrisa know cause of death if she hadn't even opened up the guy's shirt (and thus found the note) yet? Hell, even what seems like cause of death can't really be confirmed before an autopsy! I did love the nod to the show Kojak with the lollipops, though. Once again, Malcom makes a leap that didn't seem based in reality. What about this case suggested that the killer was specifically causation? (They had this same problem in the first episode, really.) The ethnicity wasn't even all that necessary for finding the killer; the other details about the decline in grades and hygiene should have been sufficient! As for the gender, I guess maybe the handwriting would suggest male, but I wouldn't call that reliable enough conjecture to narrow the suspect pool with. The mask image in the letters was not well-played. For one, I have a very hard time believing that Malcolm mentally put together the same image without ever having oriented the papers that way (going in different directions and overlapping) before. They should have had him work that out in front of us earlier in the ep, and then flashed back to it when he saw the mask in real life. For another, he talked about how the letters showed Dominic's mental deterioration, so that suggests they weren't all written at the same time! So why would they have lines that, together, form a completed image? (Unless those pages were only the ones found on the body, and not including the others pages ....) Lastly, it wasn't imperative that we know Dominic had been there before -- being Elaine's student, that was a distinct possibility -- but if they really felt we needed to know this, it could have come up naturally in conversation. Malcolm could have remarked on the masks, and she could have remarked on Dominics' interest in them, then given us the line about the psychology of them (which didn't really add all that much insight anyway). I'm curious about Malcom's actions on the rooftop. At first, he was protective of Mitchell, as we have often seen him be of those who would be killers. But then he threw Mitchell -- who was as much a victim as a potential killer in that moment -- off the roof, similar to how he cut off Nico's hand. And when Dani asked if he knew the ledge was there to break the man's fall, the way he said "sure", seemed like a lie. Thing is, I don't think he realised just how close to the edge they were when he freed himself from Mitchell's grip, so I'm not sure the fall was intentional -- but he did seem to get an adrenaline rush off it, all the same. During moments of stress, is he having some kind of psychotic break that flips him from pacifism to violence? Does the fact that he's being violent with victims while gentle with killers mean anything -- does he relate to the crimes? Is the violence an extension of his desire to punish himself for betraying his father? I'm intrigued to see how this plays out. I'm also intrigued by the fact that he's still seeing his childhood psychologist. Note how he sat on the chair with his legs crossed. With his childhood having imploded, between Gil and this therapist, he seems intent on seeking the spaces that made him feel safer in his youth. Is he regressing because he was denied a real childhood? Because he's so lost, he wants an adult to make his choices for him? Adults who proved more reliable than either parent? Malcom accidentally flinging himself out the window in his sleep was pretty over-the-top -- I highly doubt he could have flung himself from a probe position with enough force to actually go through a window (especially one that wasn't a solid sheet of glass, but rather a series of panes. All I can figure is, maybe it was so old the wood was super-rotted). But I can't deny it was thrilling! It made me wish Dani or Gil had been there, to be worried for him and offer the comfort side of things, but this scene served well to us how awful a mother Jessica is. Sure, she asked if he was okay, but then she immediately went to angry while he was still handing there from the window. She didn't hug him (that we saw) or attempt to sooth him. At first, I thought this was meant to contrast how loving she had seemed in the flashback in the previous episode, to highlight how she's turned cold thanks to her world falling apart. Another flashback, one between her and Whitly, seemed, at first, to reinforce that, when she seemed like she still loved him, but steeled herself to tell him goodbye. His reply to her that she had to always have known about his needs, and turned a blind eye to his activities so they could be happy together, was a fantastic demonstration of how a narcissist gaslights a person, making them question their own actions / motives / thought -processes. But while I have no doubt that there was some of that aspect there, Malcolm's memory showed us that she had indeed known, at least to some degree, that her husband was into some dark stuff. (Sidenote: They took the effort to inform us that memory is connected to scent, and how chloroform has a unique scent ... so why did Malcolm instead remember a scenario that didn't involve the chloroform?) It seems like she knew about the woman in the box, but we can't know for sure yet; we also don’t know she knew or even just suspected her husband was doing something before Malcolm discovered the woman, or didn’t learn whatever had frightened her until after. Even if she didn't know anything beyond a vague notion of darkness, she strikes me as being a narcissist herself, caring more about how her children (and husband) reflect on her than about their actual well-being, and treating her children like she's some benefactor they must repay in some fashion with obedience, rather than as a mother encouraging them to find the oath that makes them happy. She rails about how Whitly took everything from her, and begs him not to take Malcolm too -- like Malcolm was an item in a divorce settlement. She talks about sacrifices she made -- were the women Whitly killed part of that? Did she sacrifice human decency? Did she ever even have any? I'm all the more keen on the next ep, after that end revelation! Written: October 9, 2019
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