Paul Levinson's Infinite Regress

reviewing 3 Body Problem; American Rust; Bosch: Legacy; Citadel; Curb Your Enthusiasm; Fauda; For All Mankind; Foundation; Hijack; House of the Dragon; Luther; Outer Range; Outlander; Reacher; Severance; Silo; Slow Horses; Star Trek: Strange New Worlds; Surface; The: Ark, Diplomat, Last of Us, Lazarus Project, Orville, Way Home; Tokyo Vice; True Detective; You +books, films, music, podcasts, politics

George Santayana had irrational faith in reason - I have irrational faith in TV.

Friday, August 8, 2014

The Killing Season 4: Masterpiece Finale

I just saw the final season of The Killing on Netflix - all six episodes of Season 4 - and it is a masterpiece.

Not because of the new murder story, which was excellent in its own right, with all kinds of brutal twists and turns. With a much shorter arc than the earlier murders in this series, this one - about a family execution with only the son surviving - had to be tighter, and it was.

But the part of season 4 of The Killing which will make it, and the whole series, something which will be watched and remembered through the ages was the Linden and Holder story. Part of that is the continuation of the Skinner story from Season 3. But the even more important part is the toll that takes on Linden and Holder, and the aftermath. Don't worry, I won't give anything specific away. But if you'd rather not get any inkling that even a generality can give, don't read any further.

First and foremost, the ending was something I often want to see in a television series, but never do, because most television is afraid to deal with the realities of human nature, ugly, beautiful, destructive, redeeming, and all together. The final season shows Linden and Holder at their best and worst. They support each other magnificently when one or the other is down, and they turn on each other like nearly rabid dogs when the going gets impossibly tough. They're both deeply flawed but brilliant. And the kicker is they're brilliant not only as detectives, but in their understanding of human relationships, often occluded but always on the verge of breaking through.

The last 10 minutes of the very last episode are like nothing I've ever seen on television - hell, that's true of the last 50 or more minutes, but the last ten are something else. If you think you'll know how this is going to end, I promise that you don't, unless you have even more sensitivity than Linden and Holder in their best moments.