Murder in a Small Town – Season 1 Episode 4 Recap & Review

Prized Possessions

Episode 4 of Murder in a Small Town begins with a man named Charlie waking up to find his wife Emma holding a gun up to his face. The camera cuts to outside the room and we hear a gunshot, bringing the next case to the town.

Karl and Cass have a little time together before this is brought up though, and Cass learns that Karl hasn’t told Holly (his daughter) that they’re seeing each other. Karl shrugs it off, claiming he’s waiting for the right time, but although Cass isn’t pressuring him, it’s clear she’s a little disappointed by this. Holly is a wild-child, and she’s recently been in trouble for smoking pot and sneaking out the house.

That night, at a fundraiser, Cass attends and sits at a table with a bunch of other women – including Emma. Cass drops her off back home, where Emma comments how Charlie is a workaholic. Cass drops her off, and a scream from inside brings the police to the scene of the crime.

When Karl shows, he finds Emma sweeping, in a state of shock, and demands she stop, given this is messing up the crime scene. Karl finds blood all over the office and it doesn’t look like anything is out the ordinary, given nothing has been disturbed.

Joined by Edwina, Karl hears her theory about an attacker and Charlie bleeding to death on the ground. Karl is not convinced though. There’s nothing personal in this office, and it looks more like it’s for show than anything else. Karl walk through the house and notices a family portrait above the bed which looks out of place, covering up bullet holes.

The security cameras have been cut to the house too, and there’s no blood anywhere other than the office. Karl deduces that they’re looking for at least 2 assailants if this really is murder.

During an interview, Emma mentions how the safe was open and stuff inside stolen, along with a tentative story about covering up the bullet holes with a picture as she sees this as a marriage memento. According to Emma, Charlie had no enemies and without a body, Emma is desperate for Karl to find him.

Emma has a habit of avoiding questions about difficult topics, according to Cass, and apparently Charlie had a habit of giving blood, something she conveniently didn’t tell Karl during their interview. Emma’s brother, Blake,  shows up and points out that he wasn’t a huge fan of Charlie. Blake worked at the firm with him and despite their differences, Emma loved him so he was family all the same.

Cass has also started to see cracks in Emma’s façade, and tells Karl as much that afternoon. Whether this is grief or guilt, we’ll have to wait and see. At Charlie’s office, they do their research and notice the office is very different to that at home. They also find a thumb-drive on the ground and, notably, no pictures of Emma. There is, however, a picture of him at a blood drive.

Karl shows up to give blood and realizes that, with a pint of blood taken from him, this could very easily be made to look like a murder without a body. And then, we see the truth.

Charlie is still alive, and he’s an accomplice alongside a nurse called Toni, whom he’s been having an affair with for a long time. Charlie felt stuck in a loveless marriage and loathed working for Blake. He wanted to live with his own life, so he faked his death, disappeared with his girlfriend, and spend the past six months embezzling funds from the company. All of which, kept on a thumbdrive.

However, karma comes back to bite Charlie when he realizes he’s picked up the wrong drive and needs to head back to the office. And Blake catches him red-handed. Toni shows and stabs Blake in the back, convincing Karl to kill Blake. And that’s precisely what they do.

Karl breaks the news to Emma that Blake may have been killed by her husband but Emma refuses to believe this. Now we contextualize that scene from the beginning of the episode. It turns out the gunshot was a warning as she wanted to stay with Charlie, despite him having an affair. That was six months back and since then, she’s been living under the pretext of keeping her marriage in check, despite it being in absolute tatters.

Emma shows up to see Charlie, and points a gun at him, believing this is a point of no return. Karl arrives though and manages to talk her down, avoiding more bloodshed. It works, and both Charlie and Toni are arrested for their part to play in all this.

Edwina is encouraged to do the interviews, which is Karl’s way of praising her deduction skills, while he heads home and speaks to Holly. He admits that he’s a workaholic and needs to be bang n these cases but similarly will never run out on her. He also tells her that it’s okay to run away, given everyone feels this way sometimes, and breaks the news about him seeing Cass. He apologizes for messing up and the pair get back on level terms again. He also decides Holly should meet Cass too.


The Episode Review

There really is a lot going on in this town isn’t there? This week we get a nice twist on what appears to be a simple murder case, only to find out that Emma was the victim (kinda) all along. I mean, the woman is clearly possessive and threatening your husband with a gun when he wants to leave, and that’s all kinds of red flags.

Meanwhile, we have Charlie, who’s not a nice guy either. He’s been embezzling funds and having an affair on Emma for a long time, so he absolutely deserves to spend a long time behind bars. Lets just hope Emma gets the help she needs to move through this and grow in her life.

The framing of the “murder” and the way this is unveiled toward the end is a really nice touch and testament to the editors that they were able to do this without giving away the truth until late on in the run-time.

This reframes everything we saw beforehand, and we get a proper thriller. Although Toni and Charlie constantly calling each other “babe” probably deserves jail time for being so annoying on its own.

The writing is okay here, and the show is starting to find its footing after a pretty poor pilot and average follow-up chapter. It’s far from perfect but there’s definitely potential with this one. Which means that – given Fox’s track-record – we can expect this one to be cancelled.

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1 thought on “Murder in a Small Town – Season 1 Episode 4 Recap & Review”

  1. I really enjoy this show and think your take is spot on. I came here for more clarification on why the lead apologized to his daughter at the end, was it just because him hiding his gf and neglecting her since she’s come home or does it have anything to do with why he divorced her mother?

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