A Touch Of Panic
Episode 5 of Murder in a Small Town starts with Holly out with a new friend, Devon, from school. However as they walk home, they happen to be followed by a car on the road. Holly snaps a photo of the car before it turns off, spooked by the police car nearby.
Back home, Karl learns that someone was following them and becomes interested in chasing this up. He takes their eyewitness accounts, including a description of the car and the events of the afternoon. Karl tells the pair to remain vigilant, but Holly shrugs it off as nothing.
Meanwhile, Cass receives a visit from a guy called Gordon Murphy. He used to run a construction company, but as the pair talk, there’s definitely something off with him. He can’t remember certain projects he’s worked on, fumbles the years and goofs on the people he’s worked with. Cass catches him out and grows spooked, hurrying away. Unfortunately, she’s snatched up and kidnapped.
A subplot nestled in the midst of this episode stems from Andy Kendrick. He stops a woman called Genevieve by the side of the road and seems flirtatious and this woman makes a complaint to the station about it. Andy claims he was just being friendly and there was nothing untoward here, but Karl is not so sure. He turns this over to Edwina, who decides to follow up on it. Edwina speaks to Genevieve and calls her out for being racist, which is enough for her to drop the case.
Karl chases up where Cass may be, and finds her car door slightly ajar, the bracelet he gave her on the ground. Back at the station, he hurriedly makes a point of calling this out as a kidnapping, especially as he receives a picture of her tied up not long after.
So where is Cass being kept? Well, she tries to get through to Gordon, where we learn that he’s got cancer. Cass can relate, given her mum had it but the chemo helped clear her up. Unfortunately, Gordon has Stage 4 Cancer and the doctors missed it as they “couldn’t be bothered”. Why? Well, that’s because he’s in the prison.
It soon becomes clear that Karl has history with this guy, as he brings up the big city and uses Karl’s old catchphrase “what’s done is done” against him. This isn’t about Cassandra after all – it’s to do with Karl. Turns out this guy’s name is actually Paul Wheeler, not Gordon, and he was charged with assault, then killed an inmate behind bars which extended his sentence to 20 years. When doctors diagnosed him with terminal cancer, they let him go – and that was 3 weeks back.
Karl eventually rings and decides to enact a swap, choosing to sacrifice himself in order to save Cass. Obviously he’s told to go alone… but he’s not. He has the police hide in the woods, and after luring him out into the middle of an empty field, deicides against handing her over.
Cass manages to use the TV in the house to send an email across to the police department. She gives them a clue over her general whereabouts, including being in a cabin and the painting up on the wall. The numbers 11/20 are enough to help cross-reference the exact location so off they go. In the time she manages to send all of this, Wheeler doesn’t notice as he’s busy heating up food for her. Then Cass gets sloppy and checks the emails again… and is caught out for it.
A chase ensues on the road, eventually leading to Cass choking out Wheeler, who crashes the car into a tree. Cass is fine, albeit a bit beat up, and Karl eventually manages to arrest the guy.
Meanwhile, the complaint against Andy is dropped after the racism allegation, while Cass is traumatized by what happened to her, sobbing in the ambulance and struggling to compose herself.
The Episode Review
Another episode rolls round for Fox’s latest crime drama and while action-packed, it’s also pretty sloppy with its narrative beats. Sure, it’s exciting and action-packed but it also lends itself to some pretty big jumps in logic.
You’re telling me that Wheeler heated up a metal tin… in the microwave? On the hob? And in the couple of minutes tops it took to do that, Cass managed to use a fiddly remote to send an entire email – a long one at that – and input the right email address and close down the TV before Wheeler could spot her or even glance back in the other room?
As for the chase at the beginning of the episode, Holly and Devon could have just, y’know, ran sideways into the trees. We also get a completely pointless subplot about Andy whose behaviour could have been construed as being flirty. Instead, Edwina decides to play the race card to shut her up and honestly, I’m not sure who comes out of this worse off.
However, the idea of having a big city threat comes across into a small town is a good one and it works surprisingly well here to upset the balance of what Karl and Cass have built together. I’d imagine she’s going to be traumatized for a while over what’s happened, especially given the car crash and Wheeler’s threats.
This is easily the strongest part of the episode, and I do like that we could see shockwaves from this for the chapters ahead, allowing Cass’ character to grow and some solid acting to come into view.
The show is a mixed bag though, from what we’ve seen so far, and while many are going to like this week’s chapter, when it comes to the story, there are holes in the logic that are hard to overlook.
What did you guys think though? Did you enjoy this episode? Let us know in the comments below!
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Episode Rating
Did alberg’s wife die… or was she killed? Was this briefly touched on in first episode???
Love his shaggy hair, Peter Falk/Vincent D’onofrio like character but need a bit more tie up in future episodes. Girlfriend’s smile is worth every one!