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Oh, hey, did you guys watch the two-hour series premiere of The Killing on AMC last night? It was…OK? The Killing is based on a Danish TV series, I guess, called The Crime. Which is a really good name for a show. The Crime. They should have just called it The Crime! Anyway, The Killing is about, well, a killing. No duh. A 17-year-old girl, Rosie Larsen, goes missing but then she is found dead in the trunk of a car and there is all kinds of intrigue. Like, the dad was out camping the night she disappeared? Huh! And the car that the girl was found in belonged to the campaign of a councilman who is trying to oust the current mayor of Seattle. Interesting! And then there is this real shit-faced looking rich kid who has a GORGEOUS house on the Puget Sound and used to “stick it to” the dead girl but isn’t “sticking it to her” anymore but he is suspicious and his dad is rich so maybe his dad is suspicious too. Meanwhile, the lead detective on the case is just one day away from her retirement (LOL), by which I mean one day away from moving to California with her young son and her lover to start a new life. Will she stay to solve this mystery? Probably not. I bet the next episode starts at her wedding and she turns to her husband and says “Who cares about that dead girl, let’s eat cake,” and then the rest of the show is about her eating that yummy cake! Meanwhile, there is a new detective in town who has solved the case of Who Has a Rat Face! (SPOILER ALERT: he does.)
As someone who loves a good mystery, and is very into smelling what AMC has been cooking lately, this show intrigues me, but I did have a few problems with it. For example:
Why is everything so Scandinavian? Like, if you’re going to Americanize a show from Denmark, you might as well Americanize it? Otherwise, just slap some subtitles on the original, which is probably what you should have done in the first place. Instead, AMC’s version of The Killing feels weird and vaguely European in an indeterminate way that is hard to put your finger on. The lead actor is Swedish, so that might have something to do with it? But even the way, like, the BUILDINGS look is through some kind of translator. It’s weird!
Also: why is the sound so muddy? This show was actually HARD to watch, and not because of the subject matter. It was nearly impossible to hear what anyone was saying! I’m not sure what the problem was. It’s 2011. We created PHOTO-REALISTIC DINOSAURS for the Jurassic Park movies almost 20 years ago, surely we can get some high quality audio up in this show. (Similarly, the framing of a lot of the shots was just…a little…off. It was kind of like in Batman Begins when all of the fight sequences were filmed so close up that you couldn’t tell what was actually happening and it gave you a headache. Like that, except a subtle and moody police procedural.)
“You my ride, Linda.” Argh. Let’s just move on.
There were a couple of details that rubbed me the wrong way, too. Like, in the opening of the episode, the lead detective, Linda, is called to investigate a crime scene in some kind of abandoned steel mill or something. So she is going through this thing alone in the dark with a flashlight, following a blood trail which leads her all the way to her SURPRISE going away party. Sure, except before she got to the going away party, I was like, hey, hold on a second, if the police have secured the scene, then they should put some floodlights in there! Why is she walking around in the dark, mussing up an active crime scene? That’s just shoddy police work!
Similarly, when the councilman is going around from door-to-door campaigning, there isn’t a single leaf on any of the trees. But elections take place at the beginning of November. There would probably be one or two leaves, you know? I thought for a second that maybe it was a special election, in which case it could be any time, really, but it isn’t a special election because he’s trying to unseat the incumbent governor. Look, I’m just saying. A good murder mystery is ALL ABOUT THE DETAILS. Isn’t that right, Laura Palmer?
Oh, and in the “this season on The Killing” sizzle reel, the title card said “Every Hour Counts,” but is that really true? I mean, the pilot episode covered a few days already, and “this season on” implies that there there are going to be MULTIPLE SEASONS, so I’m sure every hour counts but also not really. Maybe if Rosie was still missing, but she’s dead. We can relax! Take our time! Let’s solve this mystery, but let’s not lose ourselves in the process, you know? Life is for the living!
Anyway: I don’t know. I’m definitely going to watch next week. I’m curious to see where this goes! But I was also not blown away. The battle for My Favorite New Show Of The Season is still any show’s for the taking. I’m looking at you, GAME OF THRONES. Right, nerds?
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I like to call the kid that used to “stick it to” Rosie Larsen “Edward Cullen.”
That can’t be his name, because Edward Cullen doesn’t stick it to ANYBODY.
Every related video being from The Pick Up Artist is the best thing ever
Oh, Mystery.
Are we supposed to be pretending like that lead detective lady isn’t a big lesbian?
Also, is this show SUPPOSED to be the lovechild of Twin Peaks, The Wire, and the movie Seven?
How big is she?
I didn’t watch The Killing last night, but I did watch that 15 minute preview for Game of Thrones, and oh boy do I have a nerd boner.
I don’t know much about the whole Game of Thrones thing, but I do know that Sean Bean’s character is pretty much just going to be Boromir in my mind.
So, confession time–I’ve read all the Song of Fire and Ice Books and am a HUGE dork (George RR Martin fan)…my husband and I don’t have HBO right now because in addition to being nerds we are also poor (contrary to popular belief, we don’t all “make it” in the world of I/T–some of us end up basement “offices” looking for our red staplers, it’s called reality, look it up!) but we are going to put all the savings from the non-nerd activities that we do not engage in (vacations at Sandals resorts/ weightlifting/ rehab) into the emergency “Get HBO” nerd fund just so we can watch this series!!
So yeah, basically all that to say, Sean Bean may be typecast for life, but, hey, if it ain’t broke, something something nerd town!
If you can’t afford it, there are always, ahem, resources online to, ahem, acquire it…. scruples be damned!
So does anyone think that all the blood on in the basement of the high school is just a Halloween prank? I mean if you were going to murder someone in a basement where all these kids apparently hang out, wouldn’t you at least try to clean up the murder scene?!
Maybe they were all reading The Red Tent in Honors English and it’s where “all the girls go to bleed LOL High Skool Yay!”
That’s what janitors are for, a-derr. My tax dollars aren’t paying them to sit around while somebody else cleans up the blood in the high school basement!
So it’s basically Scandinavian Veronica Mars? But without all the Harry Hamlin and little girl from Waterworld? Got it.
Now I’m picturing a Scandinavian Kristen Bell and I just died from the cuteness
I saw that was on last night but thought it was this
Which I would have watched if not for the fact that I have seen it a ton
and I went out to take pictures.
Taking pictures, huh? That’s an interesting development.
Hey man talk to Someone from chat they can confirm my alibi.
Your sparkling word play is lost on a generation of digital photogs.
This would have been better if they fixed the sound, picked up the pacing, made it take place in the 1960′s, in NYC, at an advertising agency, made the lead character a male in his late 30′s that kinda looks like Superman and had a lawnmower run over a guys foot.
Other than that, an enjoyable two hours.
Oh! I almost forgot. And cast a busty sassy awesome redhead as a secretary somewhere. I know someone who’s not working until March 2012….
Her????
Related: Has anyone heard the rumors that BBC is supposed to do a UK version of Mad Men with none other than Dominic “McNulty” West as the lead? Thoughts? Confirmations? Expletives?
M25 Men
Thank you for reminding me Jurassic Park came out 18 years ago. That T-Rex is probably dead from natural causes by now.
The first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie is old enough to drink now. Just think about that.
why would they assign the case to the woman who retires the next day? did her boss think she would solve the case in one day? unrealistic!
It’s one of my most despised entertainment tropes. It was in Battle:LA too. What is it supposed to
instill in us, that the main character doesn’t care or what? Or that the job they were ready to give
up is what they are meant to do and they have some sort of realization of that fact? GUH!
I dunno. I got that sense from it initially, but now I’m thinking the police chief just didn’t want to lose her yet. I mean he kept coming in telling her these sob stories of the girl and the family on purpose. Also, the new guy looks completely incompetent from afar that it would be reasonable for a fellow-mother to reconsider investigating the murder of an innocent young girl.
BUT, i did think it was gimmicky that they kept giving her these Don Draper moments, where they close up on her face and she has a moment of Creative/Detective genius. We can’t ALL be Don Draper, hunny.
I don’t get the feeling she’s a Draper type. Like, yeah, Linden can get really into the details and put facts together others might miss, but she’s shit when it comes to dealing with certain kinds of people – take the “interrogation” of Fake Robert Pattinson, the questioning of the high school kids about the dance, and her relationship with her kid as examples. She’s out of touch.
That’s why they gave her the street smart, former-undercover officer as a partner. The show needs that balance.
Ummmm I’m pretty sure that if my boss came up to me the day before my retirement and was like “Here’s an impossible case to solve that may take anywhere between 6 and 8 months to finish,” I’d most likely be like “PEACE I’M OUTTA HERE.” Don’t you think that working somewhere for decades until you retire is proof enough that it’s what you wanted to do with your life?
To be fair (and I do like to be fair, because I am almost a Libra. Just, like, two astrological signs away) when the boss initially assigned it to her, it was just a sweater in a field. Then she tries to dump it on sex crimes, but her partner’s all “I love bloody sweaters, they’re my fave.” so they stick with it a little. Then it becomes a full on dead teenager in a councilman’s trunk, and there’s no way you leave that to the sketchy guy with the untrimmed moos-tache, so the boss forces her to stay on, because men don’t have any idea how hard it is to plan a wedding.
I’m not sure what it adds to the story exactly, except that it gives the cop a slightly different perspective. She’s not just showing up to work every day as she normally would, she’s actively trying to leave. But then, maybe she’s not trying actively enough, because she has cold feet and her son’s way too old for bouncy houses and she’s real po-lice.
What I wonder is if she’s going to get paid to only work on this case. Wouldn’t most detectives have multiple cases going on at once?
“True that yo”, to all of you guys.
On an honest note, I just want to reiterate what others have already said about this site: I’m really glad we can all make a conversation out of all of this, as opposed to just spewing absurdities -”"Are you stupid!??!?!!? it’s obviously this and this and this and not anything what you said, asshole”". I mean, really take a look at some of the comments on Yahoo articles or youtube videos. This place is double-chocolaty heaven in comparison.
…i’ve commented way too much on this post. Sorry.
[SPOILER ALERT]
I was kind of digging the whole “is the new detective really a pedophile and a jerk (Also worth considering: A pedophile looking for a jerk [sorry])??” moment in the second part. I mean this guy looks too much like a pedophile
“You my ride, Linda”
He’s FAKE creepy, I think. Like… there’s a method to the creepiness LET’S HOPE! He found that murder basement, so there’s that!
he reminds me of Gareth on the BBC version of The Office
Why was the cracked out looking detective doing everything in the rain?
You are eating a hamburger in the rain? Gross soggy bread.
Her name is Linden. Sarah Linden. Not Linda.
Sorry lindawashington.
It was fine but I had two major problems with The Killing: Rosie’s mom and Rosie’s Dad.
Like, was it necessary to show us that they’re so in luv by having them wrestle and weirdly make out all the time? That only showed me that they’re creeps who are gross. Also, it was totally normal that they basically tried to keep the news that Rosie died a secret from their other two kids. Because kids are dumb! They don’t know how many siblings they have! Just tell them Rosie went to doggie heaven and get on with your PDAs. Ugh.
Kids, Rosie went to live on an avacado farm upstate.
Those kids actually were too young to hear about how Rosie dabbled in auto-erotic asphyxiation.
Wait a minute…AVOCADOS CAN’T GROW IN THAT CLIMATE!!!!!
Yeah, how old were these kids? Looked like 8 at the youngest? You can tell them their sister, you know, died. This “sis sis is in heaven” crap was weird. And why do this at the beach?
Well, they didn’t want to go home because the cops were there going through all their stuff. And then the one kid asked, and they decided it was time.
I actually liked the stuff with the parents, and thought the actors were great. Establishing them as a lovey-dovey couple mattered because you know this is going to take a toll on the relationship, and we only had a few scenes in which to get the sense that, pre-death, they were a happy, functional couple with a really shitty dishwasher.
And, what’s the perfect time to tell your young kids that their sister is dead? I mean, it’s easy to say “right away,” but I know I’d be thinking, well, maybe I should let them have one more normal day, maybe they should get to go to school once more thinking everything’s all right. Obviously you want to wait until after you identify the body in case it’s not her, and by then they’re asleep, and then you don’t want to wake them up with that news…it could easily get drawn out. That made sense to me.
I think the reason for that was Linden’s insistence that the news be kept private for 48 hours. They probably felt it would be easier to do that by keeping it from their kids for the next day.
One of those kids seems to be a lot smarter than the other.
the whole explaining death to children scene was nauseating, like the scene in jurassic park where laura dern rebukes the old scientist guy about the flea circus while they eat ice cream and cry, you remember that scene? dumb!
Gabe, don’t even get me started on Game of Thrones. (13 days and counting)
Aside from Detective Two’s distracting rat face, I had no problems with this show at all. I’m hooked, I think!
I thought it was an alright show but had the same problems Gabe did, especially about that surprise party thing. I don’t know how they can make a compelling plot out of a season of this, if the first two episodes were anything to go off of. The only character I found especially compelling was ratfaced partner and he was irritating to watch.
Here’s what I like about this show: it’s better than The Walking Dead.
That’s what this pilot wants you to think!
As any pilot should. I’ll keep watching and hoping this one doesn’t slip into Walking Dead’s sluggish torpor (get it?).
Walking Dead is the walking dead.
The new rat-faced Hood Detective looks like Garreth from the original Office. I was hoping he’d start yelling “Oggi Oggi Oggi…”
OMG the similarities are uncanny!
oh whoops I plagiarized your comment above don’t sue me
R.I.P. Kathy Marquart
*Jodeen
The inconsistent seasons always bother me, and they happen in a ton of movies and shows, glad I’m not the only one.
The best is shows where it’s always fall. Like Gilmore Girls (and most other old WB classics). Sure they throw in an obligatory winter and summer episode or two. But except for those two IT IS ALWAYS FALL IN STARTS HOLLOW/DAWSONS CREEK/THE HALLIWELL MANOR.
Any non-federal elections can be held on a day that the state/city/municipal government chooses, so you will have many city council elections in the Spring, for example. It could also be a primary.
I thought it was good. There were some stylistic question-marks, but I thought the plot held together quite nicely. So far…
Others have explained it well, but they dumped a crime scene (not a murder) on her. She decided to stay because, I think, it was a big case and she became intellectually if not emotionally invested in it.
Fun fact: the actress who plays Linden (not Linda) is married to Cameron from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.
So lucky. I’d let him crash my sports car through a glass garage, if you know what I mean.
I appreciated how, in the spirit of recreating the Danishness of it all they made the people of Seattle look aggressively plain and highlighted our excessively pale complexions and made everything hellaciously gloomy and the sound muddled as if they were producing this on a state budget. Like, I’m sure that these actors are nice looking in real life, but they really put all of that dinosaur technology to work making them look as unattractive as actorly possible! And all of the downpours and the almost humorous contrasts between the ultra working class Larsen family and the technosplendor of the rich kid’s older-lady den on Mercer Island. And wtf was the opening scene’s Montauk Monster?
Still, I will watch again.
“You my ride, Linda.” is the new “You’re my boy, Blue!” #linesfromgrownchildren
Anyone else really like the (admittedly absurd) scene when Holder gets crucial information from two high school girls by showing them how to smoke pot and pretending like he wants to “stick it to them” (sorry)? Kind of gross and uncomfortable, yes, but I thought that was a great scene.
“That was some sick weed. I’m totally stoned.”
it was a bit boring and confusing. the parents of the dead girl are annoying with their “we love each other so much! even tho we’ve been married 38 years, we still fuck like teens !” dude is a mover, but goes home to bone his wife after taping up the broken sink? no wonder the movers give you 5 hour blocks for when they’ll show up. the parents obviously don’t care about their kids cus who the hell was that chick with the sons all the time? the mom didn’t even feed em! and the bit with her not trying to call the daughter all weekend or even seeming to care to know where she is? “oh my phone was out of range” yah, but that was when you were camping. here you are now, on the weekday, and you’re daughter isn’t in school. just the whole way the missing girl thing goes down. is she missing? nah, yah? maybe? what the fuck? the first ep only represented one day tho. the series starts out saying day one, and each episode is supposed to take place during one day. like 24. so that’s why it sucks.
but whatever, let’s just make fun of everything and then die.
The Danish version was really great and compelling and I became quite obsessed with it by the end but all the comments here could easily have applied to it.
Not bothering to watch because the original was good and in a way that relied heavily on the setting and culture of Sweden. A straight translation, which seems is the case here, would just seem cheap and a bit off..essentially an ‘our people are too spoiled to watch a well written series because it requires subtitles’ remake. All the things coming across weird in the comments not only work in the original, but are important to the 3 main plot lines (for me anyway, the grieving couple was particularly compelling). American TV also isn’t nearly as slow as the original pacing, I imagine they’ve shortened it up a bit.
By weird and vaguely European, I take it you mean “Canadian.” I mean, the buildings looked normal to me, but I live in Canada, where this is very clearly filmed, so I don’t need a translator, eh?
Maybe it’s because it was filmed in Vancouver that it reminds me very much of early episodes of the X-Files, mood-wise. Also, pale, red-headed law enforcement type who must hide her pregnancy with windbreakers-wise.
Frankly, I could use a good replacement for the X-Files in my life. Looks like this is it.
Tanis, I want you to know I love you.