Review AMC’s The Killing, Series Premiere

bill bodkin reviews the latest dramatic offering from AMC …

“The Killing is a show that is so good, you will be angry every time an episode ends.”

That’s the tagline AMC is giving their new crime drama.

Throughout the entire two-hour premiere, that phrase would pop into my head, and every time it did, I just laughed to myself. I didn’t feel there was anything special about the show. I’ve seen plenty of crime dramas in my day, and what made this one any different? Why should I invest a passionate emotion into a show that was for 115 minutes just so-so? I thought: “Angry? Yeah sure, I’m angry I wasting two hours on this show.”

Then, the last five minutes of the show aired.

These last five minutes absolved any sins the premiere had committed. These five minutes hooked me. I suddenly became interested. A major plot twist combined with an air of political intrigue and deceit were throw in like a proverbial monkey wrench that was tossed at 100 mph. All this revealed, and the show ends? Now I want to know who killed Rosie Larsen. Why must I wait until next week? The suspense is proverbially “killing” me. I am angry.

Well played AMC, well played.

After the final moments of the premiere, I was forced to re-examine the entire episode. See, what seems like your run-of-the-mill crime drama — something that seems very out of place for the creative bastion of television known as AMC — was actually a brilliant set-up. Besides laying the initial groundwork for the series, it also was the perfect set-up in terms of storytelling. It’s kind of like rope-a-dope for TV — we’re lulled into a false sense of television security, a “we’ve seen this before” attitude falls over you, then WHAM, you’re given the classic AMC creative blow.

That blow forces you to look back at everything and when you do you start to see the little hints and nods that The Killing is giving you about your main characters (not just the murder investigation) — the tough workaholic cop on the verge of retirement yet you know something from her past is haunting her Detective Sarah Linden (Mireille Enos) and her eventual replacement shady and sarcastic, maverick detective Stephen Holder (Joel Kinnaman). These two are the perfect odd couple of detectives, both with major character defects, both containing some inner secret (at least I think so) and yet both driven to solve the murder of Rosie Larsen. Then there’s the seemingly altruistic yet enigmatic and untrusting Councilman Richmond (Billy Campbell AKA The Rocketeer), the man who’s not only running for mayor of Seattle but also the man who’s political team’s car the dead girl was found in. It’s classic AMC — strong plot with even stronger and irresistibly engaging characters.

There are a lot of questions that have to be answered in The Killing, and if you don’t give it patience you will easily become frustrated. But trust us, AMC has done this before and brilliant with Mad Men and The Walking Dead. So if you’re in the mood for good drama and a plot that’ll make you think, give The Killing a shot.