Let me get one thing straight before I talk about the finale (and inevitably... about the show overall). I am not a writer. I probably will never be a writer. I don't have the talent or the skills to be paid to write like the pros in the industry. I mean... I'm a machine that is built for observation... no more no less. With that said... that doesn't necessarily mean that I have to be complacent as an audience. If there is something that I personally feel is poorly executed, I won't shy away from expressing it just because I probably can't do better.
Complacency on both the artist's and the audience's part will never develop art in any form period. Actually complacency has never developed anything in anything ever. Just look at the guys at Aperture Science. Do you think they'd be the massive scientific juggernaut they are now if they were complacent in just creating shower curtains? Absolutely not. And now we can bend space and time itself thanks to some ambition.
So when I complain about The Killing, I'm not actually trying to put the people involved in the production down. Any creative endeavor is a massive commitment and takes a lot of guts, will-power, and talent to see through. That said, the difficulty of the process shouldn't excuse any lapses in quality in the result. Again... complacency doesn't develop anything.
So let's get down to the finale. To be frank, the series suck. Season 3 didn't become irritatingly bad like Season 1. But the basic core problems did rear itself again towards the final half of the season. The first thing to note is just how it's developed as a mystery. Cheap paperback airport mystery novels generally have a bad reputation due to the story being written in such a procedural way that it doesn't allow the readers to dig into the mystery themselves. The Killing is basically the same thing.
The best mystery stories are ones where the clues connect to an inevitable end. In other words, a good mystery story is obtuse in experience but obvious in retrospect. There's some exceptions to this, but generally speaking mysteries need to avoid seeming like the writer pulled contrivances and conveniences willy-nilly.
The Killing as a show is basically this episode after episode:
Linden and Holder chase after a suspect that looks better and better for the crime as they find clues. The show takes a break from this to either explore a B plotline or to have character scenes with Linden and Holder. Just when all the clues seem to perfectly accuse the episode's suspect, suddenly there's either a plot twist or a sudden new clue that points to a different suspect. Repeat.
There... I just saved you time from watching Season 1 and Season 3. This is basically exactly how the show is formatted. Also notice that the show doesn't necessarily weave in character development during the clue searches. Often times the show will literally halt progress to explore character or navel-gaze before starting again. This is something you'd expect from a cheap airport paperback mystery. Not TV and definitely not AMC. Don't get me wrong. Not all mysteries need to be ingeniously enigmatic. I recently have watched BBC's The Bletchley Circle and Whitechapel and those weren't exactly "masterpiece" puzzles. But at minimum, a mystery show should develop a logical mystery that is possible to predict without being predictable (sounds like a contradiction but really it shouldn't if you understand when and how to reveal information to the audience) interwoven with
competent treatment of characters is all I ask and honestly I don't
think that's too much at all
Surprisingly, a lot of shows fall below that mark. You'd figure that those who write mysteries as a career would understand the theories behind what makes a good mystery story (or at least "efficient"). Maybe that's just the academic in me but I've always believed that critical analysis can help develop art and aren't just mere snobby stuffy people complaining.
But back to The Killing, the way the show is written isn't even remotely possible to predict. The show is pretty rampant with false or misleading information; which is generally fine in moderation. But The Killing is basically all misinformation. There's no real intrigue here, you're really just waiting for the show to tell you when it's lying to you. So the way the story is written as a result is less like a mystery and more like a duck duck goose game.
It seems to have to go through almost all of its cast as a "prime
suspect" in each episode before it ends and decides arbitrarily on who
the real killer is. Again, that's how poorly written mysteries are put
together.
Also, it's funny how the prison plot line was literally there for no other reason than to serve as a character catalyst. I've said this before in previous view logs and I'll say it again here because it needs to be repeated... if that's all your B plotline is going to do... don't spend so much time on it. In fact it probably shouldn't be a B plotline at all. There was no twist with the prison. Seward's death doesn't mean much (again, beyond being Linden's catalyst for further emotional damage), and the prison guard characters don't really develop all that much. Was there really a point to any of them? It just feels like padding at the end of the show and makes it overly drawn out.
Sooooooo you turned out to be pointless to the story...
Finally, the ending is a straight rip from Se7en... except without the kidnapped victim actually being dead. It's almost literally the same type of resolution scene as Se7en and it didn't even execute it as well. The final dialogue between Linden and the actual killer in the car ride is just... lackluster. The writer(s) tried to be smart there but nothing was really achieved or explored. All that was there was an obvious exchange between an emotional but moral protagonist against a cold and calculated monster killer... I didn't learn anything more from these characters except that the cold killer had a misguided mission and the protagonist's "good side" could only be pushed so far before becoming destructive... you know... sorta like Se7en...
Looks... familiar?... Seriously just watch this movie over the show...
In the end, The Killing is a show that tries too hard. I have no idea if the writers overstretched their talent or if there were production issues that muddled the script and story. Could be both actually... but the actual result is far from satisfactory. So with all due respect AMC, this show sucks. Mood and atmosphere alone can't carry a story. Especially in TV.
Rating:
The crime mysteries in this show aren't anything that interesting and the historical inaccuracies (particularly how efficient the forensic police work is...) limit the show in some ways. But the writers handle their characters with cleverness and respect and the overall experience improves greatly from it.
