Let’s not beat around the bush here, okay?
This whole season has built toward a central mystery: The Ferryman, a deadly and elusive supervillain determined to destroy Angelo, leaving a trail of bodies behind.
In Memory of a Killer Season 1 Episode 8, the big bad’s identity was revealed! And it was a shocking surprise that raised even more questions.
I’m not going to bury the lede here, because the most important part of this hour was the closing seconds, which seemingly revealed that FBI Agent Linda Grant is moonlighting as the season’s antagonist, hellbent on destroying Angelo from the inside out.
This episode felt odd because I was often confused about what was happening throughout most of it.
All of a sudden, we got more information about Maria and Dave’s past relationship than we’d ever gotten in the last 7 episodes combined. Then you had Angelo randomly in a grief group with the wife of a man he killed, and Grant was back looking after a little girl we’d never met before.
The show’s constant influx of random facts and scattered lore makes it difficult to follow the main narrative, weakening cohesion and undermining investment in the characters.
Why did it take so long to reveal that Maria and Dave were childhood sweethearts? Sharing this earlier would have given greater insight into their dynamic.
We’ll circle back to Maria and Dave and that subplot later.
Let’s talk about Grant first, because since her arrival on Memory of a Killer Season 1 Episode 2, she’s been onto Angelo in a way that no one else ever seems to be. But I chalked that up to her being a Fed and the fact that she was looking at everyone as a suspect.
She had Angelo clocked at every turn, and it was kind of brilliant because no one thought twice about her because she was in a position of power. If anything, I assumed she’d be the one to finally put it all together, and Angelo would have a choice to make about whether or not he was willing to kill an “innocent” to protect his secrets.
But alas, while Grant’s a Fed, sure, she’s a mother and grandmother first.
The reveal that Dr. Parks was her son floored me, and I genuinely did not figure it out until they panned down to his grave.
Again, I was wondering why the hell we were spending so much time on Grant and this little girl, who’d clearly been traumatized by something in her past. It wasn’t remotely clear what their connection was until Grant started talking about lightness and darkness and the little girl’s father.
Even then, I had to actually see the name, and I gasped when I saw it because, huh?
So, Agent Grant’s son was brutally murdered, and she apparently solved the case years ago, if The Ferryman’s actions are any indication.
But if you accept Grant as the villain, you have to start putting a timeline together.
Parks was killed two years ago, before Leah’s death. Knowing The Ferryman wants Angelo to suffer and has a connection to Earl, should we believe Grant arranged for Leah’s death and patiently waited to ruin Angelo’s life?
Or maybe Leah’s death was unrelated, and Grant is now using Earl in her Saw-like revenge plan?
A person who sanctions a kill shot on a pregnant woman and hopes to completely mess with a man suffering from early-onset Alzheimer’s disease is probably capable of anything, so I’m going to operate under the assumption that every single bad thing that has happened to Angelo stems from Parks’ death.
If that’s true, what is Grant waiting for? Making someone suffer is one thing, but if this plot spans two years, why is it so drawn out?
Now, you could say that she only recently put everything together, but I’m not sure that tracks.
What’s made The Ferryman so dangerous is how far ahead they seem to be of Angelo, and now it’s very safe to assume Grant has been watching and plotting for a very long time.
She, or someone, has likely been following Angelo, which would explain Nicky’s involvement. Someone sees them going home together, Nicky’s whole life is investigated, her weakness is exploited, and now she’s doing Grant’s dirty work.
The Ferryman has a wide network, so I’m curious how much the show will explore how everything works and who is working underneath her. It has always sounded like a scenario where she’s some kind of hidden figurehead, but how does someone amass that kind of power?
The Ferryman is both feared and respected, but what happened over the past two years for her to gain all this power? I know this series is allergic to giving us information, but we need it here because everything’s not adding up.
Another unclear point is where Gilchrist fits. Parks’ widow told Angelo how helpful Gilchrist was after Parks’ death, while Parks had immediately suspected Gilchrist of setting him up.
Might that be how Angelo is able to divert attention away from himself when he inevitably discovers who Grant really is?
There’s SO much we still need to get into (like why hasn’t Dutch played into Grant’s plans thus far?), and with only two hours left in Memory of a Killer Season 1, I’m nervous that we won’t get all the answers we need.
I would have loved even more exploration of Grant in this hour instead of the Joe side plot, because as much as I do like Joe as a character, I can also admit that the series has no idea what to do with him half the time.
He’s Angelo’s sort of right-hand man with daddy issues, trying to prove himself, but outside of that, he’s kind of just there most of the time.
His attempt to swindle the older lady and then fail to follow through on his first kill was about the most predictable story this show has ever produced, and I was once again left feeling wholly underwhelmed by the characters not named Angelo.
Speaking of characters not named Angelo, let’s chat about Maria, Dave, and Jeff because what in the world is going on there?
As mentioned before, unless I missed something, this seemed to be the first time we learned that Dave and Maria grew up together. I thought their connection started when Dave worked on Leah’s murder case.
In hindsight, that was flawed logic because Leah’s case should have been pretty open and shut, so they may not have had much interaction there.
But hearing that the two were in love as teenagers, that Maria left the small town for the big city, and that he stayed behind, like something out of a Hallmark Christmas special, was surprising to me.
I can understand that this was all done because we were leading up to Dave having to decide whether to arrest Angelo, but even knowing that, it still felt very random because of how little investment we have in their relationship.
We know more about Maria and Dave than Maria and her own husband, but their dynamic has always felt somewhat stilted, and like it was just this extra stressor to stick on Maria, who was already dealing with her pregnancy and PTSD.
Maria kissing him goodbye would have been moving if it had actually felt like these two were star-crossed lovers stuck in a perpetual cycle of right person, wrong time, but instead it just felt forced.
And don’t get me started on Jeff.
It’s not clear how long Maria and Jeff have been together, but one would guess it’s been quite some time. So why did he choose THIS moment to confront her about Dave and give her an ultimatum?
Granted, she had been spending time with Dave, but it wasn’t even like that. She’s been lying to Dave about her foray into target practice, not some clandestine love affair with her old prom date.
It’s no secret that Jeff bugs me, but everything about his speech was just too much, because this was a conversation that should have taken place a long time ago if he truly felt like she always had one foot out the door.
They’ve built a life and a family together, and considering everything they’d been through recently, perhaps a little couple’s therapy would help before just pulling the plug on everything, Jeff!
Killer Notes
- The refusal to talk about what Parks was working on when he was murdered makes me think it had something to do with Alzheimer’s research. This show feels evil enough to have Angelo grapple with the knowledge that he killed someone who was doing research on the very disease he’s battling.
- Earl working with Grant or getting assistance from her makes A LOT of sense when you think about it.
- I knew Dave wasn’t going to arrest Angelo after literally every single thing Dave did in this episode told us he wasn’t going to purposely hurt Maria. But now that he knows Angelo is a low-key killer and a liar, where does he go from here?
- Did no one at that very small grief group wonder how Arthur heard about it?
What if the series throws us for a loop and Grant is actually one half of The Ferryman or something like that? I would be shocked if that’s the last major twist of the season.
I imagine you guys have A LOT to say about this one, so please share all your thoughts in the comments below!
You can watch Memory of a Killer on Mondays at 9/8c on Fox.
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