After last week’s episode, “Kovacs” said the following in the comments section:
I'm not buying the Crash-like interweaving of characters: the cop media rep working out next to the kidnapper who happens to meet the kids wandering away from their mother's abduction, and who stows the little girl in the trailer of her great-grandfather who loaned him keys to smuggle cigarettes… To quote the bulldog from the Chuck Jones classic "Cheese Chasers," "It just don't add up!!"
Amen, brother.
This may seem a bit sudden given my positive appraisals of the first two episodes of Five Days, but I’m seriously starting to turn on this show. It’s not that “Day 28” was particularly bad in comparison with “Day 1” or “Day 3,” but I felt that this was the episode where the “days” conceit would start paying dividends. At best, I hoped that we’d see something like a mini-series version of Zodiac, a look at what would happen to the case once the trail went cold and the media and the public moved along to the next big tabloid story. Who would give up? Who would keep searching? What revelations might be drawn from seemingly dead leads?
Now I’m convinced that the show exists merely to fuck with us.
Case in point, along the lines of what Kovacs is complaining about: On two separate occasions in this episode, a car zips down the street at top speed and you’re made to believe it’s on a collision course with bystanders approaching the road… but no, it’s just another “Crash-like” moment when different strands of the story cross on coincidence. The first time, the police PR woman is out jogging and nearly gets mowed down by a couple of a stone-faced officers en route to give the case a 28-day review. The second time, Leanne’s mother and father are racing to the airport to pick up their snotty granddaughter Tanya from France, who’s abruptly abbreviated a visit with her natural father. En route, they tear by the pack of barking dogs pulling at the chain, one of which will discover a body that could well be their daughter.
Only the body isn’t their daughter, but a Macedonian flower merchant with two missing fingers. More misdirection!
Clearly, watching a mini-series like this piece-by-piece can be deceiving, not unlike reviewing each act of a three-act movie; the set-up can be promising, as it was here, but the payoff is another matter. And while I don’t intend to revise my reviews of the first two episodes of Five Days, please know that I’m retroactively disappointed that they haven’t been nearly as enriching as I’d hoped. In the end, the whole thing may well be a monument to its own cleverness.
The fake-outs start from Scene One, when mysterious interloper Sarah turns up in her robe at Matt’s house, suggesting that he’s perhaps moving on way too quickly after his wife’s disappearance. It turns out that she’s still just helping out the family, though the daughter wants her to “go away.” (Fat chance, kid.) The girl’s having nightmares and says her mother is “asleep,” which further dims the hope that Leanne might still be alive. Matt’s mother-in-law refuses to come to that conclusion, but everyone else seems resigned to it, including Detective Barclay, who has precisely no evidence to support his suspicion of murder.
How bad is the South Hertfordshire police anyway? 28 days and they haven’t been responsible for a single revelation. Sarah found the boy, the journalist found the girl, and the dogs found the body of the Macedonian guy. All that Barclay has done, from what I can gather, is get pissy about how hard he’s working on the case, despite the fact that he’s got nothing to show for his efforts. He reminds me of George Constanza on an episode of Seinfeld: Just look flustered and annoyed whenever somebody enters the room, and they’ll think you’re a workaholic.
The question of what happened to Matt and Leanne’s daughter while she was locked up in her great-grandfather’s trailer is bothering Matt, who’s convinced that she’s been violated in some way. Meanwhile, Kyle is off in an institution, insisting that he didn’t touch the girl. Here’s my question to you, because I feel like I may have missed something: Are the police assuming that Leanne’s abduction and her children’s abduction are not related in any way? Surely it’s not just a coincidence, right? At the very least, Kyle was in cahoots with another party, yes? I’m seriously confused here, and I feel like I’ve lost the thread completely.
At the end of the episode, Matt is acting extra guilty, which means we know he’s innocent. He recalls his last conversation with his wife, which concluded with him telling her, “Remember: I’m the guy who can kill you with one hand.” Nice guy. Then Tanya’s real father from France turns up unexpectedly with her on the flight home, which I’m guessing will make him a solid suspect in his ex-wife’s disappearance.
“Day 28” ends with the discovery of a body that we presume to be Leanne’s, but turns out to be the Macedonian. The police make the wrong assumption, too, because they inexplicably tell the family they’ve found a body without identifying it first. What the hell is that all about?! Is this Standard Operating Procedure for the British police force? I’m flabbergasted.
I hope the few of you that have been following these Five Days analyses of mine will forgive me for bowing out a couple of episodes early. I’m heading out on vacation next week and I’m not inclined to work ahead on a series that isn’t rewarding any close scrutiny.
Am I crazy here? Anyone else banging their heads against the wall in frustration or am I missing some buried profundities? Sound off if you’re still on board.
Grade: C
Stray observations:
• One nice bit of observation during Leanne’s father’s meltdown at the hairdresser’s: People tend to back away from those who are experiencing grief, almost as if grief were a contagion like the flu bug or something.
• How long until Matt and Sarah hook up for real? His icky confession about telling his wife he could strangle her with one hand will serve either as a turn-off or an aphrodisiac. I’ll guess the latter.
• If any of you Brits have seen the entire series and think the latter episodes will blow me away, please don’t be shy. Otherwise, I’m not going to bother finishing.