It’s Same Shit, Different Day on The Killing

Previously, on my coverage of AMC’s The Killing: I figured out everything. Who Killed Rosie Larsen? Who is David Rainer? And/or Who is Rosie’s Real Father? But I cannot answer the big questions: When will this terrible show be over? And when will they pick up that thread from two weeks ago that hasn’t been mentioned since? I’d guess we can look forward to them returning to the Rosie’s real dad plot next week, since the previews indicate a Mitch storyline next Sunday.

This week’s episode (“Off the Reservation”) kicked off with Linden calling in a “Code 1013 Officer Down,” since she knows where the phone call of Holder getting his ass beat came from: “the location is the Wapi Eagle Indian Reservation, exact address unknown.” Linden drops off her kid again, who explicitly asks her not to leave him alone at Holder’s place–but Lt. Carlson called off the search party request and so she abandons her child before Halloween ON MOTHER’S DAY to come in and yell at Duck. Actual things yelled back by Duck: “Your word is no good” and “You stay away from that reservation, ya hear me?”

Holder’s still not answering his calls when Linden rolls up on the Mean Wapi Lady Chief who says that Seattle Police don’t have jurisdiction on their imaginary island. Linden says that when this case “goes federal,” that Chief Jackson’s “This is our land bullshit won’t matter.” Jackson rightly calls Mama Crazy’s bluff, but just then backup arrive, with Lt. Duck yelling at the Bureau of Indian Affairs and telling Linden that “whatever we find out there is on you.”

The SPD plans on conducting their search “until dawn before the lawyers show up,” so they head to Jameson Road, in the northeast division of the island, where they find Holder’s Pez dispenser! It is not meaningful at all to see that item in an evidence bag. Is that even a thing for this character? Because it was in two episodes thus far? I hope that when Linden goes missing, Holder has to come and identify her Nicorette gum.

Detective Sarah Linden has had a bad 20 days. Day 21 dawns with everybody looking through the reservation dump. But Spoiler Alert: Holder isn’t going to be dead. Because there’s still a few episodes left this season. Cut to a couple trashy rez kids, playing in garbage. One of them points to the woods and somehow that means that Holder’s in the woods? And the Seattle Police Department Search and Rescue Squad Commander Guy goes along with that? I expected more of you, Vasquez. In the woods, the dog picks up the scent! It’s foggy! Oh no, the Indians and their lawyers arrive in their SUVs. The dog finds Holder, and he’s a bloody mess, but of course he’s still alive.

Space Needle shot. Richmond is conducting his leaving-the-hospital press conference. The first question from a female member of the press: “A significant percentage of the voters still think you killed the Larsen girl. Councilman, where were you the night of Rosie Larsen’s murder?” Way to be dicks, Seattle press. Richmond wisely ducks the question, but oh noes with five days before the election, Mayor Adams is still up by 7 points! So Richmond needs to set the record straight on where he was that night and/or create a grand gesture, something to remind voters that he leads Seattle. Now Gwen and Jamie just need to figure out what that will be.

Holder has broken ribs and is suffering from exposure, and just needs to rest. Linden calls her son from the hospital to let him know Holder is alright. “Are you good to stay there a little bit longer? I should be done soon.” Mother of the Year over here. But then Holder’s sister rolls up and she’s just like him. She gives Linden the matchbook for B.B.’s Hair Emporium. (And why would a weave/extension palace hand out matches?) The appointment for Holder was originally set for 11 a.m. tomorrow, but tomorrow is today and so Linden is off! Holder’s sister wants her gone anyway.

Over at the weave shop, Linden meets (the uncle of and) the girl who gave Holder the matchbook. She’s a maid at the casino and found Rosie’s backpack in the dumpster when she was taking out the trash. Because Rosie wasn’t a prostitute with Backpage.com Beau Soleil, she was a maid. That’s why she had the ammonium hydroxide on her hands, from the cleaning products, and she was all done up because sometimes the girls there worked as overly made-up paid-under-the-table underage waitresses. Chief Jackson controls everything on the rez, like who works and who doesn’t, and the uncle says she uses the tribe to line her own pocket. All the casino staff would go to the 10th floor for smoke breaks, but the higher-ups took away all the keys the day after Rosie died.

Adams urges the voters of Seattle to “keep hope alive” and “there’s hope for the waterfront yet,” as “the Indians are coming to the table.” Richmond lets Adams know that he knows he’s behind the faked photo that framed Richmond for Rosie’s murder. Then he tells the Mayor, “It’s always good seeing you, Lesley.” And *boom* drops the mic…then wheels himself to the door, where he opens it via the handicap access button.

The Larsen kids are sent to stay with their grandparents, and when they ask about their professional escort aunt Terry, they get no response. However, Stan is getting many tips on his bounty, including scamster psychics, which his father-in-law thinks is “more attention than is good for the family.” Stan Larsen approaches Linden with his list of crazy and even she dismisses him outright. Then Duck takes away her badge and gun with a “nothing personal, but I don’t like you, detective,” before mentioning that “I understand you were supposed to get married today. Sonoma, right? Nice place to raise a family.” And Linden’s like, oh yeah, I have a kid, and she rushes out to Jack, only to find cops at her place, her son’s phone, but not her son. Turns out that Jack is at Regi’s dock, since he thought the cops were coming to get him. And really, they should have. Why is he fighting to stay with his mother again?

Gwen and Jamie are looking for something big, something very Page One. Mayor Adams holds a press conference announcing that Chief Jackson and the Kulamish tribe are going to work with him on a joint venture for Seattle’s waterfront, so Gwen and Jamie decide that the best way to make news is to take away this waterfront from Mayor Adams. Gwen tells Darren their plan to have him sit down with the mean chief lady and steal the waterfront project, and thereby steal the election, but that turns into a big fight about them and their previous relationship. In his hospital bed, Holder has a chest tat that says “Community” in fancy script, I think. (Six seasons and a movie.) Holder gives his nephew back the coins he stole to buy drugs.

Linden has finally seen the light and is at the airport sending Jack to Chicago to stay with his dad. “Why can’t you come with me?” he asks. Jack’s just so tired of his mother putting him last. And in response, Linden gives her son this pep talk: “You’re strong. You can do this. You are so much stronger than I was when I was your age. No matter what happens you’ll get through it, because you are my boy, you are my baby.” Which is all sorts of CRAY CRAY.

Of course once again, we must deal with the self-imposed impossible timeline of the show with Holder out of the hospital a day after getting his ass beat. Stan returns home dismayed and doesn’t listen to the blinking message on his answering machine. Adams keeps pressing the question of where exactly Richmond was on the evening of Rosie’s murder, while Jamie finds a gun in the campaign office, and Linden and Holder are dead-set on finding Rosie’s key to get them to the 10th floor of the casino, where she was definitely abducted. This time they mean it, you guys.