I’ll give full credit to this show for so thoroughly exploring its tortured protagonist cliché and literally living up to its title so quickly. I don’t think I’ve repulsed physically from any show as much this year as much as I did at the scene where Camille Preaker shoves a sewing needle underneath her fingernail, and that’s just the start. The subtle sound mixing is worth noting as you can later hear the sound the needle makes as she carves into her denim jeans well as the scratchy music selection of Black Screen from LCD Soundsystem embedded at the bottom of this post.

Further character developments, Chris Messina as Detective Richard Willis remains just as much of an annoying asshole he was in Live By Night. Props to The Mindy Project for making him likeable and funny, but when you strip away any sense of comedy it’s clear he just gives off an unlikeable vibe. Anytime an actor has this it’s better they steer into it and play a full-fledged villain (think Tom Cruise in Collateral). Anyways, because one of the victim’s teeth were pulled out and the coroner said it was hard to do and he struggled a bit pulling out pig teeth he assumes the killer has to be a man and not a possibly strong lady like Elizabeth Perkins’ character who seems to me to only exist so we can be shocked about her reveal later and the audience can rewatch and see her from the beginning.

This episode does have a good structure of filling out the personalities of Wind Gap as well as Camille’s Boss back home, even if it is repetitive in the lingering stares she continuously gets from random townsfolk. It does lead to one haunting lasting image though so good job Jean Marc director. Patricia Clarkson continues to pull the mother daughter tension in the right direction of being extremely annoying yet thoroughly believable so everyone here from the writers and performers across the board are still pulling their weight on episode 2 without any slumps.

My Verdict: Keep watching for something good.

Tidbits:

• Camille’s Dad’s Music CD & Record collection along with his headphones is stylish and impressive. As a man I can see how his removed sense allows him to survive in a family of women as crazy and damaged as this. That and he still dances with his wife after X number of years. A real romantic. As a character I don’t need him to be any more developed than what we’ve seen. I hope he sticks in the background.