Ben Watches Television : The Outsider - "Que Viene El Coco"
* This review contains spoilers for the first four episodes *
This week’s episode of The Outsider follows Holly Gibney (Cynthia Erivo)’s investigation of the Maitland’s trip to Ohio. She quickly establishes links between their tragedy and two other mysterious child killings, including the one involving the inmate who slashed his own throat to avoid being shanked, last week. She also puts a hypothetical face on the inexplicable evil that turns unsuspecting people into child killers. That’s about it, really. Another tense, but uneventful episode.
*
The Outsider has a problem with length and pacing. It isn’t a good sign when I start thinking about production logistics when watching a television show. If you can’t hold my attention for fifty-something minutes, it means that factors which have nothing to do with your narrative are undermining your narrative. Not sure if my prior knowledge of the novel make it worse or not, but Que Viene El Coco’s only purpose is to ratchet up tension leading to a big reveal that was already made excruciatingly clear last week: the thing killing children is not human. It’s a monster.
But Que Viene El Coco never makes that big reveal. It only alludes to it.
Last week, the police investigators working under Jack Hoskins (Marc Menchaca) found weird, calcified shedding skin near clothes that belonged to Terry Maitland and fingerprints that belonged to the same person at different eras of her life. Maitland’s daughter is being visited by a boogeyman who has messages for Ralph Anderson (Ben Mendelsohn). Something supernatural killed Frankie Peterson. It used Maitland, the Ohio guy and the New York woman to pull it off unnoticed. Just fucking get to the heart of it already. If there’s a monster, I want to see it.
Even Ben Mendelsohn is bored.
Patience, atmosphere and tension are usually good things. But it all lies on whether the characters are facing an inherent threat or not. The Outsider’s problem is that it is ratcheting tension without any stakes: Terry Maitland is dead, no kid is being followed or threatened by the wicked stranger and there’s no real sense of what to even look for yet. Outside of Maya Maitland (Summer Fontana), the thing hasn’t been in direct contact with any characters. It is supposed to go through Jack Hoskins, but if I hadn’t read the novel I wouldn’t even know what the fuck he’s doing.
There can’t be tension without something to be afraid of. I can’t believe Richard Price of all people doesn’t get that. This is why I find myself rolling my thumbs watching The Outsider and wondering whether it should’ve been six or eight episodes long instead of ten. Otherwise, it goes through the motion of what a good HBO show does: slow delivery, muted colors, brooding characters and all that jazz, it just doesn’t have the substance behind it. So far, The Outsider is very apt at impersonating good television, but it’s not good television in and of itself.
*
THAT SAID…
Let’s not be a total bitch and highlight a thing or two that I liked about Que Viene El Coco. Cynthia Erivo showcases her immense talent as Holly Gibney. Her character is much more unstable than I remember her being in the book, but her psychotronic journey into the unknown was very enjoyable. It was slowly brought up by director Andrew Bernstein, through solitude, a disjointed sense of self the series willingly explores, kissing Andy Katcavage (Derek Cecil) to fend off alienation and all sorts of erratic behavior that leads her back into monklike solitude.
The episode awesomely climaxes (not sex pun here, you dirty freaks) with Holly browsing through fucked up folkloric monsters while taking a bath in some hotel. Her reality is completely disjointed and she’s mentally preparing to accept the possibility that she’s chasing down a supernatural being. It’s one aspect of the show that’s done better and with more nuance than in the novel. Stephen King’ s Holly takes a page and a half to go like: “I’ve figured it all out guys, watch this Mexican luchadores movie from the 1960s. It’ll tell you everything you need to know.”
So, THAT was cool… but it’s quite small silver lining to an otherwise slog of a show. Oh well, on to next week…
