Killing Eve, season 3 episode 8 review: a limp finale to a once-great series
Warning: this review contains spoilers
Over a third series where not a great deal has happened, it seemed clear that two things, at least, would happen in this finale. First, we’d find out who killed Carolyn’s son Kenny (Sean Delaney). Second, Eve (Sandra Oh) and Villanelle (Jodie Comer) would be reunited in some way – possibly to run off into the sunset together. We largely got both, but one was more satisfactory than the other.
Like the passing of a baton, this episode was co-written by outgoing and incoming headwriters Suzanne Heathcote and Laura Neal, the latter of whom is lined up to take over next season from the former. I wonder which of the two gave us Dasha’s insipid death scene. Harriet Walter is one of our finest actors (though, her Russian accent has bordered on parody). But nothing about the final moments of Villanelle's handler – making a half-hearted choking sound and inexplicably expiring in a hospital bed straight after Konstantin (Kim Bodnia) tells her she’s going to die in that room (but not actually harming her himself) – lives up to the standard set by the first series. It is insultingly lazy scriptwriting.
The big “who killed Kenny” question isn’t even given a proper answer. Carolyn (Fiona Shaw) is pulled into the Bitter Pill office to be shown newly found footage of Konstantin with Kenny just before he fell off the roof back in episode one. The video is from a camera set up by Bitter Pill investigator Bear (Turlough Convery), who wanted to catch whoever was stealing his Tangfastic sweets. But once again the actual detective work (accidental or otherwise) happens off-screen; the Bitter Pill characters remain underused (though, seeing them come face-to-face with Villanelle is a delight and if we must have a fourth series then please let’s have them back somehow).
This news of Konstantin’s involvement is met by the kind of reaction from Carolyn that’s been wanting all season: she’s really angry and now she has a gun. But still – still – no explanation rings true. Did Konstantin kill him because, as he says, Kenny’s investigation was bringing him too close to the shadowy assassin guild The Twelve? As Villanelle points out, Konstantin gets other people to do his killing. He hasn’t personally killed a soul in three series, so it’s not exactly plausible that he’d start with the nice young man who might well be his son. Instead, Konstantin insists that Kenny became scared and kept stepping backwards when Konstantin tried to recruit him, and then Kenny simply fell off the roof. But we’ve seen this roof. How on Earth did he accidentally step off that? And why couldn’t Eve, who’s been up there too, point that out in the moment?
It’s hard to tell if Heathcote and Neal are being deliberately but tenuously vague or have just blundered it. But it’s upsetting to watch this once-brilliant, breathtakingly innovative series limp along like this. Similarly, the character of Geraldine (Gemma Whelan) seems to exist for no other reason than for someone for Carolyn to be mean to. Konstantin bugging their house gave him no useful information, it happened purely to show us that he was up to something – but isn’t he always? Even worse, it would hardly have been a stretch for him to just plant that bug himself. Taking Carolyn out of the professional setting and trying to create a personal, family life for her was a mistake. She is a much better character when she is merely a tough senior member of MI6 rather than an emotionally abusive, neglectful mother.
The climax was always going to be about Eve and Villanelle, and once the “who killed Kenny” series arc is done with, that’s what we get. The horse feels flogged to death at this point, but the will-they-won’t-they (or 'what are they') storyline needs closure. We don't get that either, but there is another series to come. Instead it’s as good as we could have hoped for. The best bits of the episode come in watching these two terrific actresses quietly reflect with the other, first in London’s splendid Rivoli Ballroom, then against the backdrop of Tower Bridge.
“Did I ruin your life? Do you think I am a monster?” Villanelle asks Eve. The answer, of course, is, “Yes on both counts, and now please step inside this police station.” But such black-and-white thinking wouldn’t make for a satisfying finale after three series of dancing around each other. So instead Eve says that we all have monsters inside us, just Villanelle doesn’t hide hers. To paraphrase Albus Dumbledore, however, it’s not our abilities but our choices that show us what we truly are. And the choice to murder countless people certainly does a monster make.
In the end, on Villanelle’s instruction, they turn their backs to each other and walk away. Then look around for another glance, leaving the story open. Maybe series four will take a wildly different turn – say Eve and Villanelle on a Thelma & Louise-style road trip through spectacular, dusty landscapes, shooting bad people. For Laura Neal to make something of this dry barrel, she’ll need to find a whole new way to fill it.
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