I started Cardinal in the fall and by god it’s winter already so it’s clearly the right time to get back to the story. Rolling S1:E4 Woody after the break.
We left last episode with Edie Soames (Allie MacDonald) making captive Keith London (Robert Naylor) bleed for co-kidnapper Eric Fraser (Brendan Fletcher), we’re about to see a familiar face.
You remember Woody (Gord Rand), doncha? He was the guy Detective Lise Delorme (Karine Vanasse) fingered as the Big Box Store Thief, following people home from a thinly veiled Best Buy to case their respective homes. Guess who he’s watching now? NO, GUESS??!!
Eric’s been wandering around with Keith’s guitar, which I thought was Eric’s guitar until now so I’m sorry, but Woody is intrigued. That looks like a good guitar, what are the odds it’s real? He’s about to find out, following Eric to Edie’s grandma’s house. He calls the place a “sieve”, easy peasy to get in and out.
Detective John Cardinal (Billy Campbell) fell asleep reading the casefile, now he’s dreaming of following bloody footprints across the lake. Did I mention this is a very cold part of Canada? I believe it is an approximation of North Bay, Ontario (thanks to the commenter who set me straight!) and it’s not just cold, it’s frozen solid.
He awakes with a snort and heads off for a quick visit with his wife Catherine (Deborah Hay), who is in an institution related to a flareup of her bipolar disorder.
Funny how even a little bit of time can give context, when I started this series (and read the excellent books by Giles Blunt) that didn’t seem unusual, but now I’m thinking of all the people I know who are on medication for bipolar disorder without ever having being hospitalized.
ANYWAY, she’s heard about the case, which alarms him, so he scoots and is followed. Not by his partner Delorme for once, she’s been investigating him for the Canadian version of Internal Affairs (okay, it’s the RCMP).
She’s too busy burning holes in her carseat with verboten cigarettes, I’d bet 10 bucks she neither wants to be pregnant (as her husband keeps insisting that they’re trying) or a non-smoker.
Delorme spots Detective Jerry Commanda (Glen Gould) in the office talking to Sergeant Dyson (Kristen Thomson) and follows him outside to ask for help with money laundering at the Thunderbird casino. She saw John go there in the middle of the night with black market chips and cash them in so she wants him to find some of that money so she can trace it. They watch Cardinal come outside; Jerry asking if Cardinal knows what she’s doing. She asks him to keep it quiet and I’m sure that’s exactly what will happen.
Glen Gould is excellent in this scene, all polite Canadian skepticism with no promises.
Lise’s husband Josh (Alden Adair) calls while she and Cardinal are driving, there is obviously tension there that Cardinal pretends not to notice. Josh doesn’t like Lise working long hours and honestly: how is she going to have a baby if she doesn’t remember she’s supposed to be barefoot in the kitchen?
They check out the thinly-veiled Greyhound bus station while Eric monologues at Keith in a slightly disparagingly fashion about Edie and her mother and eczema while trying to set up a VCR and tube TV in the basement. Edie listens from above unhappily.
Cardinal and Delorme get a lead at the bus stop, lots of guitar stuff but no guitar. They head off to see if anyone saw a guy walking around with a massive guitar case as Eric gets the VCR working for Keith. He queues up a video of the torture-murder of their second victim, Todd Curry (Dylan Colton), at least that’s like, totally what probably was on the tape. I stopped watching when I saw the drugged victim and Eric brandishing a hammer. Not even through fingers.
You know when you love the writing in a book series and sometimes you forget how disturbing the subject matter is? Yeah
Cardinal strikes gold at the bar, the bartender remembers Keith because he got sick right away. Now if only he remembered the two people who helped Keith…
Todd Curry had a weird, sick-inducing drug cocktail in him as well when he died, that’s a lead! Hey, Edie works at a pharmacy!
Commanda does decide to help Delorme, going to see Francis (Lawrence Bayne) of the chip sale to Cardinal in the middle of the night to ask for some of those bills for analysis. I can’t tell if Commanda knows the investigation is about Cardinal, but he has to be aware that it’s odd that Francis essentially calls the buyer an untouchable.
Sergeant Dyson has scheduled a press conference tonight, Cardinal’s favourite thing! Except for absolutely anything else, so he moans and groans, but she asserts that he will be there to trot out his steed for Corporate’s dog and pony show. Everyone is very interested in the case again since they know there is another victim.
Speaking of Keith, his parents are at the station. Keith’s mother is angry with the police for letting a murderer operate with impunity for years, but really she’s angry because she feels guilty for Keith being on that bus in the first place. She was practicing some tough love and now he’s gone and. Yeah.
Cardinal figures it’s time to warn everyone, he’ll be at that press conference with bells and whistles. Dyson says YEAH YOU WILL.
Edie stomps through the woods ahead of Eric, who finally notices that she’s mad about something. She doesn’t like him talking about her, her skin condition OR her mother, so quiddit. Eric calms her down and gets her re-focused on what’s important: her becoming a woman tonight during her first kill and them hiding Keith’s finger in the woods. PRIORITIES NOT FEELS, Edie!
Woody’s been set up with a job with his girlfriend’s brother, he doesn’t like it but she didn’t like the police at the door.
The press conference that evening freaks Edie and Eric out, how could the cops know about Keith already? Eric is transfixed by the sight of Keith’s mother crying and being encouraged by Cardinal, he revels in the pain.
That’s why Cardinal did it, course, and that’s why he kept prodding Keith’s mom’s emotional wounds, he was buying time for Keith. Dyson is pissed, but Cardinal was right, Eric was sated with Keith’s mom’s pain, so he’s not dying tonight.
Commanda rounded up some of those bill serial numbers for Lise, he warns her to be careful and once again I’m wondering if he knows. The implication is that this could kill her career.
Lise’s husband Josh shows up at Cardinal’s house, schwasted and complaining. She was supposed to go to his special dinner, she promised and everything then didn’t show. He had a liquid supper and found her birth control pills: they’re supposed to be trying to have a baby!
I said so before: this is not a woman who wants to have a baby. Maybe this isn’t a good time in her career, Josh, and maybe you spewing all this personal shite to her senior partner might explain why she couldn’t trust you enough to tell you how she felt, Josh. Maybe.
He accuses Cardinal of having an affair with Lise and then tries really hard not to puke on himself.
Delorme is back at the station, getting confusing results from the bill serial numbers. They’re all new, right from a bank, so they couldn’t have been part of evidence that he walked with OR a bribe from long ago. I’m perplexed because we saw John take those out of his chimney, not straight from the bank machine.
Delorme gets home to the most cringe-worthy scenario possible, Cardinal babysitting her extremely drunk husband.
Even though Woody swore to his brother-in-law that he wasn’t going to be up to any shenanigans anymore and would be in to work in the morning, he’s back at Edie’s house to get Keith’s guitar.
That was a very bad decision, Woody.
He makes it into the house as easily as he thought he would and spends an overlong moment making sure Edie’s grandma is awake before heading straight down into the basement.
Ah Woody.
He finds Keith!! He gets him mostly untied, but Edie and Eric are home now and time has run out for our intrepid house burglar.
“I picked the wrong house”
YEAH
A brief standoff with Eric and Woody is stabbed, but Keith is free and has a screwdriver pressed to Edie’s neck. Eric monologue-hypnotises him until he can get close enough and then he knocks Edie the feck oot as Keith and I stare in disbelief. We’re out.
I don’t know how graphic the murder tape was, but it lasted for a minute or so and I could do without ALL of that. I have a great imagination, I don’t need to see mutilation or torture, fanks. The acting is beyond reproach as always, especially Karine Vanasse and Glen Gould this time. Until next time!
