Clarice – Add-A-Bead

By: Kelly Kearney

Eight episodes into this new series and “Clarice” is finally hitting its psychological crime drama stride. This week finds Agent Starling back on the therapist’s couch where the memories of her past continue to muddy her view of the present, in particular, the current whistleblower case. Aesthetically displeasing, a merry-go-round of unsettling images cross Clarice’s mind and set the mood for the war she is preparing to wage on her own personal psyche. It is a battle that goes out of its way to avoid a certain doctor (who shall not be contractually named) who sent her down this path to begin with. Images flash like a disorienting strobe light on one unsettling clue after another – the glistening skin of a roasted duck, a suicidal swan-dive off of a bridge, and the blood-soaked crash landing onto the frosty ground below. An unholy union of what was, and what is, makes for a juicy episode to sink your teeth into.

A DNA Match!

Unlike the Krendler from Thomas Harris’ books Ridley Scott’s film of the same name, this version of the ViCAP leader does not seem to be hell-bent on ending Clarice’s career. In fact, his orders for Agent Starling (Rebecca Breeds) to take a mental health break and get her head on straight, played more like a father figure looking out for his rookie agent than it did the misogynistic power-hungry politico version fans of the books and films are familiar with. In fact, while Clarice is putting her new head shrinker Dr. Li’s (Grace Lynn Kung) mind at ease over a certain cannibal doctor who she says will not be a problem because “…hunting me wouldn’t bring relief,” Paul (Michael Cudlitz) is proving his leadership role at the bureau by risking his career to set a trap for Joe Hudlin (Raoul Bhaneja). Speaking of the sleazy lawyer, after Joe blackmailed Paul into ending ViCAP’s investigation into the river murders by pointing the finger at him for doctoring FBI files, the team went rogue and continued without their boss’s knowledge. Now Paul, himself, has gone rogue and after avoiding Joes’ many attempts to reach him, Krendler agrees to meet for lunch. Quid pro quo is in the menu for this meal that Paul practically chokes down as he sets a trap for Joe who rattles off threats about the pending Krendler custody case like he still has the upper hand in this extortion scheme. Krendler plays the game long enough to swipe a saliva-soaked pen from Joe, knowing his DNA will more than likely match the mystery man scrapings from under Starling’s fingernails. Checkmate, Hudlin! Krendler gives Murray (Nick Sandow) the pen to take to the lab knowing he is on the right track.

Breaking Ceilings Doesn’t End a Culture of Racism

After solving last week’s cold case, Ardelia Mapp (Devyn Tyler) is reveling in her professional glory. Too bad only she and her roommate noticed. The kudos for her great work are silenced when the higher ups accuse her of giving herself one too many pats on her own back. There is no applause for a job well done, only shame for her pride and a pass over for a promotion to head the DNA Task Force, something she was the lead agent on since she was assigned to the bureau. In fact, when a fellow agent attempts to recruit her as his glorified secretary, Ardelia has had enough. Once again, she does all the work and her mediocre white male counterparts get all the praise. It’s one thing to fight the patriarchy, it’s another to win that battle and then get shoved to the back of the bus courtesy of systemic racism. Ardelia cannot catch a break! She had hoped her hard work would be enough to grant her the recognition she craves and most definitely deserves, and that was why she kept turning down the offers to join the Black Coalition, but not anymore. If a stellar work record does not push her career forward then Ardelia has no other option but to join the fight against the blatant discrimination within the ranks of the FBI.

Jump Into Past

With everyone on their own mission to take Hudlin down, the case of a young Yugoslavian med student named Karolina who took a dive off a bridge seems inconsequential. Spoiler: it is not! Karolina’s backstory and her missing wedding ring are linked to Joe Hudlin! What they discover is that long after Karolina left her beloved spouse behind to die in war-torn Sarajevo, she became pregnant by a co-worker named Tyson Conway (Douglas Smith). Tyson ran a nonprofit bringing foreign med students looking for asylum into the country. He explains that she loved her husband, but after he died the two got close and lead to the pregnancy. When Murray shows Tyson a photo of Karolina, he notices she is not wearing her wedding ring, something he says she never took off. This leads Murray to dig through her belongings where he lands on a gum wrapper and written on it is a code of numbers. The code is a bank routing number that takes Clarice to the woman’s safety deposit box and in it, a sonogram of a baby suffering from the same heart defects the that led to the whistleblower river murders! If you are thinking this was not a suicide because it the coincidences between her death and the whistle blower’s murders, you would wrong because ViCAP believes the defects were too much for the young mother to take and so she ended both her and her child’s life, but it does tie Hudlin to this body and my guess, probably others they have yet to figure out.

The suicide linked to the river murders is not the only big reveal this week, we find out more about Clarice’s family during another therapy session with Dr. Li. Starling admits to being an outsider her entire life. Whether that was at work or with her family, she has always been a party of one and that is probably why she was drawn to Dr. He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named. He forced Starling to dig deep into the recesses of her mind; flushing out what it was that made her tick. He gave her the paternal interest she never got from her uncle and he saw her talent as Behavioral Science Investigator, something her superiors downplayed even after she rescued Catherine Martin from Bill’s underground pit. During the session to determine if she is capable of working while struggling with her PTSD, Clarice talks about her time on her uncle’s farm and how she was the only one kicked out of the family home. The rest of her siblings got to stay, but Clarice was punted to the relatives. Why is a question she never answers, but after the screaming lambs incident at the farm she was passed along to an orphanage. As Clarice tells her story, flashes of memories focus on a beaded necklace her father gifted her before he died. The bauble is important, so much so she admits it was her first thought when she entered Buffalo Bill’s basement skin suit factory. If that maniac dressed in his DIY fashion fails wound up killing her, at least her beaded necklace would survive! Talk about a dark and disturbing attachment to an heirloom given to her by a family who tossed her out like yesterday’s trash. Clarice has issues and that is why she is in Dr. Li’s care, but considering her last therapist and the cannibal who came before him, maybe therapy isn’t what works best for Clarice?

Anyway, if that isn’t bad enough, after therapy Clarice heads back to work where she gets friend zoned by Tomas (Lucca De Oliveira) when he fills her in on his two-year workplace romance with Jesse (Genelle Williams), a woman from another department. REJOICE, CLARDELIA SHIPPERS! VICTORY WILL BE OURS! It looks like Esquivel and Starling will set the tone for the co-worker male/female friendship which is truly an underrepresented relationship we rarely see in heteronormative television.

After that big news, Krendler follows it up with some of his own when he finally comes clean about Joe’s attempts to compromise him. He meets with Esquivel and Clarice in the basement of the bureau and away from any listening ears. He informs them of the the lab results from the pen. It is a match for the man who attacked Clarice at Marilyn Felker’s hospital of horrors. The news is no surprise to Clarice, who told anyone who would listen that Hudlin was her attacker, but this is the ‘90s, and trusting women at their word was not something the patriarchal workplace took seriously. It took DNA proof for Paul to trust Clarice, but at least the team does not have to continue to investigate the lawyer in secret. Paul orders them to keep looking into Joe, even if it costs him his job, and his chances in the custody case. For now, ViCAP’s job is to take down this killer, no matter the costs, and for Paul those costs are huge!