Killing Eve – Making Dead Things Look Nice

By: Kelly Kearney

After last week’s break up on the heels of Hèléne’s murder, Eve is at a loss of what to do with herself. Everything changed when she met Villanelle and now what once excited and motivated her just doesn’t anymore. Nobody understands this new Eve, least of all herself – nobody but a certain blonde who has embarked on her own soul-searching mission on a little island called Gunn. Meanwhile, Carolyn is closer than ever to sniffing out the leader of The Twelve, but an old friend who pops up threatening to toss a Russia-sized wrench into her plans before she can being them to fruition. Elsewhere, Konstantin gets some upsetting news that changes his outlook on what the future holds for him and new protégé, Pam. Things are changing and evolving and with two upsides left it’s anyone’s guess as to what their final forms will look like. Maybe a bit of a scorpion and frog?

Hunting for New Normals

The isolated Scottish coastal Island named Gunn is where we find the newly, sort of single, Villanelle (Jodie Comer). Thanks to a tip from Konstantin (Kim Bodnia) she managed to track down the assassin Hèléne (Camille Cottin) sent to kill her so she can get back to the basics – sleeping with goats, taking in gulps of fresh air and watching her new companion gut a local fisherman for stealing from her waters. This woman, for which the Island is named, kills without remorse and lacks the comedic flare we’re use to seeing from other killers like Villanelle, Carolyn (Fiona Shaw) or Konstantin. And, weirdly enough, the blonde visitor seems to like it. So much so she happily skips along on a hunting trip with Gunn (Marie-Sophie Ferdane) in the rural woods of the island.

In London Eve (Sandra Oh) is doing a bit of hunting of her own. She’s in search of what Yusef (Robert Gilbert) calls, “a new normal.” Now that Hèléne is dead and Lars was snuffed out before he could spill The Twelve tea, Eve’s accomplished what she set out to do: payback for the deaths of her loved ones. But something still feels unfinished and Yusef equates it to an evolution of sorts. Eve isn’t the person she was when she stepped on this Villanelle rollercoaster. What felt satisfyingly normal before just really isn’t hitting the spit now and it is noticeable. Yusef has an idea to boost Eve’s mood and it requires a microphone, a few dance moves and a bit of stage performance. Looks like it’s Karaoke time!

Moving on is a choice.

Karaoke starts off fun with Eve belting out her stress to Sia’s “Chandelier” until she sees the images of her loved ones destroyed by this entire drama, she fell into just bopping along to her off-key tunes. The reminder of what she has lost kills her singing vibes and she storms out of the room telling Yusef she can’t move on. His work is dangerous and he’s lost friends and colleagues too, so he sympathizes with Eve but can’t continue playing second chair to this endless Villanelle orchestral movement. She has to choose to find the joy in life, but Eve can’t do that with him. He chooses to kiss her goodbye and then pushes her to find that happy normal, wherever it is. Where it is, is strolling the woods with Gunn!

While Eve is trying to find her path forward, Konstantin gets a reminder of his past thanks to his daughter Irina (Yuli Lagodinsky), who reminds him why you never lock your daughter away and forget she exists. Full of anger at her father for tossing her to the side whenever Villanelle came on the scene, she tells her Komstantin that thanks to Hèléne she left the mental hospital he stuck her in and now maybe she will get a job with The Twelve. It’s a good way for him to notice her and from the terrified look on his face he’s noticed all right.

In Salzburg, Austria we see Carolyn have a heart stopping encounter when Vlad (Laurentiu Possa) shows up with an FSB entourage and they’re not exactly hungry for Wiener schnitzel. Someone may get pounded and fried! Carolyn’s double defecting is starting to catch up to her and for the first time she is visibly not in good spirits.

Speaking of bad moods, Konstantin meets up with Pam (Anjana Vasan) in Margate for her next mission and right away she can tell the “angry Santa Clause” sitting across from her isn’t excited for their work lunch. He has his mind on his daughter and feeling paternal he orders Pam a hot chocolate topped with whipped cream just to see the new kid smile. Her next mission: be young and go have fun. She has the day off and Konstantin orders her to live it up.

A Cabal of Barn Swallows Enthusiasts

Back in Austria we see Carolyn attempt to soothe Vlad’s equally sour mood with facts about what she’s unearthed on The Twelve. Each member has a connection to her past and were kept separate from each other except for the occasional meetings planned out in the little black book she swiped from Lars’ body. It seems the meetings coincided with a bird enthusiast gathering – the barn swallow to be exact – Austria’s national bird. It also stuck out to her that a rather swarthy fellow (Anton Lesser) dressed in beige safari gear and chirping loosely veiled threats in her direction was sent to assassinate her and probably poisoned the sherry Vlad was about to sip. The hotel they’re in is hosting another Barn Swallow event, so Carolyn is closer to the enemy than ever. Vlad is impressed; she was always good at hunting a mark. It’s common trait with all the lethal women on this show. Carolyn offers Vlad a deal – he can take the assassin back to Russia in her place and she can go back to London and face the treason music. This Barn Swallow killer could easily be the head of The Twelve and if he isn’t he might know who is. Vlad takes her up on the offer and then we head back to Gunn and Villanelle squatting in the forest tracking their prey. Gunn is in her element; with her crossbow and camo gear becoming one with the woods, but Villanelle doesn’t seem made for this rural life.

Eve isn’t made for the life she’s living either. She goes to her psychiatrist friend, Martin (Adeel Akhtar), who owes her a favor for saving him from her murderous girlfriend. She needs some good old fashion brain shrinking and who better than the expert on psychopaths? In a tearful monologue Eve talks about who she was and who she became on this journey to unmask The Twelve. She lost a career, a marriage and friends and, in-turn, gained a lust for killing she isn’t entirely ashamed of. She did what she set out to do…payback for Bill (David Haig), Nico (Owen McDonnell) and all the lives that were destroyed, but is it really a win if you cut off the tentacles off an octopus and they grow right back? The Twelve is an endless cycle, an infinity loop that took her for a ride, and now that Villanelle is gone and most of the former (not soon to be) Twelve are dead, what’s next? Martin reiterates the same,“find joy” advice Yusef gave her earlier in the episode. If Eve wants to find that next chapter, Martin suggests she “go to the people who love you, who understand you, who are your soul.”

Her soulmate is also getting an earful about moving on when Gunn asks Villanelle who the woman was who ran to her side when she shot her. Her response, “nobody” prompts Gunn to offer her visitor some advice: to cut out the rot so she can heal. The violence in this woman is attractive to Villanelle, which can only mean Eve’s inevitable island hop to find her girl will bring trouble.

Speaking of ill-fated lovers, Pam chooses to spend her joyful day with her boyfriend, Darren (Josh Zarè), helping him carve up meat at his kebob stand for hungry tourists. It seems to be an excellent side gig for an embalmer turned assassin. Cutting meat is her forte.

Over on the island Villanelle and Gunn share a jar of moonshine and some killer conversation around a campfire. The topics: why Gunn let Villanelle kill Hèléne. She hated the woman too, so why not take the sapphic French woman out herself. Apparently, she was curious as to what the blonde would do and wanted to find out. We also learn that Hèléne gifted Gunn the island after her entire village in France, parents included, died from poisoned water. Killing off her hometown by putting cyanide in the drinking supply is what put Gunn on Hèléne’s radar, but after years of working for her Gunn realized she was just using her. Villanelle knows the feeling – betrayal – and it burns hot. Villanelle says Hèléne only held them back and now they’re free to be their true unleashed selves.

“You Women Will be the Death of Me”

After Eve receives a text on the phone that she swiped from Hèléne she heads to Margate to ask Konstantin what it means. It’s a photo of a barn swallow–Carolyn was right and that bird is linked to The Twelve! After he finally gets his long-awaited apology over the gunshot to his hand, an exasperated Konstantin says the photo is a message about a meeting. The Twelve have no idea Hèléne is dead and Eve thinks this could be her in. Konstantin says she is going to need help and hands her the address to Gunn Island. Eve who (lets be real) wanted to find her, says Villanelle doesn’t want to see her. He shrugs off their break up and hands her the location. Doing this alone would be suicide.

After catching up with Pam at the hog stand to inform her that work calls, we head over in Austria where Carolyn watches Vlad and his men load the Barn Swallow assassin into their cars bound for Moscow. She smiles knowing she’s heading back to London and out of the clutches of the FSB and The Twelve, for now anyway.

While Villanelle gets closer to Gunn, (well, their mouths do anyway) Eve boards a train to Scotland to find her. At the same time Konstantin is back in Margate getting drunk when Pam shows up with pizza ready for her new mission. Konstantin says they are leaving because he cannot protect her from the life The Twelve has planned for her. Sadly, she has other plans and shreds him to pieces with a pizza cutter under Hèléne’s orders! When he gurgles out that the French woman is dead and she didn’t have to do this, Pam breaks down and desperately tries to save him. She is a doctor; she can fix what she broke but the proud surrogate father stops her. As he bleeds out, he makes her promise to give Carolyn Martens a letter and tell her he always loved her. As he gasps for breath the two share a sweet moment and then she slits his throat to put him out of his misery and prepares his body for a funeral. Her life of fun is over and when she tosses her kebob stand soda in the trash it’s a message that her old life is officially over; her mentor and what’s ahead is unknown.

That lack of direction is also the same for Eve, who races on a motorboat to Gunn’s Island hoping to find that one person who gets her now. Unfortunately, that person made the terrible mistake of sleeping with the lonely recluse and now Gunn’s stereotypically U-Hauled Villanelle into her cabin after she destroyed all modes of transportation off the island. She’s been living alone with her sheep for a long time, so maybe she has missed the update consent because Villanelle went from one roll in the barn hay to hostage wife overnight and it doesn’t look like she has a say in any of it. Later, when Gunn admits to working for The Twelve now that Hèléne is dead, Villanelle uses that as her out. She says she’s done with that group and plans to kill every last one of them. Gunn can’t see they’re using her, but she can. Too bad the island maven likes the life The Twelve provide for her—so if they use her a little, it’s a small price to pay for her happiness. Only it’s a huge price for Villanelle, who attempts to grab her bags and get off of lover’s island. Too bad Gunn won’t let her risk the deal she’s made with The Twelve. With her machete in hand, she takes off into the woods after a fleeing Villanelle. Meanwhile, on the shore of the island Eve gets off her boat and starts hiking through the woods. The same woods Gunn is hunting her soulmate. Unsurprisingly, she finds Eve first and with her machete front and center she tackles her and prepares for the slaughter. The screen fades to black leaving the viewer wondering if she dealt that final “Killing Eve” blow or if Villanelle, who is watching this scene unfold, saves her love from the clutches of Gunn’s death.