Another week, another new episode of Murder in the First. Fresh off the back of the strong series opener, with a plot which got wrapped up within two episodes, we're now moving onto the fallout from the tragic school bus shooting in this episode as Blue on Blue plunges Hildy and English into a new case that keeps the mystery and the tension high, even if it's not quite handled as effectively as the previous two episodes with some troublesome pacing this time around, which is a bit unfortunate when you consider that the pacing of the two episodes of "Twenty-Fifteen" and "Schizofrenzy" was a lot quicker and more streamlined than what we got here.
We explore more characters other than the main two of Hildy and English again this week even though they're still as usual the main focus. Recovering from injury, Koto is brought back into the field to deal with the surviving shooter in the hospital. It was an effective scene, even if it was the only thing that he got to do in this week's episode, now that English is his replacement. It remains to be seen how much longer English'll stay in his role, but it seems to be a little longer at least, with this show also using this week to introduce Hildy's new partner in English's place, which was a vacancy that needed filling and to fill the void we got Marty "Junior" Mulligan, who's played by AJ Buckley (Supernatural and Justified), a police officer who just got promoted into Hildy's unit. It looks as though we'll be seeing more of the troubled Mulligan family member in the future as he's going to be a series regular, and it served as a good way to shake up the Hildy/English dynamic fairly well especially with the fact that this time, they're not going to be operating on the best of terms, something that was pretty evident the moment that Junior was at Hildy's desk. However, with the introduction of this new character, there's plenty of potential for this show to cover with lots of room for new ground.
And that's probably the show's biggest problem at the moment. Unlike Season 1, which had a clear storyline over the course of the season, this show can't quite decide what it's going to be. Now that we're done with the Alfie Rentman case, we're already thrust into gang war drama, as well as internal investigations amongst the SFPD that make for the title of the episode, "Blue on Blue." It remains to be seen how far these storylines will go in the future and what will happen with them, and whether we're stuck with this plot for the rest of the season or whether we'll see new ones crop up further down the line. It's still too early to call, but hopefully there's enough material there to sustain the rest of the season.
As well seeing Junior deal with Hildy, we also got to see English interacting with somebody new and fresh in this week's episode as well. Malcolm "Sugar" Monroe, played by Mo McRae, gave us a hint at a potential bad guy for the rest of the season that should shape up to be very interesting indeed as he looks like he could be a formidable foe. If you recgonise McRae from elsewhere, it's because he's not just appeared on Sons of Anarchy (which I still really need to catch up on) as Tyler, but also cropped up in Showtime's Ray Donavan before among plenty of others. So there's some promising developments here as the new cast is being handled very well so far, and it's great to see some fresh blood on the series that's changing the Hildy/English dynamic. However, at the same time, it doesn't look as though it's done with the Hildy/English dynamic for good either with the two characters still getting plenty of screentime together, with one of the highlights being the scene when they're eating together and Hildy's daughter entering the room to proclaim that she's missing her father, being a strong personal, quieter moment in the episode.
So whilst the third episode of Murder in the First wasn't entirely perfect, there's a lot of room to improve and there's still enough material here that's starting to develop to keep it interesting for the rest of the season. Hopefully it can avoid the problem that it fell into in Season 1 where some of the middle episodes felt too slowly paced, but that said, it'll be interesting to see what happens next week, and there's still potential for more good stuff to come.
What did you think of "Blue on Blue"? Did you enjoy it or not? What do you make of Malcolm "Sugar" Monroe and Marty "Junior" Mulligan? Let me know in the comments below.
Overall Episode Verdict: C+
Positives:
-Mo McRae.
-AJ Buckley.
-The Speech.
-Hildy/English dynamic continues to be shaken up, but still there.
-Plenty of Potential, but...
Weaknesses:
-...Needs to have a clearer focus.
-Not as strongly paced as the opener.
