Major Crimes - #FindKaylaWebber - Review: "It's Not a Murder"

This week’s episode worked for me on a character level more than a overall story level. It seems as though the writers have, wisely IMHO, realized that it’s difficult to find a truly original crime story to tell, and that the solution to that is to do some great character story telling.

The case is a critical missing; a baseball player’s five year old daughter, Kayla, has been kidnapped. Jim Weber, the father, lies about his whereabouts, his wife, Lori is a mess, and the body guard, Curtis, is certain his life of privilege is over. Major Crimes discovers that the helicopter trip Weber took wasn’t out of town, but across LA to Beverley Hills for surgery on his million dollar arm. (The helicopter ride is faster than the freeway. Ha! I live in LA. He’s right. Oh, how I dearly wish I could commute to work via helicopter every day.) Surgery is a pretty solid alibi. After all of the family has been eliminated as suspects, Major Crimes can look outward. As this process begins, they find a post on Instagram that appears to be proof that the sender has the little girl. The expectation is that a ransom demand will be forthcoming.

They don’t have to wait though, because neighborhood surveillance cameras reveal a car in the neighborhood at the time of the kidnapping. Ike Gibson, another friend/employee (like the aforementioned body guard), is quickly found, and, unfortunately, has the little girl’s body in his refrigerator. What surprises the unit is the fact that his lawyer shows up before the cops have time to get him into an interrogation room. The lawyer is ready to muddy the waters to protect his client. He can save his energy, because the autopsy determines that Kayla died hours before Gibson entered the neighborhood.

When Gibson hears the prospect that he could be sent to county lock-up known as a child killer, he rethinks his recent decisions. He confesses to answering a summons to the estate in the middle of the night, because he thought he was doing a favor for Jim, which would allow him to get back into Jim’s good graces. This didn’t happen. Instead he found the distraught mother and the security guard enacting a plan to convince the world that Kayla had been kidnapped.

Kayla died from an overdose of cocaine she found in her bedroom closet: her mother’s stash. Kayla knew it was there, because she’d found it before and almost died that time as well. But that’s not murder. It’s negligence and illegal disposal of a body.

One of the things I thought was handled really well was the character work. They did a good job of establishing Jim Weber’s character. It was established that Weber has a temper and an established pattern of meting out punishment to those who disappoint him. This made the other characters’ motivations make sense. It explained why Curtis would help Lori come up with a way to make her death “look better.” I don’t think Lori was as worried about Jim’s career as she was about his reaction to the truth. Considering Jim killed her after the truth came out, it makes sense. How do you think a jury would find in his trial?

The sentencing hearing was dealt with this week. Rusty was called to speak about his interviews with Slider. Slider’s lawyer tried to back Rusty into a corner where he would have to admit that Slider’s troubled childhood was enough of a mitigating factor that he should get life instead of a death sentence. Rusty did what everyone told him to do. He told the truth. Rusty pointed out that he and Marianna were on the streets at the same age as Slider, and neither of them killed anyone.

A few posters, myself included, were against the idea of following the Slider side of the Alice/Marianna story. I began to change my opinion when it became obvious that the major point of the story wasn’t Slider, but Rusty and his journey toward adulthood. It’s been interesting watching Rusty discover ‘what he wants to be when he grows up’, but this story feels like the beginning of the story about who Rusty wants to be. After dealing with the consequences of being too chicken to deal with Gus directly, he handled that conversation pretty well. Clearly Rusty is no where close to being able to deal with an emotional relationship. Maybe that’s the next path for him to walk?

As I said, what worked best for me in this episode was the character work. What about you guys? What were your favorite elements? What did not work for you?

About the Author - Prpleight

Prpleight is a screenwriter and senior software engineer with solid geek cred. When not writing code, screenplays, or watching TV (sometimes she does all three at the same time), she uses her broadsword Bessie to battle evil. She's been a frequent contributor to the SpoilerTV discussion boards for several years now.

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