Sharp Objects - Dirt - Review: Weirdos

"My demons are not remotely tackled, they’re just mildly concussed."

Sharp Objects continues its deep dive into the setting, showing us how everything works and laying the ground for Camille’s investigation, and like any investigation it starts slow. She learns Willis is the only one trying different angles in the investigation and the only one willing to entertain the possibility that the killer is someone from the town and not an outsider (he even buys a pig’s head to see just how hard yanking out teeth with pliers would be).

Adora is always between sMothering Camille and resenting her, and when they go to the little girl’s funeral we get to see just how screwed up that relationship is in the flashbacks Camille has about her sister’s funeral, and they are all heartbreaking, especially when young Camille seeks comfort in her mother who only pulls away.

The speech given by Natalie’s mother was absolutely heartbreaking as well, and seeing John so broken up it seems weird people assume he’s guilty. Eventually Camille gets tired of her mother trying to control her and when her dress gets torn she leaves raising a few eyebrows. When she goes to buy a needle and thread at the store and she finds Amma and her posy who imply they’re safe because the girls that are getting killed are not the cool ones.

Camille talks to Curry and his wife, Eileen, and then they talk about her, she says he can’t fix everything (certainly not Camille) and he should be careful what he’s pushing her into. He says she’s a great investigator, could be a great writer and maybe even have a life, but she needs to deal with her issues and stop thinking that vodka doesn’t stay on her breath. I really liked that he has her so well figured out and he seems to only care about helping her, we’ve only had a couple of scenes with this marriage but I already love them.

On her car before getting to the Keene house Camille’s tempted to mark her skin with the needle but an argument between Mr. Nash and the Keene family distracts her. Once she’s inside she starts talking to people and the gossip moms suggest there was something odd in the relationship between John and Natalie and that’s why he’s suspect.

She starts looking around the house and finds Natalie’s bedroom, she clearly identifies with the young girl, she even goes out to free Natalie’s spider and sees the dad there, he says Natalie used to kill ants and feed them to the spider, which admittedly sounds a little serial-killy, he also tells her Natalie and Ann were friends for a while until they fell out and that Ann’s dad is a weirdo, seems the weirdos are the ones everyone is quick to point the finger to.

Later, she finds out from a couple of brave boys playing outside that James Capisi another young boy was there when Natalie was taken and said she was kidnapped by a woman in white, when she goes to see James he says he told the police but they didn’t believe him. Camille is worried when she sees him playing with a gun and alerts the mother but she’s not interested and she looks like a ghost herself, she apparently has cancer and is also a meth addict.

Camille goes to talk to Vickey who says he discounted the kid’s story because he’s eight and “troubled”. He says the kid used to tell stories of things he’d done he could never have and that his mother’s situation doesn’t help. They both remember it as town folklore, scaring each other as children with women in white taking kids, which, if they boy’s testimony is true, sounds too much like a coincidence.

Later, Camille goes to the bar to talk to Willis abut James but he wants to avoid being quoted, just not enough to refuse her company, he says if she can’t have a drink with him she can at least help him understand the town better. I have to say I love the rapport these two have, the scrip is just absolutely brilliant and I can’t wait to get more of them together. He decides to talk off the record but it doesn’t look like they have much, only their assumption that it’s a man, given the strength it takes to pull teeth out, and he tells her about his little experiment with the pig’s head. In that moment she clearly starts to like him for real.

"You sick fuck."
"Bless your heart."

After the bar Camille goes back to the house and feels like she doesn’t fit in so she goes to her room, she talks to Curry, tells him the people in town seem to be getting all the guns they can get and they discuss Natalie’s profile. He says he and Eileen are worried about her but she shuts him down and says she’s good.

She gets to writing and then she pauses, she scratches “LIAR” on her jeans with the needle before publishing it, but the she’s interrupted by Amma crying and Adora holding her, half comforting half restraining, Adora says she she’s scared and lashing out and then she proceeds to telling Camille she knows she was drunk at the funeral, Camille tells her to fuck off but then Adora says the girls reminded her of her daughter when she was younger and that she feels guilty for not being able to help her, and then Amma comes out of nowhere saying maybe Camille could be good, it’s like they’re both constantly playing games with her.

"Let me be good."

What did you think about the episode? Do you have any theories? Let me know in the comments.