A Solid Lead
Episode 6 of Unbelievable begins with Karen arriving back from Kansas and telling Grace she hasn’t had much luck. Lilley shows up at the station soon after and shows them a knife that was left at the crime scene. After convincing her that the police are working hard on the case, the girls wonder whether they’re going to solve this or not, given the lack of substantial evidence they have to go on. Back in 2008, Marie is offered a deal involving therapy, $500 and no drugs and alcohol. Still shocked from the entire incident, she approaches Judith and asks for the money, which she refuses to do until she gets some answers. Midway through taking her driving lessons, Marie spies someone with a blue rucksack that sparks flashbacks to the night of the incident, prompting her to race through a red light. As she heads back home after the lesson, she winds up smoking and drinking with a random group at the shop; a way to forget the shock of what happened to her. Unfortunately she misses her curfew and as such, she gets booted out of her accommodation and is forced back into living with Judith. Marie has her day in court and struggling to hold back tears, pleads guilty to the charge of filing a false report. Looking up domestic disturbance calls, back in 2011 Grace continues to dive deep into the investigation, helped by her partner who manages to snatch up some police files on James Massey. Looking deeper into this, it turns out he was around the area during the time of the rape. Sensing the worst, Grace investigates James, only he seems to have caught wind of what’s happening and as she goes to see him, he spits in her face and tells her not to mess with them. On a mission, Grace returns to the station where Karen updates Taggart on what’s happened so far. With no definitive clues, Grace begins to despair that they’ll never find the suspect. After the briefing, Elias updates the team on the truck and has a registration for the Mazda and the owner’s name – Christopher McCarthy. It’s a solid lead too and as Grace and Karen stake out the house, after some time they see him leave and get in a car. Karen turns around and follows them down the road where they enter a diner, prompting Karen to head in too. Back at the house, Grace knocks on the door, hoping no one is in so they can set up cameras in the house. As the duo leave the diner, Karen seizes her opportunity and snatches up the cups for DNA… only it turns out the man in the diner isn’t actually Chris, it’s his brother Curtis. With a tense finish to the episode and another spanner thrown in the works, Unbelievable delivers another solid episode here, showing the exhausting and slow process of staking out houses. If there’s one thing this show has really excelled at, it’s showing the methodical way investigations play out and it’s easily the strongest part of the show. It’s a reminder that Netflix can deliver the goods among a slew of questionable green-lit projects and right now, Unbelievable is easily one of the strongest crime dramas this year.
