{"id":7443,"date":"2019-11-20T13:00:29","date_gmt":"2019-11-20T21:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=7443"},"modified":"2019-11-15T20:40:37","modified_gmt":"2019-11-16T04:40:37","slug":"mark-watches-monster-episode-28-just-one-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2019\/11\/mark-watches-monster-episode-28-just-one-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches ‘Monster’: Episode 28 – Just One Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the twenty-eighth episode of Monster<\/i>, I WAS TRULY NOT READY FOR THIS. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Monster<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Trigger Warning: For discussion of extreme manipulation, alcoholism<\/b><\/p>\n

HI. WHAT THE FUCK. I honestly cannot believe this is happening, and the fact that someone has pieced this all together in episode 28 of 74 has left me IMMENSELY worried. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll talk about that towards the end because\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 holy shit. Richard found clarity<\/i>. The previous episode gave us a portrait of a man who had been, for many years, ruled by chaos. The shooting death of a suspect had contributed to his spiral into alcoholism, and he ended up losing his job, his wife, his daughter, and pretty much any source of stability he had once had. We don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know all<\/i> the work he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s done in the ensuing years, but there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a suggestion that he has worked very hard to stay sober and has been in therapy for quite some time. His rapport with his therapist speaks to that. (Though having dinner with his therapist seems like a lot? Maybe it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a cultural difference, but while I like my own therapist a great deal, I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t imagine going out to a casual dinner with her.)<\/p>\n

Yet his recovery is not exact. It is not perfect. He still struggles, and he still has to deal with all the lingering effects of what happened to him. Which I appreciate! I know I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve discussed this many times on Mark Watches and Mark Reads before, but too often, mental illness is treated as something easily cured. Same with alcoholism. But Monster<\/i> isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t doing that at all. Richard has made immense strides to become a better person and to trust the work he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s done with his therapist. That doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t mean he gets access to his family again; it doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t mean his job is handed back. It does<\/i> mean that every day involves conscious choices to be a good person, or to respect one\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s self, or to respect others.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

After being let go by Schuwald, I understood why Richard couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t quite let things go himself. Look, Richard\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s therapist is totally spot-on: Richard clearly projects a lot onto his cases, and then, when he is inevitably frustrated by what he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s working on, he finds other outlets for that frustration. Here, though, years from drinking, Richard has found new coping mechanisms. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s absolutely frustrated that Farren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s suicide was never \u00e2\u20ac\u0153solved,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and it bothers him that Schuwald doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t care about it anymore. But this time, as Richard goes through old case files and scrapbooks that he kept, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a different person. Sometimes, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all it takes to make sense of the past: the progression of time.<\/p>\n

Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, just watch the video to witness me completely not catch the clues given to me, and then lose my entire shit as Richard visits surviving family and friends of all the murder victims, only to discover that ALL FOUR CASES WERE DIRECTLY CONNECTED TO SCHUWALD. Even then, it didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make sense to me. All four murders had completely different contexts; they were committed at times that didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t match up; the methods of murder seemed random. One accountant didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even work for Schuwald! The president of that one company was a rival, but friendly in private. It took Richard\u00e2\u20ac\u201dnow experiencing the clarity he did not have for a long time\u00e2\u20ac\u201dremembering a key detail from the killer he murdered to piece this all together.<\/p>\n

We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re brought once again to the concept of evil. Not just any old evil, but pure<\/i> evil. And that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really the central question of a lot of this, isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t it? Is Johan evil, or is something else going on here? Does that concept even truly exist in this world? Richard believes it does, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s how he manages to piece together all these disparate cases. What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the central theme of them all?<\/p>\n

TO ISOLATE SCHUWALD. Well, to an extent, and the one thing that makes no sense to me is Karl. Why would Johan want to bring Karl close to his biological father if, in every other respect, Johan has systematically murdered anyone else who was close to Schuwald? I have to repeat myself, but what sick fucking game is Johan playing at this point? Because I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see even the tiniest thread of a explanation in all of this. Why Schuwald? Why this man at this time? How did Schuwald even come onto Johan\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s radar? WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?<\/p>\n

This episode was electrifying, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all. What a stellar payoff to everything set up in the previous three episodes. WHERE IS TENMA, BY THE WAY??? He hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been around in four whole episodes!!!<\/p>\n

The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Just One Case\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n

– The paperback edition of my debut, ANGER IS A GIFT, is now OUT!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong>If you’d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"