The CBS procedural sets up a freaky season 2.
In the series premiere ofEvil, Kristen Bouchard (Katja Herbers) had it all.
Or anyhow, she represented some version of what Having It All looks like on web connection television.
Credit: ELIZABETH FISHER/CBS
And it only took a few episodes forEvilto become the best show on broadcast TV.
Kristen’s trade was forensic psychology, the kind of wonkish law-adjacent profession that could launch multiple CBS spin-offs.
She looked fabulously professionalblazers, leather jackets, flared sleeveswhich is no mean feat with four daughters.
Her mom offered unpaid childcare.
Her husband was off climbing literal Everest.
Psychology plus mountaineering doesn’t equal a Cape Cod mansion.
The daughters shared a bedroom, and an elevated train loomed loud over the Bouchard house.
Then again, Kristen had her own guesthouse-office out backand the girls had a private swing set.
Even Kristen’s problems were cool and sexy.
Her new job was tracking Vatican secrets.
The biggest threat to her marriage was sensitive David Acosta (Mike Colter), a dreamy Father-to-be.
By the end of Thursday’s season finale, Kristen has lost so much.
Her mom Sheryl (Christine Lahti) is engaged to villainous Leland Townsend (Michael Emerson).
Also, Kristen just killed a man, and now a crucifix burns her skin.
(Don’t miss their awesome postmortem conversation with myEvil-loving colleague Chancellor Agard.)
Was Satan launching weekly torments on New Yorkers?
Or has everyone just gone crazy because of the internet?
If that devil is “real,” its purpose has twisted.
“Book 27” begins with Orson LeRoux (Darren Pettie) outside Kristen’s house.
Was he being figurative?
We don’t actually see Kristen murder LeRoux, yet all blood-on-the-knee evidence points to her executing the executioner.
In David’s vision, Kristen walks glassy-eyed toward the reaping Goat Devil.
Is she going to get slashedor pick up a scythe of her own?
The latest case is almost a repeat.
Eleanor (Laura Heisler) is worried that she needs some priestly help with possession.
“Why are all these exorcisms women?”
Kristen asksan interesting question, though not quite accurate in this case.
Eleanor is pregnant with twins, a boy and a girl.
She thinks her little man has a big problem.
“Is this even a thing?
A fetus becoming possessed?”
asks Ben (Aasif Mandvi).
Then Eleanor swallows a communion wafer and starts bleeding all over the church.
The doctors tell her the male fetus absorbed the female.
It’s called Vanishing Twin Syndrome.
“Just because you have a name for something doesn’t mean it’s not insane!”
Eleanor saysa line that could work as a motto forEvil.
“It’s likeBoys fromBrazil!”
David has a more classical explanation: Matthew 13’s line about sowing weeds among the wheat.
Are psychopaths “trying to poison a generation”?
If so, how?
Are all the samples fromTimothy Hutton?
Evilcan be scary or funny, wittily askew in its druggy-flirty depiction of supernatural investigation.
I’m not sure how well the Vatican-Demon-Drug Dreams mythology will hold together.
The finale showed off the Kings' thoughtful introspection, too.
Now two paces of the vilest earth is room enough."
He remembered a brave soldier with a funnyWill Ferrellimpression.
How is it possible for the massive weight of the human soul to disappear into nothingness?
Kristen interpreted his faith as a symptom of a deeper malady: Fear of death.
Maybe she’s right.
Yet she’s seeking something, too.
Kristen chose the Agnostic Catholic Investigation Squad over Everest.
It doesn’t seem like fear motivates her.
He tells the cops she assaulted him.
He comes to her house and leaves her a cute little note.
Now he’s dead.
Understandable, maybeand horrifying.
IsEvil’s hero, well, evil?
Did she absorb something of Orson’s terrible essence, like the proverbial devouring twin?
“Lot of blood in your religion,” Ben said.
Something tells me that, in season 2, there will be a lot more.
