Villanelle made sure Eve got a special cake this year. Photosource: BBC America
Given that the entire premise of the show focuses on gruesome murder it takes a lot to surprise the dedicated fans of Killing Eve, but this week’s episode definitely threw us for a bit of a curveball. Instead of introducing the multiple narratives by introducing the setting like London and Spain, this episode shifts into introducing each story by focusing on each individual character. And the first character it focuses on? Niko. I know what you’re thinking, why? Well, that becomes clear later, but in the meantime, we’re given an update on this boring man and his boring new life. Now living in Poland, he has a simple job delivering bread, he watches soccer in the bar and ignores texts from Eve and that’s pretty much it for him. Once again not the most exciting guy.
Eve, on the other hand, is even more of a mess than we’ve seen so far. After Villanelle sent her the talking teddy bear last episode, she elected to sleep in the Bitter Pill office which is putting serious stress on her personal hygiene routine, and yes other people have noticed. Trying to distract herself she continues to follow up on Kenny’s work after they lost Charles Kruger and are back to square one. Together she and Bear find a link between Villanelle’s recent kill in Spain with Dasha’s gymnastic kill back in 1974, given the imitation in the style Eve believes they’ve found the killer who trained Villanelle.
However, before she can get any further her fragile mental state is undone once again as a surprise birthday cake shows up for her at the office and even if there is no card we know who it’s from if for no other reason than the cake is in the shape of a double-decker bus, like the one Eve and Villanelle kissed on just recently. Eve responds by chucking it off the roof. If you thought she was making any progress in her feelings towards Villanelle seems like the wait is not over.
Noticing her erratic, and downright unclean behavior Jaime tells her she cannot continue to sleep at the office, but he does offer to let her crash at his place for a while. Though the pair make for some awkward roommates they do fall into an unprompted “who’s-the-worst-person” debate where they exchange the worst things they’ve done, at which point Eve admits she still feels guilty for how she treated Niko and put him in harm’s way. The next day when she gets a text from Niko to come to Poland she rushes off to try and save what’s left of their marriage. Okay, I cannot be the only one to think that there is just too much Niko talk this episode.
Shifting gears, Konstantin heads to Russia to check in with his daughter, Irina, and sneak her out of school. Yet, even ice cream won’t patch over this absentee father’s crimes as she is quick to remind him she knows who he works for and that he does everything for himself. After that touching reunion, Konstantin checks in with Charles’ anxious widow who informs him that before he died Charles had figured out who’d been stealing the money and asked her to send an email to an unknown account if he died. Too frazzled to make a decision she hasn’t done it and Konstantin steps in and asks her to send it to him first so he can check it out. He then suggests she stay somewhere else and she tells him she’s going to the country house in Lyon. The poor sad woman never had a chance.
From there Konstantin surprises Villanelle on a shopping spree and convinces her to talk to him privately in a streetcar above the city that Villanelle immediately starts jumping up and down in. He’s ready to give her an update on her family and will even find them but he needs a favor in return. That poor sad woman. After posing as a gardener and playing chase with the widow around the garden Villanelle strangles her with a garden hose.
Dasha is less than thrilled about her extracurriculars lately. When she dropped in on Villanelle, who was baking and icing a lopsided cake (I wonder for who), she warned her to reign her behavior in. The Twelve want to interview her, meaning her promotion to Keeper is right around the corner if she can keep it together. However, Dasha is close too, close to getting to go home to Russia, which The Twelve can only allow if Villanelle is settled and that means handling Eve by driving a wedge between them once and for all.
Here’s where it all comes together.
Dasha made her way to Poland, killed the old lady Niko normally delivers to, took her place, followed him to the bar, and stole his phone. She was the one who sent the texts to Eve to come to Poland, and when she shows up, much to Niko’s surprise, Dasha launches a rake through Niko’s throat right in front of her. Eve collapses to the ground with shock and horror as Niko dies loudly, but that’s not all. Before her attack, Dasha added a note to the rake for Eve to find, “Still Got It.” If she wanted to shove Eve and Villanelle apart forever this might just be it. Even if Eve waived back and forth from her lame husband, she clearly still loved him in some way and wanted to keep him safe and now that’s been shattered completely.
Meanwhile, Villanelle, ignorant of all of this, ends the episode in her home possibly to reconnect with her family.
In general, except for Niko’s inevitable death at the end, the episode was pretty bland and scattered. Almost as if they’re just recycling the same plotlines for those characters again and again. Villanelle and Eve come together, Villanelle does something gruesome (or in this case gets framed for it) Eve backs away and tries to catch her, only to become drawn in by her again. Now that Niko is dead the final obstacle between them has fallen and a new one has erupted, how this will play out between them, and who will cast the next severe wound is up in the air. Let’s hope this latest situation will force them to break some new ground in the series.
