Judge, Jury & Executioner
Mr Mercedes returns this week with a continuation of the Rothstein saga, and an episode that sees Bill get closer to figuring out what happened while Morris formulates a plan of his own to track down his lucrative stash. All of this builds to a dramatic finale that looks set to push Mr Mercedes back to its supernatural roots laid last season. The episode itself begins with Bill arriving at Rothstein’s house and checking the police report about what happened. It’s here he deduces that Rothstein shot first and then the third man shot him. As he wonders just what may have stolen from the open safe, Bill spitballs ideas with Jerome and Holly around the case. Meanwhile the defence and prosecution return to the Judge with bad news – they haven’t come to an agreement and a plea deal seems to be off the table, much to the disdain of the Judge. As it happens, he’s also called Bill in too and grills him for his report, telling him he needs to come up with something less pie-in-the-sky and more substantial. Standing up, Bill threatens him but the Judge does agree to extend the date of the verdict until Tuesday. If this goes to trial it’s going to go very badly for one of them and to avoid that, he wants them to come up with a plea deal by then. Peter, the boy who managed to snatch up the stash last episode, heads back to the crash site and finds the dead body of Stan in the upturned car. Meanwhile Morris comes under fire for losing the manuscripts and is determined to get them back. Analysing a map of the area, he begins to write down a list of people living nearby before Danielle sits him down and talks about Rothstein. She assumes he’s mourning the author’s passing, unaware of the real reason he’s so obsessed with this case. As it happens, everything appears to be connected as Peter’s Dad was one of Brady’s hit and run victims in the first season. After their fight earlier in the day, Bill learns where the Judge drinks and heads there to smooth things over. However, he’s called to the car crash site first where they find Stan in the car. He tells him Finkelstein needs to take a plea deal but unfortunately Lou won’t budge, especially after how confident her lawyer was at settling the case. This goes right down to the wire too, as the people want it to go to trial but due to a lack of evidence, self-defence is off the tables. The Judge leaves things open for a trial with a final closing statement involving Lou being taken to an institution for at least four weeks and undergoing a mental health trial to check her sanity. Given she told Finkelstein she’s been seeing and hearing Brady earlier in the episode, this is the worst possible outcome for her. At the morgue, Bill learns the truth about Stan. He’s what they call a “Dead Herring”; an intentional ploy to throw them off the scent of what’s really going on. He and Antonio talk about the case and it’s here he tells him this is their calling – their chance to find the ones responsible for killing Rothstein. The episode then closes out with Lou being taken to a mental institution and seeing Brady in her cell, prompting her to scream. With an open ending and plenty of questions left unanswered, Mr Mercedes finally looks set to deliver some supernatural drama after a somewhat subdued few episodes. In a way, this has worked well to lay the foundations for the season to come and much like last year, the pacing is deliberately slow here as the scene is set and everything begins to slot into place. The cat and mouse vibe returns this season too and although Morris is nowhere near as charismatic as Brady, he does well to maintain a maniacal edge in the face of the manuscript saga. Quite how this will tie in to Brady (if at all) remains to be seen. Still, Brendan Gleeson does well here to keep things ticking over and his gruff, prickly demeanor works really well alongside the other characters. Quite where this is likely to go from here is still unknown but the ending certainly leaves the door wide open for where this may go next. Season three of Mr. Mercedes airs Tuesdays at 10pm ET/PT on AT&T AUDIENCE Network. AT&T AUDIENCE Network is available on all AT&T video platforms including DIRECTV Ch. 239, AT&T TV NOW, and U-verse.
