S3E12 - “Third Life”
The episode begins with shaky-cam shit going on in the woods. We can hear what is presumably a girl screaming, and then some shots of bloody legs and feet? Quickly the camera pulls away and there are a ton of police cars and officers swarming the woods, and apparently, a body has been found. Apparently, there are two missing girls, and this seems to be the body of one of them. The girls have been missing for 18 hours, and the search dogs found the body five hours before the beginning of this episode. Apparently, the parents of the girl have been at the crime scene the whole five hours and the police are running out of excuses of what to tell them.
The lead police dude or whatever he is called admits to being really grateful that the FBI is there because he’s “never seen anything like that”. Her face and hands have been “obliterated”. The parents of the girl dropped her and her friend off at a movie theatre, went and got dinner, but when they went to pick them up they were gone. The usher tells them that the girls left halfway through the movie and went outside to smoke a cigarette.
Prentis, Goobs, and Rossi inspect the body of the deceased girl and deduce that she was strangled to death. She also has a ton of bruising and injuries on her body. Hotchs explains that given her face and hands are destroyed, she likely knew her attacker; destroying her ID the unsub is hoping to delay the police making a connection between the victim and unsub, as well as giving the unsub time to getaway. The BAU also asserts that this location - ravine woodsy thing - is the dumpsite, so they need to figure out where specifically they were actually killed.
Morgan approaches Mrs. Owen - the mother of one of the girls - and asks if he can listen to a voice message that Katie left her on the phone. Morgan asks for Garcia to access the voice message and run filters through it. Additionally, the police and BAU say they need to move the body of the deceased girl, despite the fact that she has not been ID’d. Mr Vaughn, Lindsey’s dad keeps saying he could ID the body, but the police/BAU really do not want him to do that, and refuse to let him.
Garcia runs the filters, and the message is actually really alarming. We can hear a girl’s voice saying “stop! Don’t fight them! Please, no, please!” and phrases of that nature. Garcia shares it with the team and says it lasts exactly 53 seconds, until it goes dead...as she likely did as well. Rossi suggests that the parents ID the voice, but the rest of the team is like UH NO. the local police dude suggests DNA, but Hotch thinks that would take too long and it wouldn’t give them time to find the other girl.
Hotch - you know, king of bedside manner - goes to tell the parents of the girls about the message. He explains its the last minute of one of their daughters’ lives. They explore the different options they have, such as making a public appeal, but agree it likely isn’t a good idea, and decide to all listen to the tape, which is wildly traumatic for everyone.
Bruce - Katie’s dad - says it is definitely not her, but everyone seems to think he is on a huge denial trip. He even suggests they play it again. Jack - Lindsey’s dad - is like...its Katie. Its very sad.
Hotch says he wants Lindsey’s picture posted everywhere. Rossi also then brings up that on the tape there is a lot of screaming and crying, but they haven’t had any calls from neighbors or anyone complaining, so they deduce Katie must have been killed somewhere where there weren’t any neighbors. We have that clear map and “comfort zone” conversation again. ANNOYING.
Prentis and Hotch go to the movie theatre where the girls went missing. They see two other girls standing outside smoking and talking about “boys”. The “boys” show up. They talk about how it is hard to adduct two girls in plain sight without being seen - so they likely knew whoever it was that abducted them. At Lindsey’s home, Morgan, Goobs and Rossi ask about Linsey;’s mom. Morgan also calls her dad out on the fact that Lindsey’s room is very much NOT what a teenage girls would have.
Garcia found a blog - vlog - and she is talking about Lindsey and her dad. She calls Lindsey’s dad a “creep”. They moved there 6 years ago, and her mom died in a car accident. EXCEPT THAT LINDSEY TOOK HER LIFE AND NAME FROM A BOOK. Goobs also sees that her dad’s computer is designed to wipe its history every day. It is impossible to track his internet history.
Rossi then is like ‘DOESNT LOOK MUCH LIKE A HOME’. They basically say, ya interior design is trash. This seems like a rental. Reid goes on to try to politely say that the way Lindsey behaved on the tape, and the words she said - now Rossi cuts him off and is like - she was either coached or has been through sexual abuse before, what gives. Guns are drawn, its a tense mess. Jack’s friend pulls out a badge from his pocket - he is a marshal. Basically jack and Lindsey are under witness protection.
Cut and we now see Lindsey in a public restroom by herself. She is bound and has obviously been roughed up. The sink is dripping ominously. She is Unwell.
Cut and we see the the BAU checking in on Jack and the Owens. Mr Owens is like - why are you keeping me away? Turns out Jack is a states witness, and has been under witness protection for 10 years. Its very serious. He also says that it would be Irish American - 2 or more men - that would come after him if anyone. Hotch is PISSED he was kept in the dark about this - and that Jack’s friend is like, not telling him anything. The Owens are FREAKING OUT.
Now we see a horrific home video vlog from Katie singing Rihanna. Garcia researches flights to see if any Irishmen are flying in/staying in the area. Jack is in custody.
Lindsey has reached the point of screaming at the sink for dripping. She tries using her teeth to turn the faucet because her hands are tied. Then we see someone - two guys - walking into the bathroom. He does not know who they are - but one of them holds up a knife. He is like “you don’t know who i am, but i know who you are”. And says more generally threatening shit. So dramatic.
Hotch interrogates Jack, but he isn’t saying anything. But he basically works for the Irish mob. The McCrealan brothers are the ones he used to work for, and who they think may be behind this. Local police also say that they have found something in an abandoned house - which i guess makes sense given the neighbors didn’t say anything and the whole comfort zone nonsense.
Inside the house is a lot of beer bottles, and then blood smudges all over the walls. And then they find what is truly a relic of its time - a pink flip phone with KO bedazzled all over it. AND there is a belt, which is what they suspect was used to strangle Katie. They point out how many cigs and beer bottles have been left around - which is weird given that these two are supposed to be ya know, professional killers. Rossi believes they are sending a message. They also think they maybe has nothing to do with the mob. There is a trail of blood that leads outside, they follow it, but it stops in the yard. They search the grounds and the houses near by. There are a lot of scenes of the different BAU members just sneakin through houses and kicking down doors. Hotch finds one house with blood smeared on the inside. It leads to a body of a young man who has been stabbed three times. His cellphone was also left with him, and he has scratch marks all over his face, a bite mark on his hand, etc. all defensive wounds. Rossi suggests he was in on something, and then tried to back out, hence he was taken out by another one of the unsubs. This is even more unsettling because of how young he looks!
They tell Jack and he is also shocked to learn the age of this dead unsub. They believe it was teenage boys - social dynamics. Garcia looks into school records, trying to find the ID of this teenage boy who they found dead. Garcia finds him. Hotch briefs the team and police, saying this teenage male wanted out, but then the dominant male attacked him. We learn that his name was Douglas Silverman, and he was 18 years old. They believe there must have been at least two more boys involved, one will be older and have minor misdemeanors on his record.
Cut and we see the two other boys fighting in front of Lindsey. One of them seems to want one, whereas the other is like WE NEED A GUN. Lindsey calls the dominant one dumb, and he threatens her more. But she doesn’t seem too scared.
Cut to a recycling plant and Hotch and Prentis are there. They go to talk to one of the workers - it is Douglas’s dad. They have to break the news that he is dead. Cut and we see JJ asking the Owens if they know anything about Douglas - or if Katie ever said anything. We also learn that Lindsey knew everything about her dads history. We see more home videos from Katie - she talks about some boys she likes - who Lindsey is telling her to stay away from. She describes the two others as “dweebs”. Garcia is trying to match these descriptions etc to names. We also learn that Lindsey was very protective of Katie.
AND THEN Mr Owens approaches Jack and is like “I want to know if you are capable of doing what you still do”, and says he knows who Douglas hangs out with. And now. Jack stole a car and is ON THE LAM. Garcia has told them they are looking for a Ryan Phillips, who is 28 yo. Jack shows up at Ryan’s house and is like WHERE IS MY DAUGHTER. He then POINTS A gun and SHOOTS THIS KID IN THE LEG. we don’t even know if this is RYAN???? My god???
Reid nerds out and identities that they probably took her to Mayfield High. We cut and see Lindsey and Ryan. Ryan is ANGRY. He throws his cellphone in a urinal, and he prepares to sexually assault her I guess. Jack is in the school now too, so we know the kid how got shot must have told him about this location.
We see Reid scouting the building alone i guess? Ryan is getting up in Katie’s business. And jack shows up and smacks him with the gun. Lindsey is begging her dad to kill Ryan, and Reid shows up and tries to deescalate the situation. While Lindsey still says KILL HIM. Ride is like “when does it stop?” and jack goes ‘TOMORROW” and blows his head out. Reid is in shock from what he saw. Rossi points out that depending on how important of a witness Jack is he might get away with this scot free.
And then we get a merchant of Venice quote. Cut and we see Lindsey and Jack in Georgia now. And Lindsey introduces herself to new neighbors as Katie as Rihanna is in the background.
Rating Criteria:
Criminal/Serial Killer: 15/20
Character development/ character arcs: 10/20
Forensics/Context: 7/20
Script writing: 15/20
Background characters: 20/20
Overall: 67/100