S6E6 - “Devil’s Night”
We open in Detroit Michigan. Detroit, I am so sorry. (DF)
Detroit is the Potato Chip Capital, based on consumption alone. Detroiters consume 7 pounds of chips a year on average as of 2014. The rest of America eats only 4 pounds annually.
We see some run-down parts of the city, and then we see a hooded figure in an abandoned factory. The hooded figure is literally dragging a guy with cuffs down a hall. They start grappling with each other when the man being dragged comes to, and he’s asking: “why are you doing this? Don’t do this?”. The hooded figure starts pouring gasoline over the handcuffed man. The hooded figure gets s blow torch and sets the prisoner on fire.
Now we see Hotch with a jack-o-lantern calling for Jack. Jack doesn’t have his Halloween costume on anymore, and we learn that he doesn’t want to be spiderman anymore because the costume is itchy, and because he doesn’t know. So basically hotch and jack made cookies for Halloween, and it’s very cute. They look store-bought. How about some more DF?
Did you know that the Detroit River is not actually a river. It’s a strait. A strait is a waterway that connects two larger bodies of water. The Detroit River creates a passage between Lake Huron and Lake Erie.
Cut to the BAU and Reid is talking to Prentis about how Halloween is a very American holiday; basically, how there are connections to other holidays. It’s very much a melting-pot of American culture and commercialized.
Garcia comes in looking like an absolute pumpkin, and the team gets ready for a briefing. Garcia talks about how they are killing a lot of trees with all the briefing and papers they are using. Hotch comes in and ruins everyone’s Halloween plans by saying they are going to Detroit that weekend, and Reid seems absolutely shocked as if he hasn’t been working this job for like…six years by now.
Hotch explains that arson investigators have noticed a trend in the last three years leading up to Halloween – Devil’s Night – where this unsub is only killing on these days, and he is burning the victims alive. Seemingly random people, dumping their bodies randomly. Attacking the city at its most vulnerable time.
So then the team arson/exposition drops about arsonists. Reid talks about how arsonists are usually young men who are white, between 17-25, and can’t stay away from fire. They are addicted to it and can’t stay away. There is also no rehab for this addiction. They usually target dwellings as well, rather than people. Aka, burn a building down, not a person.
So perhaps, this is a killer, not an arsonist. And his weapon is fire. So basically the question is, how does he get these people, and how does he transport them around without being noticed?
Parts of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech debuted in Detroit. Though the actual speech was delivered during the March on Washington in August 1963, King also said some of the speech during Detroit's Walk to Freedom in June 1963.
On the BAU jet, Reid talks about the cultural importance and significance of Devil’s night. So much like Prentis, I thought it was the night before Halloween (I think my dad used to call it Mischief night), but according to Reid it is the 3 days/nights before Halloween, and it is like, a city-wide celebration in Detroit. Let’s get some more Detroit facts.
More than 70 feature films and a dozen television shows have been filmed in Detroit.
Who wouldn’t want to spend an afternoon traipsing around town checking out the film locations of Transformers, Evil Dead, Beverly Hills Cop and Freaks and Geeks?
In Detroit, Devil’s Night has masks, costumes, and chaos. As they say in the show, think of mardi gras, but like, with vandalism and arson. Maybe think of like, when the Eagles win. Reid says it all kind of started as pranks in the 1930s but escalated in the 70s with disenfranchised youth. And now with today’s economy, the foreclosures, and unemployment rates, it must be a “chaos free for all”.
They talk about how this unsub must be really angry – especially given the severity of which he is killing the victims. However, extreme anger usually manifests in a quick temper, but this guy must be patient. At the Fire Department, they meet up with a guy who is presumably the fire chief, and he has a GREAT voice. He tells them he hies they have a strong stomach at the morgue.
They look at the morgue, and basically, the body is just a crisp! It is a fourth-degree burn, and there is a fracture on the skull – the victim had been blitz attacked before being burned. Additionally, the fabric basically fused to the body during the burning, leaving just scraps. However, it appears that all the victims (past and present) were wearing a mask of sorts while being burned. He doesn’t want his victims looking at him – even though he wants to watch them burn. AN execution.
Prentis and Morgan visit the place of the crime, and they meet Al Garner with the DFD. He says that it isn’t as crazy now as it was in the 80s (devil’s night), and he tells them about a community group with over 1000 volunteers who are helping keep the city safe since the budget does not allow for increased police patrol. They go inside, and they learn it is an old engine factory from the industrial age – the car boom. He was watching from a strange location. He probably knows the response times (or listens to them) to know how long he could watch before leaving.
We see the unsub listening to a radio. It looks like he is involved in this community in some way, as he has lots of posters.
Next we cut to Reid talking about the victims and victimology. He says at first it didn’t make sense – 7 victims, all different ages, sex, and ethnicity. However, the first victim Tommy had a very long rap sheet. His body wasn’t found for days, and it took a long time to find him and it took him a long time to burn. It deems as if he also knew all the victims.
They meet with the most recent victim’s wife. She is very upset. There is a long dramatic shot. But before we get into this, how about another Detroit fact?
Techno music was invented in Detroit.
Who knew? Three high school friends actually founded the genre in a garage here in the late 1980s, and Detroit still hosts the world’s largest outdoor electronica festival each year. Read our piece about Detroit techno if you want to know more. Of course, the city’s music scene doesn’t stop here: Motown legends, hip-hop superstars and even several rock gods call Detroit home.
Prentis introduces herself, and she sits with the wife. She asks to see the picture of her husband, and Prentis was like… he was burned you don’t wanna see that. Kristen finds out that he was burned alive because somehow she didn’t know that.
Rossi does one of those “close your eyes” exercises. Now we get some blurry and shaky cam shots of them at the party from the night before. We find out that they met at the festival when they were in high school, and they would go every year. However, they did not dress up this year. She says they were grilling lamb, and food and they separated when we went to go get food. She says he went to the Mexican restaurant while she was ordering, and she sees someone sitting a little bit behind Tony. It’s a man wearing a mask, and it is a black guy wearing half a mask – he is severely burned.
The team meets to discuss this – he is punishing his victims for “punishing him” even though some of his victims probably had less/more significant interactions. Morgan suggests that maybe he is targeting couples that have relationships he covets. Especially since he has a deformity that would make him insecure.
Next we see a guy driving and singing “he’s got the whole world in his hands” his daughter is singing, and he does not notice while he is fucking blitz attacked and dragged off before getting his daughter out of the car. She sees the face of the unsub in the side window as he drags her dad off. How about another DF?
Detroit holds a lot of firsts. A lot of firsts.The first paved road, first individually assigned phone numbers, first state fair and even the first place an automatic coffee maker was ever used. Detroit’s always been home to some truly innovative thinkers, and it still is!
Now we see the unsub zooming around in his car. The BAU discusses – how would someone with so much control choose an unpredictable weapon. They decide they need to look into cases from the past where a couple were both burned and gasoline was the accelerant. They get a phone call about the girl’s dad missing, and the girl on the phone “A Monster” took her dad. We now see shots of the dad – Christopher Edwards – coming too in the car, and he is awake saying “Kaman let me go” and stuff to that effect.
The Detroit PD sets up roadblocks. Garcia sees that CE is a contractor, so she starts looking into subcontractors. She starts cross-referencing the list of subcontracts with people on Detroit’s Finest list to see if there is any crossover. She finally finds someone while crossing the Michigan business directory with the payroll, and she finally finds one guy; Kaman Scott.
Christopher is begging Kaman to let him go; he offers him money or a job. According to Garcia, from the looks of his early years, he was “on the track to be some kind of hoodlum bad boy super convict” (this is coded, racist language) however, in 2002 something changed and he cleaned up his act. He also had a connection with Tommy Procter – they were arrested together, but then a couple of years later, they were in a car accident; Tommy hit Kaman and the car exploded. So there’s the revenge. Tony Terrel was the Kaman’s landlord.
The BAU gets Kaman’s address. They show up at the apartment, but it looks pretty abandoned. And HUGE. There are no mirrors, lights; etc. it does not look personal at all. They talk about how the abduction tonight seemed very different – he went on personal property and took Christopher with a witness. Also – what is the connection here?
We see Kama crippling Christopher and setting him on fire. He is running around and he runs into a car. The car stops, and Kaman takes off. But like, he’s toast – fuck – bad choice of words - but Kaman left his car right there, and if Christopher makes it, he can tell whoever it is that hit him who Kaman is.
Unfortunately, it looks like Christopher Edwards did not make it, and he fired Kaman 7 months ago. They look in his car, and the most notable thing in it is the cage in the back. They also believe he will strike again soon. Back at Kaman’s apartment, Morgan finds a book under Kaman’s pillow. There are photos of a girl in the book, and Prentis believes that she is most likely his next target. Garcia starts looking into finding out who she is.
Kaman shows up at Jay-Mo’s diner. The guy there is like, nope, we’re closed. Kaman gets aggressive and asks where Tracy is. Kaman beats this guy to shit because he won’t tell Kaman where Tracy is. We later learn that the man who owns this diner is Tracy’s father.
Garcia finds out that the place is called Jay-Mo’s, and it was Kaman and Tracy’s favorite place. Kaman starts…cooking. And he lights the place on fire while the owner is tied up inside. Hotch just WALKS INTO the burning restaurant and pulls the owner out, SECONDS before it blows. Tracy’s Father lives and tells the BAU about his daughter Tracy.
Kaman is being a creep and looking through the window watching Tracy’s aunt and uncle. He sneaks into the house and attacks Tracy’s uncle. Her aunt sees he’s been attacked and sees Kaman in the house. He douses them both in gasoline and asks where Tracy is. They keep telling him that she is at medical school in Ohio, but he does not believe them.
The BAU, police, etc are swarming the place, but they have to be really careful. They get a single shot on Kaman.
Kaman is blaming them, saying it is their fault. He lights the blow torch, but Tracy comes in and stops him. She apologizes, but then shit gets even wilder when a little kid comes in asking for his mommy. There is hubbub about who the baby belongs to.
We find out that the kid belongs to Kaman, and hotch uses that to his advantage, saying not to kill them in front of your son. Tracey admits that she found out after the accident that she was pregnant, and she thought Kaman was gonna die, so she decided to have the kid. But then when Kaman survived, she just decided to not… tell him that he was a father??? And end their relationship?
But I guess it’s okay because the kid’s name is “Daniel Kaman Anderson”, and the kid touches the burnt side of Kaman’s face. FAM TRACEY SHOULD HAVE TOLD KAMAN THAT HE WAS A FATHER. Kaman allows himself to be peacefully apprehended.
Back at home, Jack is dressed as a “real superhero” for Halloween – and that is “you, daddy”. So much fatherhood in this episode!
The official motto of Detroit: Speramus Meliora; Resurget Cineribus, which is Latin for “We hope for better things; it shall rise from the ashes.”
Rating Criteria:
Criminal/Serial Killer: 17/20
Character development/ character arcs: 15/20
Forensics/Context: 12/20
Script writing: 10/20
Background characters: 18/20
Overall: 72/100