The Truth Will Out
As we’re gearing up toward the business end of this season, Hightown returns for a more intense episode as the noose starts to tighten around Frankie and Osito’s throat. While the drama continues to suffer from the same issues that have plagued most of its run-time, this week’s episode is a little better with some solid plotting and a consistent push toward our unconventional protagonists uncovering the truth. Episode 6 of Hightown begins with Krista’s body taken out the motel room as police swarm the area. As it turns out, there was a witness to what happened the previous night who confirms to Ray that two men walked into the room that night but she can’t be sure exactly what they looked like. Jackie shows up and speaks to Ray about the missed call. He grills her for being drunk and this clearly rattles her. As they keep talking, Ray confirms he believes Frankie was behind Krista’s death. She immediately wishes him dead but right now Ray tells her to go home. After what happened at the motel, Junior struggles to get a grip on his personal life, placing his child back in the crib and lying down while she cries. Meanwhile, Frankie Jr. falls over and Renee is forced to take him to hospital. While Jackie cries as the gravity of what her drinking has done hits home, back at the station Ray starts going through the security footage and trying to find something to pin on Osito. Instead of CCTV footage though, the Lieutenant tells him to pin Osito directly at the motel otherwise all of this is just circumstantial. Although it can’t necessarily be used in court, the CCTV footage Ray finds does confirm it was Junior and Osito out that night. Jackie heads back to therapy but this time she actually tries to get involved, with a poignant, heartfelt statement about her addiction. After a round of applause from the other members, she hears Junior hasn’t shown up prompting her to head out and find him. In the street she stops him but Junior is clearly rattled, thanks in part to his earlier conversation with Osito where he told him to watch his back. At the prison, Frankie hears his son refer to Ray as “Uncle Ray” and immediately calls Renee a whore and goes on to admit Ray slept with Sherry too before she died. After an ominous threat, Renee leaves with her son as Frankie eyeballs them. Jackie tracks down Renee at the strip bar and tries to convince her to talk. While she refuses to give her much, she does recommend Jackie visit Frankie in prison to get the truth from him instead. Once there, Frankie realizes who she is and the two start talking. However, things go south quickly and it prompts her to threaten him and promise to make sure he stays behind bars for a long time. Ray interviews Scotty at the station and demands he speak about Krista. Through some intense pressure, Ray manages to get a statement that confirms Osito is directly linked to the murders, prompting Ray to go straight to Osito’s house and bring him in for questioning. Osito refuses to play ball though and decides to get a lawyer involved instead. Ray however, sees this as evidence that he’s involved and works harder to try and pursue this. Meanwhile, a battered and bruised Junior heads home after his drug deal incident earlier in the episode while Jackie finds evidence linking Junior’s boat to the murers, which is where the episode ends. While the drama this week is a little more exciting and the series is starting to gear up toward a dramatic climax, Hightown continues to experience issues portraying empathetic, likable characters. Renee gets very little screen-time this week while Jackie seems to have turned a new leaf…until she asks her colleague at the end out for drink which undoes this work. Despite that though, the cat and mouse game between Osito and the police is reasonably interesting and there’s an injection of pace in this episode which looks like it’s gearing up for a decent finish. Given this one has already been renewed for a second season however, it remains to be seen if we’ll have this case wrapped up or if there’s another twist in the tale to come.
