Heartbreaking
Episode 7 of Unbelievable begins with Karen learning they’ve now gone from one suspect to two. Heading back to the station, the case is blown wide open as the group scramble to piece together timelines for both brothers. For now at least, they’re handling the cups as one shared piece of DNA. As they dive into the family history, all hope rests on the DNA results to get them into the house. With a timeline now drawn up for both Chris and Curtis, Karen turns her attention to a specific event that may be linked to buying a gun and items for the next assault. This leads them down a new path that sees Christopher buying a gun on April 22nd. The same date that of course, coincides to the sexual assault. As they get the DNA results back, Karen prepares for the house arrest while Grace hangs back at the station, attempting to handle the handful of other cases on her desk. On a mission and with a steely resolve, Karen arrives at the house with a squad of other officers and arrests Chris. Spying the birthmark on his left calf, she reads his rights and heads inside the house. Here she finds disks with names written on them in an office and the pink camera mentioned by one of the suspects. Opening up the closet, she goes on to find the rucksack and shoes. With Christopher now behind bars and a mountain of evidence against him, Karen spies an amplifier with a whole stack of women’s underwear in. Elias was right – he’s taking the underwear as trophies. Back in 2008, Marie arrives at counselling where she refuses to engage and sits twiddling her thumbs until the time is over. However, as she talks about zombie films with Dara, the therapist tells her she believes that she didn’t fabricate the story and thinks there may be an element of truth to it. Here she opens up a little and talks about the incident, telling Dara she wishes she lied earlier and figured it out on her own without the need for the police to become involved. It’s devastating and seeing everyone fail her in her life is a heartbreaking moment. In 2011, Karen and Grace enter the interview room with Curtis and ask him to show them his leg. It’s clean and no birthmark. Confused, Curtis asks what he’s doing there and it’s here both Grace and Karen tell him the truth about his brother. Shell-shocked, Curtis tells them he had no idea as he sits in stunned silence. As they head out the room, both women are warned about the pictures on Christopher’s computer as the officer tells them he managed to crack the computer and get into the files. As they click through the various pictures, both Karen and Grace struggle to look at the graphic nature of what they’re seeing before stumbling upon pictures of Marie. The episode then bows out on a heartbreaking and devastating note, as Marie tells her therapist “If the truth is inconvenient and doesn’t fit, they don’t believe it”. Out of all the episodes in this 8 part mini-series, this one is by far the most emotional. It’s hard not to feel heartbroken by the ending too and seeing Karen and Grace’s reaction to these photos is testament to the acting prowess in this show. Seeing Curtis’ reaction to hearing what his brother has done is another stand-out moment too and accompanied by the plot reveals and devastating nature of finding all the evidence in Chris’ room, really hammers home the gravity of what’s happened. Unbelievable delivers one of the most emotionally charged episodes here and Marie’s speech at the end is likely to be a big talking point long after this show has finished. The penultimate episode to Unbelievable is very good indeed and easily the highlight of this series.
