I love the intro to this tale which sees a completely self-centred and uppity man who won't stop talking about himself at a candlelit dinner one evening until his clearly miserable and beautiful younger wife very dramatically asserts her independence and declares her intentions to run away with a mystery lover, to which he reacts rather negatively and kills her in a fit of rage! To me that scene is one of many in the series that really perfectly embodies the pulpy tongue in cheek kind of tone with a horror edge that the show originally set out to bring to life from the comic books. The reason I love this episode is because it has something that the vast majority of the other ones don't, and that's that it's a very performance-based and character-driven story, and although the plot does have its gory moments and grim surprises, what I like the best about it is just watching the back-and-forths between the cool and collected police officer and the increasingly nervous and agitated businessman as they play off each other and share a long train journey and exchange a sort of unspoken low-key interrogation as they sit opposite each other, face to face. Only in this story the officer isn't trying to get him to crack for the noble purpose of solving a crime and catching a killer, but is working toward his own agenda as he harbours a dark secret of his own, and his ruthless scheme is entrapment of the highest order! How Officer Fine(bit ridiculously on the nose!) traps Andy the murdering husband does seem a bit convoluted but it's actually quite a cleverly thought out plan with early signs and moments in the story that you don't completely get on the first viewing. It is a bit complicated but it seems that Officer Fine killed his own wife at some point after confirming that she was cheating on him when he found her high school ring at the businessman's apartment after he went there to investigate the disturbance and realised that she'd given it to the businessman's wife, then when he presumably knew that Andy had murdered his wife because of the ring being on the floor, he concocted his plan to make Andy crack and pin both murders on him - in my opinion making him the greater evil in this tangled web of infidelity and death! It's a neat idea but some of it really begins to feel like a stretch if you think about it too much, like when could Officer Fine have possibly had the opportunity to switch tags on the suitcases, let alone magically know that Andy would pick the right one, hm.. It's still great tense fun though, I love when Officer Fine is playing around with Andy by stealing his food and trying to get him to lose it with the fear of getting caught. David Paymer is also good in his role, and despite the horrible thing he does and shows absolutely no remorse for, you still feel for him a tiny bit as he's framed for at least one murder that he didn't commit and is dragged away, leaving a scott-free Officer Fine at the end to casually grind up the remains of Andy's wife and flush her down the tubes... Some of the logic and morality is kind of all over the place and the twist is a bit rushed, but it's still a very solid and engaging and slow-burning murder mystery on the rails that's well worth watching. I also love the hilarious wraparound with the Cryptkeeper performing his trademark horror pun themed standup to a truly dead audience! One of the better episodes in the later seasons, just one thing though, instead of "Two For the Show" which makes no sense in relevance to the story at all really, they should have called it Two For the Price of One! X
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