Elsbeth Season 3 Episode 15 could have been boring, but it wasn’t.
For the second week in a row, Elsbeth went up against an entitled, narcissistic woman who thought she knew how to cover her tracks perfectly.
However, Elsbeth Season 3 Episode 15 wasn’t about someone used to throwing her power around — it was about a woman who wanted so desperately to be loved that she killed the person who told her the truth about her behavior.
Rachel Was The Perfect Balance of Smug and Insecure
This character was as ridiculous as she was obnoxious, and that made her the perfect foil for Elsbeth.
She was a party planner whose ego was too big to sustain the truth that she had alienated all her friends with her controlling behavior, and when she was confronted with that, she lost control and killed the messenger.
I completely believed that this crime was a spur-of-the-moment thing. Rachel panicked, threw the weapon in the dishwasher, and then came up with this plan on the fly to frame Howie for the murder.
Thank goodness Elsbeth could tell the difference between minute shades of yellow, because I couldn’t.
I was with Donnelly on that one — those two pots looked exactly the same until Elsbeth put the lid on the murder weapon and demonstrated that it matched the pot.
That’s the kind of great, Sherlock Holmes-like detail that Elsbeth used to pick up on regularly. Elsbeth Season 3 has gone off track a bit, but finally returned to its roots with that clue.
Of course, the fact that the second pan had traces of blood that were hard to wash off and that there was also blood in the dishwasher filter was stronger evidence than the yellow pan color debate, but it was still neat that Elsbeth picked up on the discrepancy.
Meanwhile, Rachel’s plans to cover her tracks grew increasingly elaborate, but paying off Carson was stupid and implausible.
I get that he was supposedly bribed into giving her an alibi, but after she was so nasty to him, there was no reason for him to cover for her, and I found it hard to believe he did.
Of course, the guy was such a doofus that he showed up at the police station. ina brand new Cybertruck after admitting he had run into Rachel on his bike, so their plan to give her an alibi fell apart quickly.
I guess some men are desperate for attention, but sheesh. Have some self-respect and don’t let some woman you just met bribe you into giving her a fake alibi.
Could Donnelly’s Doubts Be Any More Annoying?
Not so much fun: Donnelly continually insisting that Elsbeth had to be wrong.
As you know if you’ve followed my Elsbeth reviews for any length of time, that doubting-cop trope is my least favorite part of Elsbeth.
It simply makes no sense to assume she’s got it all wrong after all the times she’s already shown up the cops.
In this case, it was especially stupid. The only evidence against Howie was that he was drunk and was found holding a pot that could have been the murder weapon.
There was no physical evidence on the pot. Since Donnelly was so good at understanding the forensics when it came to the real murder weapon, she should have at least questioned the narrative she saw.
At least she grudingly admitted that Elsbeth was right after the other pot was found, completely with blood traces that proved it was the weapon. But she wouldn’t have had to apologize if she had used her brain in the first place.
Chief Wagner wisely stayed out of it, allowing Elsbeth to do her thing, but he probably would have sided with her if he could.
He’s been wrong when it comes to her enough times to know better.
Of course, all that doubting gave Elsbeth plenty of reasons to talk to Rachel and try to get the truth out of her, which was fun.
I Wasn’t Thrilled With Wagner’s Story Either
Chief Wagner made the faux pas of inviting both his daughter and her ex to his anniversary party, and then he had to find a way to uninvite Rivers.
This kind of plot belonged on a sitcom somewhere, not as a subplot of Elsbeth Season 3 Episode 15.
I’m not a fan of people declaring that if someone else is invited, they won’t be coming to a party.
My belief has always been that that’s that person’s problem, and if they don’t come, they’re the ones missing out.
Unfortunately, Wagner didn’t see it that way and had an awkward exchange with Rivers, which led Rivers to pretend his aunt had died so he’d have an excuse not to go.
Wagner should have stuck to his original belief that decisions shouldn’t be made solely on the basis of who felt uncomfortable.
Alex’s speech was also somewhat of a let-down — he told the truth, stayed in the campaign, and life went on. I loved him and Elsbeth watching ET, but the rest felt like a waste of time.