Perry Mason Chapter Two Review

For our review of the last episode of Perry Mason, click here.

Synopsis: Following one of her trademark barn-burning sermons, Evangelical preacher Sister Alice offers the Dodsons the church’s full moral and financial support – much to her mother Birdy’s dismay. During a routine domestic intervention, beat cop Paul Drake is rerouted to a gruesome crime scene, where he follows a confounding trail of evidence. Mason is left incensed by a jaw-dropping admission from Baggerly and, after pressing Emily on her husband’s alibi, finds himself confronted by an outraged Emily. Detectives Holcomb and Ennis use Drake’s findings to their own advantage. (HBO)

When you thought the mystery was going one way, this latest episode went ahead and threw more reasonable doubt into the mix. While there’s still plenty of shady in the mix, it will surely all come together somehow for better or for worse. Meanwhile, the episode would start to tear back some of the layers off of Mason’s gruff exterior. providing a glimpse of where that damage came from and proving that he’s clearly been through some things.

Chapter Two began with a flashback of Mason’s time in WWI where he was part of a massive battle. The episode saw him reflecting on that battle on multiple occasions throughout, supposedly the one that led to his discharge for executing wounded soldiers. Meanwhile, Mason was still on the Dodson case, starting with looking into the thread used to stitch Charlie Dodson. The leader of the church, Sister Alice (Tatiana Maslany) led her latest sermon to start off the new year. Hearing about the Dodson’s plight, she offered them the full aid of the temple while the elders offer to cover their expenses.

Under the guise of showing a lineup to Matthew Dodson, the police arrested him as the result of a witness claiming to see him at his home at the time of Charlie’s kidnapping despite his claim to have been working at the time. Meanwhile, Paul Drake (Chris Chalk) was an ambitious, up-and-coming police officer who somehow found himself stumbling onto the conspiracy behind the Dodson kidnapping and the murder scene of his would-be kidnappers (one of them was a detective working on the case, Ennis (Andrew Howard)). Ennis and Detective Holcomb (Eric Lange) tried to steer him away from his suspicions that someone murdered the men and fled to the roof before disappearing while they claimed the opposite to be the case. Drake had no choice but to comply being a black officer with no chance to climb higher in the ranks. However, by the end of the episode he would find evidence proving his theory.

Through Matthew Dodson’s surprise interrogation, we learned that Mason’s benefactor, Herman Baggerly (Robert Patrick), was also his father. This led the police to believe that Matthew was extorting his father. Mason looked into the police’s witness but Emily Dodson’s alibi became more and more suspicious. This got worse as Mason found evidence that she was having an affair with a man named George who appeared to have commited suicide a considerable amount of time prior, leaving a note implying a part in the kidnapping. Mason believed that the extortion scheme was orchestrated by Emily and George. Meanwhile. Emily was overwhelmed by the responsibility following her son’s death just as the temple and Alice’s mother Birdy’s (Lili Taylor). Following Charlie’s funeral (and a fiery sermon from Sister Alice that put the authorities on notice), Emily Dodson was arrested.

In the end, the Dodson angles seem to merely be a smokescreen for some bigger play. This combination of plot and character development has been an interesting one so far as Rhys continues to deliver as Mason. Meanwhile, Maslany was impressive in what looks to be a meaty role. She should be in more things.

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.