- Title: Murder in a Small Town – A Chill Rain
- IMDb: link
Notable for downplaying the romance into a subplot separate from the latest murder, “A Chill Rain” gives us Zoe Strachan (Stana Katic) whose brother is found murdered after arriving in town begging for money to pay of loan sharks. It’s not a bad episode, but there’s little surprise that Zoe is the killer (and just what is that accent from Katic?). Zoe is smart enough not to incriminate herself but acts incredibly recklessly in lying to the police and bullying her nephew when a little kindness, even faked, would likely have led her to getting away with murder. Her recklessness makes you wonder how she remained out of jail for so long.
The downplayed romantic episode is pops up her and there with Cassandra Lee (Kristin Kreuk) spending time with an old friend. Again, however, while her actions might have created some insecurity where Karl (Rossif Sutherland), especially while navigating the rocky nature of the relationship, the show doesn’t ever seriously sell the man as a legitimate love interest for the town librarian. A more interesting take might have been to introduce Zoe previously, given her flirty behavior with the sheriff, and save her murder until later in the series (which would also have allowed more appearances from Katic which I wouldn’t object to, even with that accent).
