Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Director: Various, Via Vision Entertainment.
Cast: Kristin Lehman, Louis Ferreira, Brendan Penny, Lauren Holly, Roger Cross, Warren Christi, Cameron Bright.
Watching a good crime drama on television has merit. Watching Motive takes a bit of getting used to. Why? It’s an original spin on the genre and shows you who the killer and victim are in the opening scenes.
The next question is whether it’s worth watching after you know their identities? The answer? Yes.
That’s when a double-take is in order. As the name suggests, motive is the reason that leads the killer to kill the victim. It’s a good-to-watch drama that explores people’s psyche and the reasons that drive them to do what they do.
When you first meet the killer, you don’t think it could be him/her and ask yourself the relevant questions. It’s when you think about what drives them to do what they do … that’s when you’ll love this collection. Most of the time when you’re introduced to the killer, you can’t place him/her as a killer and it’s interesting to watch what leads them there. What’s even more commendable is watching the story unravel.
Described as a police procedural drama series, Motive is set in Vancouver, British Columbia. It follows the investigations of working class single mother Detective Angie Flynn (Lehman).
There is a motive behind every murder, but feisty female homicide detective Flynn, matches ‘wits with killers in this deadly, cerebral game of cat-and-mouse’. Her team, with the help of the Coroner’s Office, must find their way through twisted, complicated and, at times, diabolical mazes on a quest to analyse the evidence and ultimately, to discover … the motive.
It’s an unusual format, though relatively similar to another TV series Columbo. Once the identity of the killer and victim are revealed, the rest of the episode details the ongoing investigation, the killer’s efforts to cover-up the crime, and, via flashbacks, the events leading to the crime.
Once the truth is uncovered and we learn the killer’s motive, it eliminates some of the usual sources of murder-mystery tension, but there are other factors that come to the fore.
We know the real killer, so we get impatient as police focus on the wrong suspect/s. There’s also the likelihood that the guilty go about their daily business as usual and the innocent incriminate themselves.
This collection comes from the producers of Dexter, featuring all 52 episodes from Seasons 1-4 in a special 16-disc box set.
Among the standard array of characters, Ferreira (Stargate: Universe) is the cynical detective, Lehman (The Killing) is ambitious, cynical and sympathetic and Holly (as the medical examiner) is recognisable from NCIS.
This unconventional crime drama poses the question of `whydunit’ rather than `whodunit’ – and effectively covers the boundaries.
