S01.E09: A Secret of My Own

[Spartan Girl]

I don’t know. I’m not ready to let Jeanette off the hook just yet after the show has built her up to Nice Girl Breaking Bad. I’d feel cheated if the show just dropped that for the “Jeanette was the victim and Kate turned vengeful” narrative.

[RachelKM]

22 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

I don’t know. I’m not ready to let Jeanette off the hook just yet after the show has built her up to Nice Girl Breaking Bad. I’d feel cheated if the show just dropped that for the “Jeanette was the victim and Kate turned vengeful” narrative.

I don't see the options as that binary. Jeanette lied, stole items while breaking and entering (which is the technical definition of burglary), was clearly angling to move up socially (not that that one is inherently bad but her method was unnerving), manipulated, and generally acted like a jerk at times.   But maybe I just never saw her as a villain and assumed there would be twist.  To me there is a lot of ground between being a teenage asshole, lying, and social climbing and willfully allowing a missing girl to remain secretly in the home of a school administrator much less trapped in his basement (if there were a later encounter).

Based on the premise of the show, I expected that the truth would fall somewhere in the middle of the two positions and/or it would turn out both girls were deeply flawed.  I never saw them are presenting Jeanette to be BabyWalterWhite. And even if Kate lied, she is still a victim and processing everything through the lens of her trauma. 

[ZeeEnnui]

37 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

I don’t know. I’m not ready to let Jeanette off the hook just yet after the show has built her up to Nice Girl Breaking Bad. I’d feel cheated if the show just dropped that for the “Jeanette was the victim and Kate turned vengeful” narrative.

I'm with you on this. The writing has been too smart, and much too nuanced in its character portrayals to end the show this way. Whatever truth we land on with this show. It's going to be complicated, much like life. 

The things that don't change. 1. Kate is a victim. Full stop. The grooming and the manipulation were not her fault (thanks, and PREACH!, Kate's therapist). Why did she blame Jeanette? We'll find out next week, I guess. I don't think it came from a place of malice. Even Jeanette said early on that she thought the accusation came from a place of trauma.  2. Jeanette may -- and I only say that because we have one episode left -- be innocent of what Kate accused her of, but that doesn't wipe her slate clean. She's a liar, she's shady, manipulative, and shown some disturbing personality traits. Jeanette didn't deserve the social flogging that she received from her town and the media but that doesn't suddenly make her a great person. She doesn't have to be a hero. That's OK. What makes this show so good is how messy, and real it is. People aren't who always who they appear to be, and this show has portrayed this beautifully. 

Edited June 9, 2021 by ZeeEnnui
spell check

[SoMuchTV]

15 hours ago, LittleIggy said:

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I believe Martin thought Kate would leave and go to school then back home after that first evening when she showed up. I don’t think he initially planned the whole thing. Not excusing his subsequent behavior, just saying...

 

14 hours ago, Chicken Wing said:

Yes, I think this is correct. When he left that morning he told her he assumed she would walk to school by herself, and when he came home that evening after being confronted by Joy Wallis he was angry that she didn't leave his house like he thought, and she probably said, she would.

Just part of what makes him so manipulative, really. Just about every one of their interactions is laden with subtle impropriety from an adult authority figure to a minor child, but every now and then he sprinkles in some normal, "responsible" adult responses that would make Kate think that he can't possibly be up to no good, then he's perfectly normal. Like when he told her that she really should call him Mr. Harris and not Martin ... at least when they're in school. And then pouring her a scotch and then "remembering" that she's underage and she shouldn't drink that ... but then immediately agreeing to play a drinking game with her. And pointing out correctly that it would look very bad if people found out that she stayed at his house last night and all day ... but especially bad for him, and does she want him to get in trouble? Creepy AF.

Another interesting thing about this show is how all of Martin's behavior is very calculated and also not. Yes, he is grooming her, had been since the moment they met. He wanted to manipulate her into trusting him as a confidante, a friend, to make her come to him. And, of course, she did, in the end. But did he always intend for her to come willingly to his doorstep looking for a place to stay? If she hadn't, would he have grabbed her off the street, or manipulated her into going to his house and trapped her then? I don't know. As it happened, she just came to him, showed up at his house. And then he thought she would leave in the morning, but she didn't. And he told her to leave that night, and she wouldn't. And then it was like, he's got her, he was after her and he caught her and she's still here, still caught, staying caught, and he couldn't let her go. It was all on purpose, all predatory, all clearly a trap but also so subtle and seemingly coincidental that Kate couldn't possibly have even realized that she was in a snare the whole time.

I'm several hours behind, watching it the next day, but I concur in believing Mr. Harris didn't really intend to "keep" Kate when she showed up on his doorstep.  I feel like his point of no return was when Joy came to his office the next day.  He could have said, "she came to me very upset, I know I should have called you but I wanted to give her some time to cool down, I fully expected she would come to school & go home, let's go get her now and work things out..."  When he didn't do that, everything else became exponentially harder to get out of.

[Cinnabon]

10 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

I was referring to Jeanette’s excuse for putting herself in this situation with her repeated break ins. Because regardless of whether or not she saw Kate—she didn’t see her on Christmas Eve, but we still don’t know if that was the last time she went to the house so she could have seen her another time—it must be sad that those break ins are part of the reason she’s in this mess. Had she not been sneaking into Harris’ house, she’d still be the girl that took Kate’s place but she wouldn’t have been demonized as an accessory after the fact.

Her “excuse” is just being a dumbass teen playing stupid pranks. Like many other kids.

[gesundheit]

2 hours ago, RachelKM said:

I don't see the options as that binary. Jeanette lied, stole items while breaking and entering (which is the technical definition of burglary), was clearly angling to move up socially (not that that one is inherently bad but her method was unnerving), manipulated, and generally acted like a jerk at times.   But maybe I just never saw her as a villain and assumed there would be twist.  To me there is a lot of ground between being a teenage asshole, lying, and social climbing and willfully allowing a missing girl to remain secretly in the home of a school administrator much less trapped in his basement (if there were a later encounter).

Based on the premise of the show, I expected that the truth would fall somewhere in the middle of the two positions and/or it would turn out both girls were deeply flawed.  I never saw them are presenting Jeanette to be BabyWalterWhite. And even if Kate lied, she is still a victim and processing everything through the lens of her trauma. 

Agreed.

 

In fact, it would be a pretty bad show if it opened with Jeanette being accused of this horrific thing, then followed it by showing her doing some shady things and being an asshole, and then concluded it with "yep, the accusation was correct, that's why we showed you how much of an asshole she was!" Great twist! What a misdirect! But yes, I'm still hoping for some explanation that isn't just "Kate knowingly lied."

 

Did Jamie explain why he saved that answering machine message? I can't remember now.

 

Really looking forward to seeing how they found out where Kate was. I sure hope they tell us. I am also curious about Jeanette's absolute certainty that Kate was murdered. 

Edited June 9, 2021 by gesundheit

[RachelKM]

22 minutes ago, gesundheit said:

Did Jamie explain why he saved that answering machine message? I can't remember now.

I think he said he always thought it was possibly Kate and so he saved the machine tape. (I guess he didn't have caller ID to note the call was local or who called) 

22 minutes ago, gesundheit said:

Really looking forward to seeing how they found out where Kate was. I sure hope they tell us. I am also curious about Jeanette's absolute certainty that Kate was murdered. 

How Kate was found needs to be explained!  

I don't think Jeanette was "absolute(ly)" certain that Kate was dead.  I think it was an assumption based on 1) the fact that Kate had been missing for 10 months and 2) that Tennille said she'd been "found" and not that she was back.  

Edited June 9, 2021 by RachelKM

[racked]

10 hours ago, Chicken Wing said:But is it a defense for Jeanette? Kate actually being inside the main house and not in the basement as she claimed she was held all the time doesn't actually answer the question of whether or not Jeanette saw her in the house and failed to report it, and that's what's at stake in the Kate vs. Jeanette thing. Really all this revelation does is impugn Kate's testimony about what she says happened to her. Is Jeanette's defense really going to be about discrediting Kate's claim about being a victim, that she was not "trapped" and she could have walked out of that house anytime she wanted? Is that really how Jeanette and/or her lawyer want to prove Kate as a liar? That could serious bite her in the butt.

And the thing is, Kate being upstairs in the house and not in the basement doesn't discount her being held there against her will.

The goal would be to impeach Kate, and it’s a very successful approach in litigation. If she’s lying about x,y,z why not this? Especially if the goal is to prove she’s lying about Jeanette seeing her because she was jealous over her boyfriend and friends. 
 

I’m in the camp that things both girls are innocent victims. I’m not sure what causes Kate to be so certain that Jeanette saw her but I don’t think she’s actually lying. And I don’t think Jeanette is a sociopath either. But what’s interesting is that if Kate does truly believe Jeanette saw her - she thinks that Jeanette saw her free, roaming around Martin’s home. Not locked up and held prisoner. Which, yeah she still should have told people to at least help Kate’s family, but even from Kate’s POV, that wouldn’t make Jeanette an evil sociopath. 

Edited June 9, 2021 by racked

[KaveDweller]

17 hours ago, racked said:

I think Jeanette is going to get Jamie to play the answering machine message to prove Kate called him from Martin’s house (with the snow globe music playing in the background). She will also need Mallory to back her up that Jeanette stole it from the house. Flimsy defense (certainly not the only snow globe that plays that song and maybe Martin is the one who called him) but that’s my guess. 

Jeanette admitting she'd been in the house makes her look bad. She has been saying she was only in Martin's house the time they played hide and seek. If she says, "well, yeah, I broke into the house and stole things, but I never laid eyes on Kate" is not a great defense.

17 hours ago, gesundheit said:

(Yikes, does Jeanette somehow think maybe Kate lied about all of it? Like was literally never locked up and invented the story or something, instead of just about timing? We still don't really know what her story was or how they even found out, right? We know he died while being apprehended, but there's an awful lot we don't know unless I'm seriously forgetting major early plot points.)

Jenaette seemed really surprised when she found out Kate went to Martin's willingly, so I think she originally believed she was in the basement the whole time. We don't know how much detail was in that chat transcript.  I hope she doesn't think Kate was there willingly the whole time.

Her thinking Kate was in the basement the whole time probably is why Jeanette was so confused by Kate's accusation. She knew she was in the house, but that she didn't go near the basement. It probably never occurred to her that the noise she heard upstairs was Kate.

[jackjill89]

I can't believe this is going to wrap up in one more episode! I think there's more to the Jeanette/Kate/Martin's house story. I don't think this was the only time Jeanette was there with Kate there or someone that Kate thought was Jeanette there. It's such a big leap for Kate to accuse Jeanette of knowing she was there and not telling anyone. 

This show is so messy and complicated and really shows there is no black and white with these characters. They are really layered. Even Martin is complicated. I'm glad they aren't showing him as the mustache-twirling villain. The way he ingratiated himself into Kate's life, groomed her and manipulated her show a more realistic portrait of how this could happen. 

Last night's episode was hard to watch, but very good. I can't wait to see how this all wraps up. I don't think there will be good/bad and right/wrong in terms of Kate and Jeanette. 

[JenE4]

I’m watching this again now because my daughter missed it last night. Jeanette didn’t even LOOK at the house! She jumped on her bike and high-tailed it out of there. When she picked up her bike she turned her head for a spilt second, so maybe glanced toward the direction of the house. But at that point Kate was at the top of the stairwell, and then walking down the stairs. By the time Kate is at the window and knocks over the nutcracker, we cut to Jeanette peddling away. So they didn’t even have a cut scene that maybe Jeanette heard the noise and looked. Nope. She was outta there! Kate saw her peddling away, but she knows Jeanette didn’t see her. 

But on Christmas when Kate started saying she wants to leave, Martin was said, “it’s not going to look good for you, either, that you stayed here when people were looking for you.” And Kate responded, “I’ll think of something.” So, I think this just part of the “story” she concocted so she wouldn’t look bad: Jeanette was there—because she technically was—but there was no misunderstanding on what she saw. Could it be wishful thinking and a coping mechanism to give her hope that help was on the way? Maybe, but deep down she knows Jeanette didn’t see her, and she has gone to the police and on national TV to throw this innocent girl under the bus as a “story” rather than admit that she willingly stayed there for 4 months. She didn’t have to involve Jeanette in that story. But maybe Jeanette’s necklace was the one secret thing she had in the basement with herself, so it was almost like a talisman: This good luck charm will be the key to saving me.

[CraftyHazel]

18 hours ago, LittleIggy said:

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I believe Martin thought Kate would leave and go to school then back home after that first evening when she showed up. I don’t think he initially planned the whole thing. Not excusing his subsequent behavior, just saying...

When I first watched this, I kind of agreed with you, but now I’m not so sure I do.

He possibly thought she would go to school the next day and things would turn out fine, but really?  If anyone asked Kate where she spent the night and she naively said, “Oh, Mr. Harris let me sleep on his couch”, he’s still going to be fired, possibly arrested, and certainly ruin his career.  And Kate seems like the kind of girl who would be dropping that truth bomb without necessarily believing she was doing any harm.  After all, he’s a respected authority figure, and he was only being helpful, right?  (I know he wasn’t, I’m saying a 16-year-old girl might believe that.)

But say she spends the night, goes to school the next day, and manages to keep a secret from absolutely everyone in her life that she spent that night at Martin Harris’s home.  I think it’s extremely unlikely, since she got in an online chat room and spilled the tea, couldn’t wait to tell Mama that she thought her Dad was cheating on her based on a scrap of one-sided conversation she overheard, etc., but let’s suppose she does keep the secret.  Martin knows, though, and so does Kate.  And there will gradually be enough of an obvious connection to stir a rumor or two, especially after all of her young friends and their parents admit that she wasn’t with them.  Gossip runs rampant at that age.  So I think she would finally confide in at least one friend, or her boyfriend.  And all it takes is one.

Martin also, upon letting Kate in the house, cast a very furtive glance around the neighborhood, to make sure no one saw.  He had to know that once she set foot inside, alone, there was no turning back.

He didn’t lure her there that night specifically, but he did set himself up as her savior, her shoulder to cry on, so that at the first sign of trouble she’d turn to him.  And that’s just what she did.

So although he could try to paint himself as a victim of circumstances (and did so, quite successfully I might add, with Kate), he baited a trap for Kate the minute he laid eyes on her.  There’s nothing less than calculating about Martin Harris.  He had every opportunity to do the right thing…and 1993 wasn’t so long ago that he could have been unsure about what that right thing was…and chose to do the wrong one every single time.

[KaveDweller]

41 minutes ago, CraftyHazel said:

But say she spends the night, goes to school the next day, and manages to keep a secret from absolutely everyone in her life that she spent that night at Martin Harris’s home.  I think it’s extremely unlikely, since she got in an online chat room and spilled the tea, couldn’t wait to tell Mama that she thought her Dad was cheating on her based on a scrap of one-sided conversation she overheard, etc., but let’s suppose she does keep the secret.  Martin knows, though, and so does Kate.  And there will gradually be enough of an obvious connection to stir a rumor or two, especially after all of her young friends and their parents admit that she wasn’t with them.  Gossip runs rampant at that age.  So I think she would finally confide in at least one friend, or her boyfriend.  And all it takes is one.

I don't think Martin was thinking clearly about any of it. I think part of him knew once Kate entered his house there was no real going back, that is why he got so freaked out about Mallory's tape. But part of him probably did think she'd go to school and his life hadn't changed.  But if he really didn't want to be a kidnapper, why didn't he tell Joy "Kate showed up at my house last night. I'm sorry I didn't call but she told me you hit her and I thought letting her sleep on my couch was better than calling the cops on you. She promised she'd go home tonight." Or SOMETHING.

And what did Martin think would happen when Kate turned 18 and became "safe." She'd go home, not say where she'd been and they'd just start dating with no suspicion? He was not rational at all.

Maybe Kate got rescued because he finally realized there was no way out and killed himself.

 

[Chicken Wing]

Okay, so I rewatched the scene where Jeanette flees the house and Kate watches her leave.

These kinds of shows, you really need to watch each episode at least twice to catch all the hints. I totally missed it the first time, but I think I found a major clue that might be It.

I will put this in spoilers. The first part of what I'm about to say is just recapping what I more clearly saw after watching the scene again. The latter part is the light bulb that went off as to what is possibly The Answer -- pure speculation, but I will hide it in spoiler tags anyway.

Spoiler

 

Jeanette grabbed her bike, turned it around and started off away from the house. She did not look back at the house, though she may have glanced up slightly as she was turning her bike around -- although at that moment, Kate was not at the window yet. When Kate looks out the window, we cut to a dark figure riding away on a bicycle. A bicycle with a card flapping in the spokes. Jeanette's bike did not have a card in the spokes. It did not make that sound when we saw her wheeling it away just the moment before.

Guys. It wasn't Jeanette outside by the time Kate looked out the window. We know who had a card in their bicycle spokes. We saw in the very first episode.

It was Mallory.

 

 

Edited June 10, 2021 by Chicken Wing

[waving feather]

@Chicken Wing Wow, I'd have to rewatch that. But that does make sense if it turns out to be the case.

Spoiler

Mallory might be following Jeanette from the mall, out of curiosity of an ex-friend. And saw Kate. But she wasn't supposed to be there and was no longer friends with Jeanette so she didn't confide in anyone about it.

 

[Anela]

That was tough to watch. It still wasn’t her fault, but it also wasn’t Jeanette’s fault.  She probably assumed another adult was there.  

[moonshine71]

23 hours ago, ZeeEnnui said:

 

Did Martin purchase that snow globe at a haunted antiques store? Real cheerful. Okay so now we know how Kate got the necklace, and why the snow globe is important, but I guess I'm not seeing how Jeanette is going to use it to help her case. Kate was hiding upstairs, and Jeanette didn't see Kate. Also, this would bust Jeanette who had been in and out of Martin's house for months. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that she went back again, and that's when Kate thought Jeanette "saw" her. 

Pretty sure Jeanette doesn't think the snow globe  can help her case, she wants to get it back from Mallory because she thinks it can tie her to Martin's house after that Christmas Eve call was made. Imo, it's a pretty big panicky mistake. All she is going to do is draw attention to the snow globe, which probably would have stayed under Mallory's bed until the end of time, she didn't seem to know It held any significance or that it came from Martin's.

[meatball77]

12 hours ago, Chicken Wing said:

It was good that these scenes were interspersed with Kate’s therapist providing Cliffs Notes explanations for everything Kate was revealing/we were seeing — breaking down how this moment was Martin grooming her, this feeling was actually manipulated, this decision she thinks was her own was actually forced. I’m sure the younger audience gets the point of the overall story, but some of these scenes taken independently might not resonate with the appropriate understanding for more impressionable viewers who might miss some of the nuances of the predatory behavior. I hope the therapist explaining it all helps make things crystal clear.

They're not going to but I'd love for them to have a special on freeform on the topic of grooming (with the two actors), really explaining it and even talking to some survivors who were in different situations and how to identify it.  The way that Martin treated Kate at the fair vs the way he treated Jeanette was such a good example.  It's such an important topic that we don't discuss with kids and teens enough and actually far more likely to result in teens being traffiked or abused than the white vans or random people following you at target that people like to freak out about. 

[Black Knight]

38 minutes ago, moonshine71 said:

Pretty sure Jeanette doesn't think the snow globe  can help her case, she wants to get it back from Mallory because she thinks it can tie her to Martin's house after that Christmas Eve call was made.

If that's what Jeanette was thinking, she would've tried well before now to get that snowglobe back from Mallory. I don't see how learning about the Christmas Eve call would change anything in that regard.

What's significant about the Christmas Eve call is that Jeanette now knows that Kate wasn't in the basement at that time, but upstairs, where the TV was playing. She already has learned that Kate went to Martin's house willingly, so it's easier for her to then make the realization that Kate had physical freedom of movement within the house for at least some time thereafter. The snowglobe, being a holiday decoration, would only be out during the holidays (which Jeanette would know since she's been in the house before). I still think Jeanette's hoping to find Kate's fingerprints on it. Kate's lawyer can argue there's nothing to show that Kate made the call, but her fingerprints on an item that's out upstairs during a time she was supposedly locked in the basement is much harder to explain.

I think Martin always intended for Kate to stay at the house, once she spent that first night there. It was smart of him to act as if he assumed she would go to school that day. He's the school principal: If he'd suggested she miss school, that might have set off alarm bells in her mind. He couldn't be certain that she wouldn't go, but there was a pretty good chance she wouldn't. But letting her spend the night was really when he crossed the point of no return, because he had already done something that would get him not only run out of the school but run out of the town. The principal, letting a high school girl spend the night at his place? Total no-no. There's no way he could trust that Kate would not end up telling where she stayed.

He was obviously grooming her earlier, but his plan then was probably of the more common nature with teachers and other types of adults in authority who molest minors: Meet up regularly, and gradually transition those meetings into occasions for sex. I don't think he had a clue how to carry off the sort of kidnapping where he grabs someone and transports them against their will to his house to be held prisoner there. Psychological and emotional manipulation were much more in his wheelhouse.

[LittleIggy]

Did Martin drive to another city to buy Kate’s feminine hygiene products, toiletries, clothes, etc? Sorry, my mind goes to minutiae like that! 😏

[HolmesUltimateQu]

36 minutes ago, LittleIggy said:

Did Martin drive to another city to buy Kate’s feminine hygiene products, toiletries, clothes, etc? Sorry, my mind goes to minutiae like that! 😏

I actually thought something similar! When Kate was wearing that pretty Christmas dress and makeup, I thought, "did he buy that for her? And if so, how did he explain to the clerk in the small town that he's buying clothes for a female?"

But the town can't be that small because the boyfriend didn't know nerdy Jeanette (or acted like he didn't know) but in a small town, you know everyone, even if you aren't in the same circles. So idk. 

[Cranberry]

2 hours ago, LittleIggy said:

Did Martin drive to another city to buy Kate’s feminine hygiene products, toiletries, clothes, etc? Sorry, my mind goes to minutiae like that! 😏

I actually had the exact same thought when I was watching! I decided he probably orders from Amazon. I did that when I didn't want to visit the drugstore during Covid, and they had almost everything I normally buy. 

Edit: Yes, thank you, I forgot this was set in the mid-1990s, haha.

[Cinnabon]

11 minutes ago, Cranberry said:

I actually had the exact same thought when I was watching! I decided he probably orders from Amazon. I did that when I didn't want to visit the drugstore during Covid, and they had almost everything I normally buy. 

Not in 1993

[RachelKM]

35 minutes ago, HolmesUltimateQu said:

I actually thought something similar! When Kate was wearing that pretty Christmas dress and makeup, I thought, "did he buy that for her? And if so, how did he explain to the clerk in the small town that he's buying clothes for a female?"

But the town can't be that small because the boyfriend didn't know nerdy Jeanette (or acted like he didn't know) but in a small town, you know everyone, even if you aren't in the same circles. So idk. 

The town is big enough to have a good size mall.  And, if I'm not mistaken, Ben anticipated being seen by scouts. So I don't think the town is that small.  In the unlikely event that he was seen buying young women's clothing and jewelry, I imagine he could always claim he was buying things for a girlfriend or niece.

Even still, I suppose he could have driven to the next town for purchase runs.

3 minutes ago, Cranberry said:

I actually had the exact same thought when I was watching! I decided he probably orders from Amazon. I did that when I didn't want to visit the drugstore during Covid, and they had almost everything I normally buy. 

Amazon didn't exist then.  It began as a online bookselling site in 1994. 

[CraftyHazel]

15 minutes ago, Cranberry said:

I actually had the exact same thought when I was watching! I decided he probably orders from Amazon. I did that when I didn't want to visit the drugstore during Covid, and they had almost everything I normally buy. 

LOL…except in 1994, Amazon really was a small business that sold books.  In 1993, it didn’t even exist.

 I hadn’t really thought about the issues of tampons, makeup, and clothing for a teenaged, female hostage.  In the mid-90s, you didn’t really order everything online and have it shipped to your home.  I suppose he could have ordered her clothing from catalogs, but wouldn’t the catalogs even raise questions around town?  Like, why is the new, single male school principal getting Delias catalogs and shipments?  Kate packed a really small bag, after all…she was going to need more clothing, underwear, etc. at some point in time.

I guess the town isn’t all that small, and he could be buying jewelry and clothing for a girlfriend.  But feminine hygiene products, that would raise an eyebrow or two.

Edited June 10, 2021 by CraftyHazel

[Cranberry]

I keep forgetting that this takes place in the 90s, haha. I didn't even have the Internet at home until 1997 or so. Yeah, now I really am wondering where he bought the stuff. You know people would be gossiping about the young new vice principal's love life and reporting to each other if they saw him buying stuff for a woman, especially personal hygiene items. Jeanette's dad was nosy enough about the two coffee cups.

[BingeyKohan]

Jeanette’s Dad was actually kind of a creep himself in this episode for someone who purportedly shouldn’t suspect anything. Is that his *actual* away from home personality? lol. 

Can you imagine what it would have been like to film this episode? Seems like it would have been as suffocating to make as it felt to watch. 

[JenE4]

We know he went to the local mall to buy gifts for Kate this episode, so we can assume he bought her other items there, as well. As for tampons and whatnot, the thought of that usually doesn’t exist in TV-land…just like no one ever uses the bathroom, unless it’s some type of a plot point, lol. So, I think it’s making up background stuff that “the show” would not have considered. Though, I think there may have been tampons when she woke up from being drugged and there were stacks of supplies surrounding her—which were not there when she went down to the empty basement to look for her suitcase, so it seems like he bought bulk supplies after he locked her up.

[waving feather]

I forgot to mention Greg in the midst of all the more serious things that went down in this episode.

He was totally inappropriate when he went to Martin's house to ask to use his phone. He knew Martin was reluctant but still barged in and crossed all kinds of boundaries by strolling around the house, touching things, looking at things and being nosy. Ewww. How rude.

[CraftyHazel]

59 minutes ago, waving feather said:

I forgot to mention Greg in the midst of all the more serious things that went down in this episode.

He was totally inappropriate when he went to Martin's house to ask to use his phone. He knew Martin was reluctant but still barged in and crossed all kinds of boundaries by strolling around the house, touching things, looking at things and being nosy. Ewww. How rude.

I think Jeannette gets her weird, awkward personality from her dad.  

[Pixel]

On 6/9/2021 at 3:38 AM, RachelKM said:

I think it is clear after tonight that Jeanette did not see Kate.  For one thing, recognizing the music from the snow globe and rushing off indicates that she only put together that Kate was not in the basement on Christmas Eve in that moment. I don't see how she plans to use the globe, though, unless she intends to out herself as having broken into Martin's house after the initial game her father made her confess to. (I do think that was the only time during Kate's captivity.*)

Martin was out of the house when Jeanette went in, and she found the snowglobe. The recording is potentially evidence that Kate wasn't being held against her will, that she had free reign of the house. It's tenuous, because just because she was able to make a phone call doesn't mean that she wasn't usually locked up somewhere, but if I'm Jeannette I'm grabbing at any possibilities.

Theory, but spoilered just in case I'm right:

Spoiler

I'm convinced that Annabelle is a gun. The whole shooting range thing still hasn't paid off. Kate's good with a gun, but we've yet to see that come into play. Winchester made a rifle called the Annabelle. I think Martin attempts a murder-suicide and Kate takes him out, and she's so traumatized by that that she's suppressed the memory in favor of the "official" version of events, which is that Martin was killed in a shootout with police.

 

 

[TattleTeeny]

Quote

What's significant about the Christmas Eve call is that Jeanette now knows that Kate wasn't in the basement at that time, but upstairs, where the TV was playing. She already has learned that Kate went to Martin's house willingly, so it's easier for her to then make the realization that Kate had physical freedom of movement within the house for at least some time thereafter. The snowglobe, being a holiday decoration, would only be out during the holidays (which Jeanette would know since she's been in the house before). I still think Jeanette's hoping to find Kate's fingerprints on it. Kate's lawyer can argue there's nothing to show that Kate made the call, but her fingerprints on an item that's out upstairs during a time she was supposedly locked in the basement is much harder to explain.

This all makes sense to me, but I am stuck on how anyone would prove the whereabouts of the snow globe in the house; it's small and portable and could have been anywhere. Obviously, it would seem that it would have been where the other decorations had been 6 months earlier, but by June, all of the decorations would have likely been put away. I guess if the phone message is used as some kind of evidence, it could be deduced that the noise from the TV and the placement of the phone indicate that the call was made from the living room and so the snow globe must have also been there. And is the message time/date stamped? I guess they could figure out what movie it was and when it was shown on TV too, but there's still no way to prove it was Kate who made the call.

Edited June 10, 2021 by TattleTeeny

[Blue Plastic]

13 hours ago, Chicken Wing said:

Okay, so I rewatched the scene where Jeanette flees the house and Kate watches her leave.

These kinds of shows, you really need to watch each episode at least twice to catch all the hints. I totally missed it the first time, but I think I found a major clue that might be It.

I will put this in spoilers. The first part of what I'm about to say is just recapping what I more clearly saw after watching the scene again. The latter part is the light bulb that went off as to what is possibly The Answer -- pure speculation, but I will hide it in spoiler tags anyway.

  Hide contents

Jeanette grabbed her bike, turned it around and started off away from the house. She did not look back at the house, though she may have glanced up slightly as she was turning her bike around -- although at that moment, Kate was not at the window yet. When Kate looks out the window, we cut to a dark figure riding away on a bicycle. A bicycle with a card flapping in the spokes. Jeanette's bike did not have a card in the spokes. It did not make that sound when we saw her wheeling it away just the moment before.

Guys. It wasn't Jeanette outside by the time Kate looked out the window. We know who had a card in their bicycle spokes. We saw in the very first episode.

It was Mallory.

 

 

Oh wow, that is crazy and interesting if the show really did that on purpose as a clue.

There’s really no excuse for Martin. There’s no way that would ever have been okay.

I think Kate and Janette have both lied about things and done things that weren’t right, but they were also both victimized in different ways and were both minors.  I don’t blame Janette at all, so far anyway, for wanting to defend herself. I know that could and would easily fall into “blame the victim” territory, but IMO Janette shouldn’t be expected to sacrifice herself and not point out if Kate lied about something.

[peachmangosteen]

On 6/9/2021 at 12:35 AM, Jx223 said:

That transformation didn't happen quite as quickly as I thought it would. Just like Kate being held captive by Martin against her will didn't happen right away. It would have been nice to see at least one episode that focused on Jeanette's transformation. They could have even done it in the same format they did in tonight's episode, showed it played out over the course of a few months in one episode. (Or multiple episodes if they had more time). I think that is one interesting part of this story that hasn't been focused on enough. 

Yea, I'm bummed that we're not getting an episode like this one that focuses on Jeanette's life during the time Kate was at Martin's. 

On 6/9/2021 at 9:39 AM, gesundheit said:

For the same reason that teenagers being groomed think they're the ones making the choices, teenagers watching might see her as a willing, consenting participant in the relationship even though she isn't.

This is why I was hoping the show wasn't going to go this route. There has been a large contingent of viewers that have been absolving Martin of doing anything wrong since the beginning and this just gave them more ammo in their minds, which is really sad.

10 hours ago, LittleIggy said:

Did Martin drive to another city to buy Kate’s feminine hygiene products, toiletries, clothes, etc? Sorry, my mind goes to minutiae like that! 😏

I totally thought about that, too. I think he definitely just drove to another town to buy the stuff. Buying some women's clothes around Christmas isn't going to be the suspicious but buying a bunch of tampons/pads would be and Martin knows how things look so he must have went somewhere else.

4 hours ago, BingeyKohan said:

Jeanette’s Dad was actually kind of a creep himself in this episode for someone who purportedly shouldn’t suspect anything. Is that his *actual* away from home personality? lol. 

Seriously! He was really bizarre in that scene.

Fun fact about 'Stockholm Syndrome:'

I hate that there's only one episode left. There's just no way they will be able to show me everything I wanna see.

[Cheyanne11]

3 hours ago, waving feather said:

I forgot to mention Greg in the midst of all the more serious things that went down in this episode.

He was totally inappropriate when he went to Martin's house to ask to use his phone. He knew Martin was reluctant but still barged in and crossed all kinds of boundaries by strolling around the house, touching things, looking at things and being nosy. Ewww. How rude.

So out of bounds!  

I wonder (and this is more minutae): did Jeanette have the house key with her at the mall or did she have to ride home, get the key, then go back to Martin's?  

Edited June 10, 2021 by Cheyanne11

[itsweird]

22 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

I totally thought about that, too. I think he definitely just drove to another town to buy the stuff. Buying some women's clothes around Christmas isn't going to be the suspicious but buying a bunch of tampons/pads would be and Martin knows how things look so he must have went somewhere else.

 

He is an admin at a high school - maybe he just stole that stuff from the nurse's office?

[peachmangosteen]

23 minutes ago, itsweird said:

He is an admin at a high school - maybe he just stole that stuff from the nurse's office?

Possible, but you'd think someone would notice a ton (because he had a lot) of them going missing and/or notice him taking them. It's a real risk and Martin is careful. It just makes more sense to me that he went to a neighboring city to buy them.

[BingeyKohan]

I kind of enjoy Jeannette in the 93 TL (the others not so much). She had such housefire girl energy when she spotted Martin at the mall!

[TattleTeeny]

45 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

Possible, but you'd think someone would notice a ton (because he had a lot) of them going missing and/or notice him taking them. It's a real risk and Martin is careful. It just makes more sense to me that he went to a neighboring city to buy them.

OR, twist -- he broke into Jeanette's house to get teenage girl things, hahahhaa!

Just kidding.

[Mrs Shibbles]

In addition to the feminine hygiene products, extra food, and clothes, I wondered about what they are hopefully using for protection/birth control.  I'm guessing condoms.

[Cinnabon]

20 hours ago, CraftyHazel said:

When I first watched this, I kind of agreed with you, but now I’m not so sure I do.

He possibly thought she would go to school the next day and things would turn out fine, but really?  If anyone asked Kate where she spent the night and she naively said, “Oh, Mr. Harris let me sleep on his couch”, he’s still going to be fired, possibly arrested, and certainly ruin his career.  And Kate seems like the kind of girl who would be dropping that truth bomb without necessarily believing she was doing any harm.  After all, he’s a respected authority figure, and he was only being helpful, right?  (I know he wasn’t, I’m saying a 16-year-old girl might believe that.)

But say she spends the night, goes to school the next day, and manages to keep a secret from absolutely everyone in her life that she spent that night at Martin Harris’s home.  I think it’s extremely unlikely, since she got in an online chat room and spilled the tea, couldn’t wait to tell Mama that she thought her Dad was cheating on her based on a scrap of one-sided conversation she overheard, etc., but let’s suppose she does keep the secret.  Martin knows, though, and so does Kate.  And there will gradually be enough of an obvious connection to stir a rumor or two, especially after all of her young friends and their parents admit that she wasn’t with them.  Gossip runs rampant at that age.  So I think she would finally confide in at least one friend, or her boyfriend.  And all it takes is one.

Martin also, upon letting Kate in the house, cast a very furtive glance around the neighborhood, to make sure no one saw.  He had to know that once she set foot inside, alone, there was no turning back.

He didn’t lure her there that night specifically, but he did set himself up as her savior, her shoulder to cry on, so that at the first sign of trouble she’d turn to him.  And that’s just what she did.

So although he could try to paint himself as a victim of circumstances (and did so, quite successfully I might add, with Kate), he baited a trap for Kate the minute he laid eyes on her.  There’s nothing less than calculating about Martin Harris.  He had every opportunity to do the right thing…and 1993 wasn’t so long ago that he could have been unsure about what that right thing was…and chose to do the wrong one every single time.

I mostly agree, but I still think he thought she would probably leave his house and go to school the next day. 

[Cinnabon]

4 hours ago, TattleTeeny said:

This all makes sense to me, but I am stuck on how anyone would prove the whereabouts of the snow globe in the house; it's small and portable and could have been anywhere. Obviously, it would seem that it would have been where the other decorations had been 6 months earlier, but by June, all of the decorations would have likely been put away. I guess if the phone message is used as some kind of evidence, it could be deduced that the noise from the TV and the placement of the phone indicate that the call was made from the living room and so the snow globe must have also been there. And is the message time/date stamped? I guess they could figure out what movie it was and when it was shown on TV too, but there's still no way to prove it was Kate who made the call.

In a civil case, the burden of proof is much less. The jury might go for this theory.

[Cinnabon]

4 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

Yea, I'm bummed that we're not getting an episode like this one that focuses on Jeanette's life during the time Kate was at Martin's. 

This is why I was hoping the show wasn't going to go this route. There has been a large contingent of viewers that have been absolving Martin of doing anything wrong since the beginning and this just gave them more ammo in their minds, which is really sad.

I totally thought about that, too. I think he definitely just drove to another town to buy the stuff. Buying some women's clothes around Christmas isn't going to be the suspicious but buying a bunch of tampons/pads would be and Martin knows how things look so he must have went somewhere else.

Seriously! He was really bizarre in that scene.

Fun fact about 'Stockholm Syndrome:'

I hate that there's only one episode left. There's just no way they will be able to show me everything I wanna see.

Who here has been absolving Martin of anything? I haven’t seen any comments supporting him.

[RachelKM]

3 minutes ago, Cinnabon said:

Who here has been absolving Martin of anything? I haven’t seen any comments supporting him.

I don't think the poster was referring to this platform.  Several people have mentioned seeing post and tweets blaming Kate and/or at least partially absolving Martin.  I have not seen those posts myself. 

[TattleTeeny]

32 minutes ago, Cinnabon said:

In a civil case, the burden of proof is much less. The jury might go for this theory.

Thank you! I am not too well versed in the various types of trials in which this kind of stuff wouldn't be considered too circumstantial. 

[Cinnabon]

7 minutes ago, TattleTeeny said:

Thank you! I am not too well versed in the various types of trials in which this kind of stuff wouldn't be considered too circumstantial. 

I think if this were a criminal trial the evidence might not be enough, but this is a civil trial (think OJ).

[TattleTeeny]

Yeah, I keep forgetting that part. Plus, I’m a true crime fan. PLUS, I am a chronic what-iffer!

[Chicken Wing]

Yes, for a criminal case you need proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the person had to have done the thing they are accused of. If defamation were a criminal case for some reason it would probably never even make it to trial -- there's no "there" there to either girl's arguments from a purely legal and evidentiary standpoint. It's pretty much a literal she said/she said. But this is a civil case, and here you only need to have a preponderance of evidence that the person simply more likely than not did the thing. Jeanette only needs to bring evidence that it is more likely than not that Kate is lying about her and the false accusation did harm to her reputation/livelihood/whatever. If Jeanette comes out with good proof of all the other things Kate lied about, it helps tip the scale for the jury that it's more likely than not that she is also lying about this.

In a perfect world, the easiest way to prove that someone is lying when they said that you were present somewhere would be to prove that you in fact were not there. Obviously Jeanette can't use that, because she was there. She went there multiple times, including the night that Kate claims she saw her. Hard to prove that Kate is lying that she saw her if she was in fact there. With that off the table, Jeanette's only recourse to prove that Kate is lying is to simply prove that Kate is a liar. 

Edited June 10, 2021 by Chicken Wing

[moonshine71]

3 hours ago, Cranberry said:

I keep forgetting that this takes place in the 90s, haha. I didn't even have the Internet at home until 1997 or so. Yeah, now I really am wondering where he bought the stuff. You know people would be gossiping about the young new vice principal's love life and reporting to each other if they saw him buying stuff for a woman, especially personal hygiene items. Jeanette's dad was nosy enough about the two coffee cups.

I don't really see him buying stuff as that big an issue. I think people are elevating the level of celebrity a high school assistant principle has exponentially. Basically, high school students will recognize him. I doubt most of the parents of those students would, much less the rest of the town.  And that's ignoring that we don't know how big this town is. It doesn't really feel "rural small town" to me, more mid-size suburb that's probably not immediately adjacent to a major metro area, but probably not in the middle of nowhere. My son just graduated last year, I consider myself pretty involved father, I went to all the parent teacher meetings, award ceremonies, school programs, etc. I just went down the list of the administration staff on his school website, there is not a single one of them I would recognize if I just randomly came across them in public. That includes his principal, who I know I've seen speak at several functions and briefly met at least once, much less any of the assistant principals. There's a few teachers, coaches, or advisors that he had good relationships with that I might recognize. All Martin h as to do is stop at the nearest Costco or Sam's Club and buy tampons and other toiletries, people will just think it's some random young just shopping for his wife. Same with buying a dress. 

 

To be honest, from the start, I've felt one of the strangest aspects of this show is how interested an affluent, and kind of snobby, group of people seemed in  a new assistant principle and the efforts they made to involve him with their social group. Everyone was just fawning all over him at the garden party, and then inviting on an overnight hunting trip w/ your gun club? The whole thing is weird to me. 

[BingeyKohan]

1 minute ago, moonshine71 said:

To be honest, from the start, I've felt one of the strangest aspects of this show is how interested an affluent, and kind of snobby, group of people seemed in  a new assistant principle and the efforts they made to involve him with their social group. Everyone was just fawning all over him at the garden party, and then inviting on an overnight hunting trip w/ your gun club? The whole thing is weird to me. 

ITA! Thought that all along. Now a new pastor at a mega church I could see. It made me wonder if they intended it to be a church community at first then changed it to a school connection for some reason.

Re the case wouldn’t Jeanette have to prove that Kate was not only demonstrably incorrect but made up the story with malicious intent? That’s such a high bar - her only standing (as far as establishing Kate motive) would be Kate’s resentment that Jeanette had taken over her friends and boyfriend. But then it would be in Jeanette’s best legal interests to keep that boyfriend through the trial to drive home her point.