S04.01: Joe Takes A Holiday

[Door County Cherry]

Quote

Now living in London, Joe tries to lay low and resist old habits...until he's forced to tie up loose ends and bond with a circle of wealty socialites. 

 

[Lebanna]

Ha! As if Royal Holloway is actually ‘in London’. I mean, it’s part of the University of London and it’s an absolutely beautiful uni, but come on, show. It’s about an hour from central London by train on a good day. 

Although it certainly wouldn’t have been so glamorous for Joe to be hanging around in Slough.

Roll on the weird tweedy British stereotypes.

[krankydoodle]

This is my first time watching this show and I didn't realize how funny it can be. Joe panicking after finding Malcolm's body, stuffing him in the car trunk, then telling himself "I've got till dark to figure out what the hell to do with him. And mentally prepare to drive on the wrong side of the road" cracked me up.

[Spartan Girl]

Congratulations, Marianne, you are the smartest character on this show.

[Anela]

The serial murderer really needed a nice vacation. 

I'm actually tired of him falling into lifestyles of the rich and famous. The constant flow of rich people, and parties.

I was wondering how long it would be, before the douchebag is dispatched, but there are multiple douchebags. And the first one is already dead. 

I've seen speculation about who the person texting him might be, but I can't see them murdering people to set him up. 

Joe really did look as creepy as he is, when he showed up and chased Marianne. 

[skotnikov]

How did he get this job? There are like 200 candidates for each vacant position in English/American Literature/Studies and you would be never able to get one without connections, monographs, peer-reviewed articles, diploma from Cambridge, Oxford, Princeton, Harvard, or Yale and a PhD. One should also have a certain media presence, or be known from conferences and conventions. And then (if  you get it) during first years you wouldn't have a salary to live in a posh apartment.

I know the show is unrealistic, but all these stereotypes about  Literary studies (including a professor, who is a serial murderer) are old and outrageous.    

Edited February 9, 2023 by skotnikov

[Chaos Theory]

Joe in London is going to be fun.  Yes the show is going to get a lot wrong about the country but it will still be fun to watch a condescending stalker’s take on the British privilege/Royal adjacent 

Of course curtains continue to not exist in this universe.  

Joe should really avoid people who take him to bars/clubs where there are drugs or alcohol because when Joe gets drunk someone ends up dead.

I am glad at least that it looks like the first part of season 4 isn’t going to be Joe chasing Mariannne.  

Professor Joe or whatever is current fake name is is at least entertaining.

[BlueSkies]

6 hours ago, skotnikov said:

How did he get this job? There are like 200 candidates for each vacant position in English/American Literature/Studies and you would be never able to get one without connections, monographs, peer-reviewed articles, diploma from Cambridge, Oxford, Princeton, Harvard, or Yale and a PhD. One should also have a certain media presence, or be known from conferences and conventions. And then (if  you get it) during first years you wouldn't have a salary to live in a posh apartment.

I know the show is unrealistic, but all these stereotypes about  Literary studies (including a professor, who is a serial murderer) are old and outrageous.    

I agree.  The show stretches the imagination but what kind of resume did he put together for his job?  College transcript alone how the hell did he pull that off?  

[HolmesUltimateQu]

I chuckled when the neighbor girl snapped her fingers at Joe and said, "where did you go?" when he started to go into a mental monologue. It reminded me of all of those videos that were going around of Joe interacting with people without the voice over and how weird it was. 😆 

[peachmangosteen]

That reminded me, has there always been this much voice over? It feels so overkill but maybe it was always like this and I'm just not remembering and/or I was more interested in the other seasons so I didn't notice it.

[Chaos Theory]

19 hours ago, skotnikov said:

How did he get this job? There are like 200 candidates for each vacant position in English/American Literature/Studies and you would be never able to get one without connections, monographs, peer-reviewed articles, diploma from Cambridge, Oxford, Princeton, Harvard, or Yale and a PhD. One should also have a certain media presence, or be known from conferences and conventions. And then (if  you get it) during first years you wouldn't have a salary to live in a posh apartment.

I know the show is unrealistic, but all these stereotypes about  Literary studies (including a professor, who is a serial murderer) are old and outrageous.    

From what I gathered from the flashbacks, Joe got a golden new identity from the PI that Love's parents hired to kill him.   The idea was to get blackmail money from Joe that he stole from Love and still get the money he would get paid for killing Joe.   Part of the deal was for Joe to disappear and I think it was inferred that the identity was tailor made for Joe so making him  temporary professor does take tv magic but not the kind you have to bend over backwards to understand.   Joe is quite affable when he wants to be and even though hedidn't  he sounds like he has had a big education so its not hard for him to fake it.   So yeah a little of tv magic but not too hard to  just handwave to get the plot going.    And even if Joe did give alot of money to the PI to not kill him he is at least clever enough to not give all of it.   So he likely had enough money to fake it in most ways until he made it,  

Edited February 10, 2023 by Chaos Theory

[Blakeston]

13 hours ago, Chaos Theory said:

From what I gathered from the flashbacks, Joe got a golden new identity from the PI that Love's parents hired to kill him.   The idea was to get blackmail money from Joe that he stole from Love and still get the money he would get paid for killing Joe.   Part of the deal was for Joe to disappear and I think it was inferred that the identity was tailor made for Joe so making him  temporary professor does take tv magic but not the kind you have to bend over backwards to understand.   Joe is quite affable when he wants to be and even though hedidn't  he sounds like he has had a big education so its not hard for him to fake it.   So yeah a little of tv magic but not too hard to  just handwave to get the plot going.    And even if Joe did give alot of money to the PI to not kill him he is at least clever enough to not give all of it.   So he likely had enough money to fake it in most ways until he made it,  

The PI explains how Joe has a passport, work visa, etc., but I don't think it explains anything about the job. Joe could be using the social security number of someone who went to Harvard or Cambridge, but that's not going to be nearly enough to get him a coveted university position.

I also don't buy that this expert PI - who managed to find Joe by tracking Marienne - would decide that having her locket is proof that she's dead. Wouldn't he show up at her end destination to see if she arrives? It's all a deeply silly situation, even by the standards of a show that isn't meant to be particularly realistic.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Blakeston

[skotnikov]

18 hours ago, Chaos Theory said:

From what I gathered from the flashbacks, Joe got a golden new identity from the PI that Love's parents hired to kill him.   The idea was to get blackmail money from Joe that he stole from Love and still get the money he would get paid for killing Joe.   Part of the deal was for Joe to disappear and I think it was inferred that the identity was tailor made for Joe so making him  temporary professor does take tv magic but not the kind you have to bend over backwards to understand.   Joe is quite affable when he wants to be and even though hedidn't  he sounds like he has had a big education so its not hard for him to fake it.   So yeah a little of tv magic but not too hard to  just handwave to get the plot going.    And even if Joe did give alot of money to the PI to not kill him he is at least clever enough to not give all of it.   So he likely had enough money to fake it in most ways until he made it,  

The most important part of this job, even a temporary one, is that you have to be recognized before you get the position. Academia doesn't function in a way it is portrayed. Conventions, reading groups, colloquia etc. are all very public activities. Then the information about you + your picture can be on the university's website, so if you don't want to be visible, lectureship in an Anglo-Saxon university is not a job for you.   

[Jillybean]

Wow. After this episode I don't think I have any interest in watching this season. I'm not interested in the whodunit of Malcolm's murder, and I already find the cast of characters quite tedious. 

[Cementhead]

22 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

That reminded me, has there always been this much voice over? It feels so overkill but maybe it was always like this and I'm just not remembering and/or I was more interested in the other seasons so I didn't notice it.

It feels like overkill to me, too.  And though it is my favourite aspect of this show, too much of a good thing is never a good thing. 

38 minutes ago, Jillybean said:

Wow. After this episode I don't think I have any interest in watching this season. I'm not interested in the whodunit of Malcolm's murder, and I already find the cast of characters quite tedious. 

Yes, the cast is made up of caricatures and tired cliches.  I am also not a fan of the 'turning the table on Joe' thing and I almost feel like I am watching a too forced and rushed version of A Knives Out Mystery.

I have often found that season 4 of a series is usually the worst and sadly I think that is proving to be the case here.

[BlueSkies]

3 hours ago, skotnikov said:

The most important part of this job, even a temporary one, is that you have to be recognized before you get the position. Academia doesn't function in a way it is portrayed. Conventions, reading groups, colloquia etc. are all very public activities. Then the information about you + your picture can be on the university's website, so if you don't want to be visible, lectureship in an Anglo-Saxon university is not a job for you.   

I've had part time jobs at a community college before and even getting a teaching job there is like a huge ordeal.  

 

So yeah wile I admittedly enjoy the show the average person has a better chance of winning the lottery than landing a gig like that imo.  Not that Joe can't fake it once he's in....   just sayin' 

[dubbel zout]

On 2/9/2023 at 6:25 PM, Chaos Theory said:

when Joe gets drunk

And he's always saying that this is why he shouldn't drink. As he takes another drink, LOL.

I always ignore the broader strokes of this show, because of course they're ridiculous. Joe gets his new identity after he's in Europe—did he use a passport with his real name on it to get there? And it's a bit ludicrous to me that he's not on some law enforcement group's radar at this point, even with the name changes in the States. But again—broader strokes.

In general I'm finding the show a bit tedious at this point. The showrunners keep talking about putting Joe into new situations and watching him cope, but that's not really happening. As much as I enjoy the obscene immorality the show traffics in, I'm more than ready for this to be the final season. (I know, there are five more episodes to come in March or whenever.)

[Paloma]

On 2/9/2023 at 12:12 PM, Spartan Girl said:

Congratulations, Marianne, you are the smartest character on this show.

Well, she is smart to try to get away from him but not so smart to tell him she knows he's a murderer when they are alone in what looks like an abandoned space. I guess she thought that he was going to kill her anyway so she might as well try confronting him with the truth...which apparently worked, since he wanted to prove to her that he wouldn't hurt her.

[Kirkydee]

On 2/10/2023 at 10:51 AM, peachmangosteen said:

That reminded me, has there always been this much voice over? It feels so overkill but maybe it was always like this and I'm just not remembering and/or I was more interested in the other seasons so I didn't notice it.

I remember reading an article a few years ago where Penn says he has more lines as a voice over then he has on screen.  

[Scarlett45]

9 hours ago, dubbel zout said:

I always ignore the broader strokes of this show, because of course they're ridiculous. Joe gets his new identity after he's in Europe—did he use a passport with his real name on it to get there? And it's a bit ludicrous to me that he's not on some law enforcement group's radar at this point, even with the name changes in the States. But again—broader strokes.

 

I assume he’s using his fake name/identity he bought in season 2, Will- he likely still has the contact info for the guy he kidnapped and let go, who moved to the Philippines. 

[Spartan Girl]

Boy they didn’t skimp out on the gore factor of the disembodiment scene. We even saw Malcolm’s you-know-what. That’s a first for this show.

Edited February 13, 2023 by Spartan Girl

[BaskingsharkGTX]

This is the most inauthentic portrayal of anything English since Bert the chimney sweep.

 

[BaskingsharkGTX]

20 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

Boy they didn’t skimp out on the gore factor of the disembodiment scene. We even saw Malcolm’s you-know-what. That’s a firs5 for this show.

That entire sequence was probably the weakest, most unrealistic thing in ANY season of this show. I almost turned it off at that point.

One thing You has always done pretty decently is build fairly complex tension. Even when it strains the boundaries of credibility, it throws enough curveballs at Joe that you don't really stop to think "This is stupid" and stop suspending disbelief, eg, the rings everyone wore in Madre Linda. However, nobody on the writing team seems to know that London is one of the most surveilled cities in the world. There are cameras everywhere and there is no way that a "sawmill" like that one wouldn't be surrounded by a high fence, have its own cameras and security system. If it was left unattended, it would certainly be securely locked up and there would also quite likely be a large and unfriendly dog in residence.  Not to mention that for him to be able to cut up a body AND clean up in the space of half a football/soccer game is some light-speed butchery. 

Kudos also to Joe for being able to transition seamlessly from driving his and Love's automatic Lexus SUV and Toyota Prius with parking assist, reversing cameras etc to taking the wheel of a 65-year-old Jaguar with a manual choke and stick-shift on the wrong side of the road!

[dubbel zout]

7 hours ago, BaskingsharkGTX said:

Not to mention that for him to be able to cut up a body AND clean up in the space of half a football/soccer game is some light-speed butchery. 

That's what struck me, too, though I guess Joe has enough experience with dismemberment that it's old hat by now, heh.

7 hours ago, BaskingsharkGTX said:

Kudos also to Joe for being able to transition seamlessly from driving his and Love's automatic Lexus SUV and Toyota Prius with parking assist, reversing cameras etc to taking the wheel of a 65-year-old Jaguar with a manual choke and stick-shift on the wrong side of the road!

In fairness, in his voiceover Joe did say he needed time to mentally prepare for driving on the wrong side of the road. I loved that detail.

[tennisgurl]

At this point, Joe has killed so many people that the only thing he has to adjust for this most recent murder is which side of the road to drive on. Joe in the UK should be interesting, a whole new kind of annoying rich people to snark on/murder, its sort of hilarious how he just keeps getting sucked into the orbit of annoying super rich people. He just cant resist, probably because Joe loves being around people he hates so that he can really enjoy feeling like the smartest best guy in the room. 

I really am surprised that Marianne is still alive. She was at least smart enough to make a break for it when she saw Joe, as everyone should, although next time stay on the crowded street. Don't run off to the creepy abandoned building! 

I miss Love. Her crazy matched with Joe's crazy really gave the show a different twist. 

[JenE4]

The hit man after Joe specifically mentioned this job when he handed Joe the new identity, so we are to believe that he had it all prearranged. For all we know, Jonathan was a real academic with a published history and all that and this guy knocked him off to give Joe his identity, but all of that is besides the point. It’s *tv magic* just like everything else.

I was more struck by how the class was impressed that he was an edgy professor and then he assigns…Edgar Allan Poe?!? But, now seeing the plotline of the season, if it was “The Tell Tale Heart” (I don’t recall the exact story), then it does make for a thematic reference of a murderer so anxious and paranoid about being caught, that he thinks the police can hear the heartbeat of the dead man hidden under the floorboards, but it was just his own heartbeat getting progressively stronger in his chest, and his paranoia was his own demise. Checks out so far. 

[Artsda]

I like the twist of Joe assuming he did it but not being  the one who did it and going the opposite route.

Edited February 18, 2023 by Artsda

[Lady Calypso]

Yeah, one episode in, and I'm not so sure that season 4 will be for me. I found myself more confused than anything, and I'm also 100% sick of the exact shame schtick they go for. Joe falls into a rich, elitist crowd. All of them suck to varying degrees. Someone gets murdered, then it's just an avalance of murders. Joe makes condescending voice-overs about how he hates rich people while looking creepily at them. 

I think what also doesn't help is that I am not interested in ANY of the new characters introduced. Malcolm actually had SOME appeal to me, but he's dead now. I just don't see how they will get me hooked into whatever is going on because everyone has a very bland and vapid personality. It's just the same old-same old, and there's no crazy Love to add something new. We've seen Joe fight the rich before. It's boring, quite frankly, and it shows that...what, Joe will always just attack the rich? Will he ever fall into a poorer crowd? Or are we supposed to root for Joe to win because he's against the rich and privileged? I'm just so bored by it, give me something new because this isn't new. Different location, same batch of characters. Yawn. 

Also, the hit man is confusing. So, apparently, he gets hired by Love's family to kill Joe, decides...not to kill Joe, gives him a new identity for some reason, and then...tells Joe to kill Marienne? I'm sorry, what? Is this hit man Joe's brother or something, because if it's not, I have no idea why he'd care about Joe so much that he'd protect him.

Also, another note, didn't Joe cut off his finger last season to put DNA in the house when he killed Love? Why does he still have his finger? Or did he cut off his toe and we'll just never see him barefoot? 

They tried to add a twist where, oops, someone else killed Malcolm and is trying to frame Joe and is speaking exactly like he does in his voiceovers. But, again, with this bland cast, do I really care who it is? I really don't think so. It's not gonna make me feel bad for Joe, and it also won't make me feel bad for the person who is inevitably murdered or framed. 

Marienne escaping unscathed was the ONLY good part of this episode. Now, I still believe she's on a ticking clock, since Joe only let her go for now to prove he's changed. Once it's clear to him that he can never change, he's just going to murder her when she rejects him again. So I guess, at this point, I'm rooting for her to escape with her daughter while she still can, since she knows he knows they live in Paris.

I'll see if the rest of the episodes fare better but, honestly, they're all so two dimensional that they have no personality that separates them from past season characters. Not even Joe's supposed new love interest, who is bitchy and that's about it.

[dubbel zout]

14 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

did he cut off his toe

Yes.

[KaveDweller]

9 hours ago, Lady Calypso said:

Also, the hit man is confusing. So, apparently, he gets hired by Love's family to kill Joe, decides...not to kill Joe, gives him a new identity for some reason, and then...tells Joe to kill Marienne? I'm sorry, what? Is this hit man Joe's brother or something, because if it's not, I have no idea why he'd care about Joe so much that he'd protect him.

He asked Joe for money in exchange for not killing him, because he knew Joe had cleared out one of Love's bank accounts. We didn't actually see Joe pay him, but I assume he must have.

Then that's why Joe needed to get a job, because I guess he'd been living on that money.

[Scarlett45]

12 hours ago, KaveDweller said:

He asked Joe for money in exchange for not killing him, because he knew Joe had cleared out one of Love's bank accounts. We didn't actually see Joe pay him, but I assume he must have.

Then that's why Joe needed to get a job, because I guess he'd been living on that money.

That’s how I saw it too. Also I can imagine Joe wanted something to do, and he does love literature.