S01.E01: Arrangement in Grey and Black

[tanita]

Spoiler

Honestly, if this is inspired by BTK, the identity of the killer shouldn't have even been a misery. The capture and fallout alone would have been enough for a 13 episode run. I mean, I'm not from the US, but even i have heard of BTK.

[Enigma X]

I just watched and found it very cliched, but I was intrigued and in for now.

[breezy424]

I'd rather watch The Family.  Too bad it was cancelled.  The 'cat' thing was 'too much'.  Too disturbing.

Unfortunately, I'll probably keep watching for now. 

[Tara Ariano]

In case you missed it, here's the Previously.TV post on the episode!

Should You Take A Stab At American Gothic?

What happens when a member of a prominent Boston family is a suspected serial killer? It's not a laugh every minute.

[iMonrey]

Like others I saw a lot of similarities between this and The Family. Prominent families, political campaigns, alcoholism/drug abuse, etc. Time will tell if this show is as watchable as The Family - at least that showed moved at a decent pace. I'm not sure the story itself is as compelling.

[Guest]

One thing I'll give this one it has better real estate/decor porn.  

I hope, too, since it has a basis in a real story, it doesn't ask me to suspend disbelief on a lot of things quite as far as The Family did. That one had a couple whoppers I had trouble swallowing.  

[Cardie]

The New York Times reviewer said that American Gothic, The Family, and some other shows--I'd add Bloodline--form a sub-genre he calls PFDS: Prominent Family, Dark Secrets.

[ghoulina]

Late to watching, but I think this will be a fun, summer affair. It was definitely a bit cliche and predictable in the first episode....but then it wasn't. I knew they were going to find bells when they were looking for drugs. I highly suspected that weird kid had the cat. But I didn't see the mother offing the father, so that was kind of fun. And the final scene was definitely chilling. 

As for the "who dunnit" - Garrett told his father that he was going to say it was him. That leads me to believe that it WASN'T the father, but....Garrett sees him in some way responsible. He is clearly angry at his father. Is he the killer? And his father did something to him that made him that way? (In his eyes) Or, maybe there was more than one killer. Interesting. 

[Josette]

Quote

 I just googled the show to see a cast member's name and saw an article that said it's loosely based on a real serial killer who was

Spoiler

Dennis Rader (BTK) is not dead.  Also, they mentioned BTK during this episode when the younger sister asked her cop husband about serial killers. 

Edited June 28, 2016 by Josette
context

[iMonrey]

They really glossed over any repercussions for the kid who cut off the cat's tail. Were there any? Seeing as the father had the wherewithal to take the cat to the vet I'm assuming they took it back to its owner afterwards. Did they make up some story about what happened to its tail? Can vets even sew tails back onto cats when they've been cut off? I don't think so. Does anyone else in the family know what the little psychopath did to that poor cat? 

[ghoulina]

11 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

 

They really glossed over any repercussions for the kid who cut off the cat's tail. Were there any? Seeing as the father had the wherewithal to take the cat to the vet I'm assuming they took it back to its owner afterwards. Did they make up some story about what happened to its tail? Can vets even sew tails back onto cats when they've been cut off? I don't think so. Does anyone else in the family know what the little psychopath did to that poor cat? 

 

I don't think he told anyone else. He was teetering on the edge as it was, and couldn't cope. So he left the kid and went to get high with his ex. I'm really not sure how that kid is in the custody of either of those parents at this point. 

As for the cat, my bet is that it was just released in the general area in the hopes that the owner will find it herself and no explanations will need to be given. 

[backformore]

On ‎6‎/‎23‎/‎2016 at 11:58 PM, Jordan61 said:

Thank you! I said the same thing to my husband. Plus, could you even kill somebody by pinching that thing off? I had to wear one after a surgery but I occasionally  took it off when it was bugging me and I was fine.

That's what I thought, too.  It was just an oxygen line, right?  He wasn't hooked up to a machine that was breathing for him.  The oxygen line just helps by delivering more oxygen to your lungs.  Without it - you breathe regular air. 

[Amelie06]

2 hours ago, backformore said:

On 6/24/2016 at 0:58 AM, Jordan61 said:

Thank you! I said the same thing to my husband. Plus, could you even kill somebody by pinching that thing off? I had to wear one after a surgery but I occasionally  took it off when it was bugging me and I was fine.

That's what I thought, too.  It was just an oxygen line, right?  He wasn't hooked up to a machine that was breathing for him.  The oxygen line just helps by delivering more oxygen to your lungs.  Without it - you breathe regular air. 

This scene made me laugh when I was supposed to be taken aback by this cold-blooded murder. All I could think was, "that's not how this works. That's not how any of this works!" All he had to do was breathe like he normally does. He wasn't on a breathing tube. He wasn't reliant on that for the only oxygen he could get. He should have been looking at her like, "what are you doing? Nurse! Nurse!"

I was put off by creepy son who kidnapped a damn cat to torture it. Yuck. We didn't need that. Are we to suspect that the kid was the serial killer?

I hated the peppy, youngest daughter. She seemed like she was going to stamp her feet and say "gee whiz, guys! We've got to do the right thing!" How did someone like her end up in this family?

Where has Garrett been? And why was he forced to shave with a sharp knife? This seems supremely unnecessary on his part. Even if he wanted to get away from his family, that didn't mean he had to fall in with Alaskan bush people. (I'm talking about that weird family that has a show on the Discovery channel.

[izabella]

14 hours ago, Amelie06 said:

Are we to suspect that the kid was the serial killer?

I think we're supposed to suspect that serial killing runs in this family, and he is the next one in formation.

After just this one episode, I'm placing my bets on the serial killer being the older sister.  I never trust super ambitious politicians.  She seemed the least concerned of the siblings that dad might be a serial killer, and was eager to put the bells away until "after the election."  What do you bet those bells disappear in the meantime?

[ghoulina]

1 hour ago, izabella said:

After just this one episode, I'm placing my bets on the serial killer being the older sister.  I never trust super ambitious politicians.  She seemed the least concerned of the siblings that dad might be a serial killer, and was eager to put the bells away until "after the election."  What do you bet those bells disappear in the meantime?

This is a good point. She didn't seem all that shocked or upset. However, how many shady politicians out there are all too eager to brush skeletons under the rug because it could compromise their campaign? I'm definitely not ruling her out, but I am open to believing her reaction was because she was putting her campaign first. 

[izabella]

I can believe she's putting her campaign first rather than being the serial killer.  She might still make the bells disappear!  I'm holding onto her being a politician, so she must be shady, lol.

Mom seems the shadiest at the moment, murdering her husband and all (as silly as that method of murder was).  Garrett seemed happy to see Mom when he returned, and I feel like he left so as not to face the serial killerness of whichever family member it was...signs point to Dad.  Like maybe Garreet found out, and he and Dad had a big blow-up about it, and Garrett left rather than turning Dad in.

[Arynm]

On 6/25/2016 at 6:58 AM, Margherita Erdman said:

I didn't like this pilot much, and not just because of the animal mutilation (and the family's complete and utter lack of alarm about it — I was relieved they rushed poor Caramel to the vet, but how on earth did they explain the "mishap" to Caramel's owner???).

Is that what happened? I honestly thought the son was sitting in the car with the severed tail of Caramel in a tupperware container.

I like the show, I have no idea who it could be, hell, it could be every damn one of them.

[Save Yourself]

On 23 June 2016 at 1:02 PM, bmoore4026 said:

Of course there's some creepy ass child that's an insult to everyone on the autism spectrum.  Of course there is.  Because TV writers suck.  And he's unimaginative to boot. 

I got sociopath from him, not autism. I don't think people assume those on the spectrum are cruel do they? I really hope not, that's not a trait of the condition at all. I actually found him quite horrifically intriguing, I'm always interested in what a young sociopath might be like and how frightening it would be if you saw the signs in your child.

 

On 24 June 2016 at 2:25 AM, candall said:

The lighting was ridiculous.  I had to pull out my special User Mode, normally reserved for Game of Thrones.  I know GoT, sir, and you are no GoT.

I wasn't sure if it was just me! The lighting was so annoying, I found it so difficult to see which is particular frustrating as I have a huge crush on Justin Chatwin.

 

On 25 June 2016 at 11:21 PM, Winston9-DT3 said:

I kind of wondered if the cop saying he had no blues was his way of saying 'fuck no' to the campaign manager.  It was kind of an insulting request, I thought. 

  Reveal hidden contents

a deceased patriarch, whose family discovered his crimes after his death.  Here is the link:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/btk-serial-killer-daughter-speaks-out-american-gothic/

I thought that too and I also thought it would be against police policy for an officer to endorse a candidate like that - it's different if he's just in civvies, in uni it looks like police approval.