‘Killing Eve’ Recap: ‘Beautiful Monster’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM. YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.

When we take the time to stand up for ourselves and our virtues, we do it because we are in desperate need of a change. We need the status quo to end before it suffocates us and often times, standing tall does produce wonderful benefits for us. Because it gives us strength and confidence and of course, it does engineer change in our lives. But while it is important to rise up from time to time and shatter the status quo, we do need to be prepared for potential blow back. Because some people, really don’t care for change, and rattling their world to alter ours can bring about ugly consequences, as evidenced by last night’s episode of Killing Eve.
 
Because ‘Beautiful Monster’ saw all kinds of fallout come forth for the bravery that so many of the characters exhibited during last week’s tale and that made for some ugly and unfortunate moments. Take Carolyn’s journey for instance. Because taking the time to stand up to Paul, emboldened her further when it comes to her suspicions of him, and that prompted her to put Mo on the trail to find something concrete about Paul’s ties to the Twelve. And sadly, the consequence of pushing hard against an agent of the Twelve, is seeing more innocent lives lost. For Mo didn’t survive an encounter with the Twelve’s newest assassin, after accomplishing his mission, something that once again rattled Carolyn’s psyche because the losses keep mounting for her.
 
While Carolyn worked to reconcile more death in her life, Konstantin dealt with the fallout of his manic push to escape the Twelve by racing to Cuba. For his daughter’s newfound bloodlust put her in a detention center, one that there was seemingly no escape from. Prompting him to head to London to check in and plan the next steps for his 'retirement'. But unfortunately for Konstantin, the stress surrounding him in both his professional and personal life, brought about the worst possible consequence imaginable, failing health. Because during an attempt to head for the money with Villanelle, he suffered a massive heart attack. And while he made it to a hospital in time, the fact that he’s stuck in a room with Dasha and on the Twelve’s bad side, doesn’t exactly engender much hope for a long-term recovery.

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​Speaking of Dasha, her time in the hospital is also related to the power of consequences. Because her belief that she is the finest assassin to ever work for the Twelve, combined with her sour attitude and constant abuse of Villanelle, finally drove our favorite assassin to offer up a little payback. The kind where she straight up cold cocked Dasha upside the head with a golf club during a mission in Scotland. Which didn’t exactly have the intended effect that Villanelle was looking for, but it was enough to set up her getaway and hopeful escape from the Twelve, since she seemingly has all the information regarding Konstantin’s vast stores of money, making this part of the story a bit of a win for this emotionally rattled assassin and oddly enough, the good-ish vibes didn’t end with her.
 
Because the only person who didn’t suffer any consequences in this tale was Eve and that’s honestly a good thing. For this intrepid and brilliant spy has been through enough this season, and it is high time that she celebrates a little joy and a little hopefulness toward something bigger and she did indeed enjoy a taste of that in this tale. Which stemmed from her belief, that the time was right to contact Villanelle and recruit her into the cause since it was obvious that the Twelve were trying to use her as pawn, and thanks to Bear and Jamie, she was able to track her down quickly. But getting close to Villanelle up north offered an unexpected bonus for Eve, since it allowed for her to enact a little payback on Dasha when she stumbled upon her wounded body, since the elder assassin admitted to going after Nico. But what matters most is that Eve finally got the attention of her obsession, and they’re talking at this point and that could be a dangerous combination for the Twelve. Because if Eve can indeed enlist Villanelle’s help in going after this organization, MI6 might finally have a chance at bringing these jerks down. 
 
If anything, this is an episode that more or less featured organized chaos. Since there were uplifting and dark moments abound in this tale and that is a stroke of genius storytelling wise. Because it provides the audience with a genuine sense of danger and confusion, since the Twelve are clearly done with playing games and it feels as though no one is safe. Which means there are no guarantees that everyone will make it out of next week’s season three finale alive. And that is going to make the wait for said finale an unnerving one for certain. Because this season has already been a costly and painful one, and more loss would be tough to stomach. But sadly that is the nature of the spy business, one that the audience is now heavily vested in and a stunning ending is the only way to remind of the fact that this battle was always going to get worse before it gets better, and it should be interesting to see how the season three finale will up the ante and rattle us like never before.  Until next time.

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