The image immediately sends a cold chill down the spine, evoking any number of classic horror nasties, particularly from the slasher and home invasion subgenre.<\/p>\n
Yet, this eerie twist is quickly exposed as a misdirect, with the person under the mask being Damon himself, returning from a Halloween stag do having downed a few too many drinks. His wife isn\u2019t impressed, and the noise of someone \u2013 or something \u2013 tumbling down the stairs not long after implies an argument turned violent.<\/p>
However, it\u2019s fairly obvious that things are not as dark as they appear. In fact, an air of silliness sweeps in that has been absent from season 9 to date, as self-styled neighbourhood watchers Sheila, Ken and Larry attempt an investigative break-in that descends into utter farce.<\/p>\n
As their confidence grows that Damon has done something unspeakable to his wife, the tone feels closer to Tom Hanks<\/a> comedy The \u2018Burbs than to Hitchcock thriller Rear Window. Sure enough, the embattled husband is shown to be innocent when he makes a vulnerable call to Val, expressing his desire to have her back home.<\/p>\n When she does return late the following night, she explains to Larry \u2013 out looking for his missing dog \u2013 that a wine-stained futon was shoved down the stairs, rather than herself or her husband. A misunderstanding, nothing to worry about. But then they find his dog, dead in their recycling bin. Oh dear.<\/p>\n A startled Val rushes inside to call Damon for an explanation, but something in Larry seems to instantly snap as he proceeds to brutally murder her with a brick. Sigh. Where do I begin?<\/p>\n For starters, there had been nothing in the episode to suggest that Larry could be capable of such a shocking and sudden act of extreme violence \u2013 on the contrary, he had seemed rather timid and empathetic.<\/p>\n Perhaps that\u2019s a deliberate move to show how suspicion can be misplaced and that people who are disarmingly affable can be hiding an inner darkness. For what it\u2019s worth, the episode does make multiple references to Netflix<\/a> true crime documentaries, and few things play better on the service than a sensationalised suburban murder story.<\/p>\n But I can\u2019t help but feel that this twist is just a bit lazy, leaning into a trope so well worn that there\u2019s a special word to describe it. Have the writers heard of \u2018fridging\u2019 before, I wonder?<\/p>\n The term dates back to a controversial Green Lantern comic book, in which the titular hero discovered his girlfriend\u2019s dead body stuffed into a refrigerator by a sadistic foe. It\u2019s since been used to describe the frequent, unceremonious and typically brutal killing of a female character in the interest of male development.<\/p>\n It creates a storytelling landscape in which women are helpless victims to be disposed of when the time is right. That\u2019s not to say, as some like to unhelpfully extrapolate, that fictional female characters should never be killed off under any circumstances. But merely that they shouldn\u2019t exist only to be sacrificial lambs and are worthy of the same dignity afforded their male peers.<\/p>\n In this case, that dignity feels lacking. While Val comes across like a well-realised character in her relatively short amount of screen time \u2013 credit where it\u2019s due to Shearsmith and Pemberton\u2019s down-to-earth dialogue, and Robinson\u2019s natural delivery \u2013 this unpleasant end to her arc feels like little more than cheap shock value.<\/p>\n Fans like it when Inside No. 9<\/a> gets dark \u2013 heck, I\u2019ve highly praised<\/a> the last two episodes for doing so \u2013 but it only works if there\u2019s a narrative justification; a commentary to be made; an emotional payoff; an understandable character choice. The climax of Mulberry Close fails to meet any of these criteria.<\/p>\n We learn that it was actually Sheila who accidentally ran over Larry\u2019s dog, dumping the body in Damon\u2019s bin to get herself out of trouble, while adding more weight to their existing suspicions of him. It\u2019s a plan that perhaps could have worked \u2013 were it not for the doorbell camera footage we\u2019ve been glued to.<\/p>\n We then discover that this footage forms the basis of a Netflix-style true crime documentary titled The Mulberry Close Murders, narrated by none other than Michael Ball (just as Sheila had enthusiastically pitched).<\/p>\n Again, there\u2019s an argument that Val\u2019s grim fate is in service to this last minute punchline, but I would argue that the satire is neither sharp nor novel enough to justify ending yet another story with a savaged female body.<\/p>\n![\"Larry](\"https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/3\/2024\/05\/475556-d17e0ef.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C413\" "\\"475556,Inside")
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