Killer Instinct, Club manager in 1.12 "Love Hurts" (2006)

Killer Instinct

Luciana Carro as a club manager in the penultimate episode of this short-lived cop show





The Show

Killer Instinct was an hour-long crime drama television series broadcast on the FOX Network. The pilot episode aired on September 23, 2005 and the final episode aired on December 2, 2005.

The show starred Johnny Messner as Detective Jack Hale of the San Francisco Police Department Deviant Crimes Unit. Each new crime spree is investigated by the head of the unit, Lieutenant Matt Cavanaugh (Chi McBride), and Hale's partner, Detective Danielle Carter (Kristin Lehman), as well.

Fox recorded 13 episodes, but only 9 episodes were broadcast in the United States. The remaining 4 were premiered in the UK throughout March, 2006 on Channel 5. (Wikipedia)


The Episode

"Love Hurts" is the penultimate episode of the first season (and of the series). It's among those three which weren't shown in the U.S. but only saw the light of day when the short series was broadcast on British channel five.

Luciana Carro portrays the manager of a club (Eljay) who helps Carter when she investigate the first murder. (at 11'30'').


Links

- Internet Movie Database - "Killer Instinct" overview
- Internet Movie Database - 1.12 "Love Hurts"
- Wikipedia
- Frosty's screencaps of Luciana


Review

In stark contrast with, say, Lucci's "Collector" ep, I was quickly hooked by the appealing audiovisuals of "Love Hurts". The episode has a flashy and stylish beginning, with an unusual murder (hence, Deviant Crime Unit) taking place in the very first minute. Given that "Killer Instinct" was developed to be a successful "CSI" clone, it comes at no surprise that KI's glossy and fast-paced photography and music is reminiscent of the 21st century's crop of homicide cop shows.

Unfortunately, (as with CSI et al.) this reduces the realism of the show significantly. I doubt that so many personal and technical resources are allocated to one single homicide case. The whole atmosphere is casual and flashy at the same time. In fact, the male lead's coolness was a little bit over the top, IMHO. Plus, even by TV standards (where the "ugly" people are only "TV ugly") the three most prominent women in "Love Hurts" are very pretty. (BTW: The female suspect reminded me of Leah Cairns...)

The script features some witty dialogue, but some unnecessary red herrings, too. Like so often, it's the coroner/pathologist who serves as the weird sidekick. What I as a tofu-eating do-gooder really, really didn't like was how the episode suggested that requiring a subpoena is nothing but a bureaucratic pain in the ass that slows down the investigation.

Luciana herself appears after the first quarter and has a couple of lines. Her clothes and style were okay. I was glad to see her in a role that, to speak with Lucci's own words, was "free of bullshit". Nothing spectacular, though.

Bottom line: Typical modern cop show with stylish production values but without any desire to provoke any thoughts.

It's been two years since the last activity in this thread, so I added a Killer Instinct page to the Fansite today (caps and video by Frosty).

Perhaps I won't remain the only one to comment on Luciana's foray into the world of police procedurals...

Nice work on that page.

Yeah, I just noticed I didn't comment on this episode at all so far. I'll post some thoughts soon.

Thanks

And I look forward to your review

Alright, here is a short review:

While I usually don't watch crime shows like Killer Instinct, CSI etc (and I wouldn't have watched Killer Instinct if Lucci wasn't in it), the episode was actually entertaining. I agree with Pedda that the producers of the series gave style a higher priority than realism, but it seemed to work more or less. The search for the killer was about as interesting as one can make it in a non-serialized drama where the plot has to be resolved within one hour and the episodes are self contained. The plot featured a twist, and at least it wasn't clear in the beginning who the killer was and who not. The interaction between the female suspect and her friend during the first half of the episode added to the suspense, since it was not clear whether they worked together or whether she would be a future victim of him. Yet, by the middle of the episode it was clear these two were working together, so for the viewer the question who the bad guys were was already resolved. From then on, the suspense only stemmed from the questions how the police would find out who the killers were and how they would catch them (and it was of course clear that they would catch them, the good guys always win in a series like this, so there was no suspense in that), and of course how many more victims there would be.
There were some more or less original ideas. The killer pair and their motivations (not greed or hunger for power like almost always) were unusual for such a show (at least as far as I know, but like I said, these crime shows are not what I regularly watch).
As was to be expected for a show with self contained episodes, there was no character development to speak of, neither with the main characters nor the guest stars. And the characters were more or less stereotypes with no depth (the "cool" good guys, the evil killer, the cute victim, the eccentric pathologist etc.)
What I also disliked was the violence. I guess it's quite "normal" nowadays to show a beheaded body, but the show certainly tries to satisfy the viewers blood lust more than I personally would like. There are series which handle this topic better in my opinion, for example Battlestar Galactica in which death is an important part because it's a war drama, but where it is usually shown as something terrible with all it's consequences. In Killer Instinct, it seemed more like the cruelty was done solely to satisfy the blood lust of the audience, for example when they showed the slow death of the female victim drowning.
Other than that, it was a quite solid piece of TV entertainment which can also appeal to the casual viewer who isn't familiar to the series (which is of course the upsode of a non-serialized show).
Interesting side note: The female victim was played by the same actress who played Esrin in the BSG webisodes The Face of the Enemy. So there were two Colonial pilots in this episode.


Luciana's character wasn't important to the plot, so she only had a single, dimly lit, scene. But she did a good job in my opinion, her portrayal of Eljay (cute name) was believable, and despite the short screen time one could notice this character had it's own personality which differed from her other characters. So I'm satisfied with her role here (it could have been bigger, of course), and I enjoy these kinds of guest appearances.

That was quick!

I don't know about you, but when I watched the ep's first half for the first time, I did not suspect they were working together at all. Did you? Granted, I'm not the brightest when it comes to anticipating these twists. Yet, watching the ep again, the way they shot and cut it, I felt this is more like a cheap red herring instead of "clever scripting".

Good point. Since this show isn't about exploring the sociological causes of crime anyway, it was a good decision to have a little fun with the murderer's motivations and techniques.

Funny thing is, the beheaded body was such an unusual image, that it almost looked goofish and reminded me of stylized violence such as in "Sin City" or "Sweeney Todd".

Now that's an interesting factoid! Did you mention it over at Caprica City?

I think there was a scene that at least implied they knew each other. But when watching it the first time, I didn't think they worked together, either.

Well, in shows like CSI this is quite common I think.

Now that's an interesting factoid! Did you mention it over at Caprica City?

Since I don't think we ever discussed Killer Instinct there... no. There a so many Canadian actors and actresses in BSG, I didn't think this was that noteworthy, so I only mentioned it here when discussing the episode anyway.
Hmm, I have seen Jessica Harmon in two different roles, and she got killed in both of them. If I'll ever get stuck in a TV series, I'd rather stay away from her if I want to survive.