The following wild flurry of rhetoric is not meant to subtweet anyone’s else’s pieces about The Jinx, as I object far too strongly to any criticism of said show to read it.
“After all, Watson,” said Holmes, reaching up his hand for his clay pipe, “I am not retained by the police to supply their deficiencies.” – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
What exactly do you ingrates want? Is it not enough for The Jinx to be wildly entertaining AND for it to have solved a cold case murder using evidence the police already had in their possession and ignored? Now we’re expecting Television to text the Keystone Kops of the LAPD every four seconds to patiently spoon-feed them their own case? How many cold case murders have you solved, that you think these brilliant, dedicated, MURDER-SOLVING gentlemen should have solved theirs slightly differently? They should bundle everything up and wait for the police to fail to bring a rich white man to justice once more?
This is Television, giving you The Jinx:
This is you, being a greedy soulless garbage-monster who has never solved a single cold case murder:
But Nicole, what if Robert Durst had killed someone else during the two years or whatever after the filmmakers found the envelope?
(He didn’t, though!)
What if Robert Durst killed someone during the thirty years after the cops failed to catch him? Oh, wait! HE KILLED TWO MORE PEOPLE.
Do you know whose literal job it is to catch murderers? It is the job of the police!
What is the job of Television? It is to entertain us. Once in a very long while, when the shocking and widespread incompetence of the police leaves a meaningful vacuum in the world of jobs, Television is kind and generous enough to do TWO JOBS. Don’t you dare criticize Television for picking up the police’s slack. The police were never, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER going to catch Robert Durst. They weren’t even trying anymore.
This is the police, trying to catch Durst without the assistance provided by Television:
No, that’s unfair, because that suggests the police were still trying. This is the police, trying to catch Robert Durst without the assistance provided by Television:
But Nicole, the “confession” doesn’t mean anything!
I have no interest in the confession. The confession was wonderful Television. I will not be bogged down in the swamps of what he meant, or the intricacies of his bizarre bathroom conversation, recreated below by a courtroom artist:
It is irrelevant to the case. What matters? THE ENVELOPE MATTERS. Ed Wright’s report, with Durst’s inconsistent and murder-y accounts of his whereabouts matters. They solved it! It was solved. They solved it via hard work and stick-to-it-iveness. They listened to Gilberte! They listened to WOMEN, women who demonstrated the beauty and resilience of female friendship by tirelessly attempting to bring Durst to the attention of the police. Do you think Kathie’s family watched the documentary and were all TUT TUT IF ONLY THE MORONS WHO FAILED TO BRING THE MAN WHO KILLED OUR DAUGHTER TO JUSTICE WERE INSTANTLY INFORMED OF ALL THE THINGS THEY FAILED TO NOTICE ORIGINALLY?
No. They were not.
But Nicole, what if law enforcement and the justice system fail in their appointed rounds once more, and Robert Durst goes free bc blah blah chain of custody blah blah something?
Television has ensured that we will at least know that Robert Durst is a murderer. That is a great gift! As someone who would prefer not to be murdered, I like knowing that people are murderers, so I can avoid them. Do you remember when the incompetent buffoons of the LAPD failed to put OJ Simpson behind bars? Happily, Television made sure we all knew he was a murderer, and so he has been prevented from murdering anyone else to this very day, however much he may want to. I wouldn’t get into an elevator with OJ Simpson, because of Television. He will not be able to murder me. This will also be the case with Robert Durst.
But Nicole, they played fast and loose with The Timeline!
Here are the only timelines that matter:
The Timeline of The Jinx
1. Filmmakers make a documentary about Robert Durst.
2. During the making of this documentary, they tirelessly pursue evidence ignored or overlooked by the original investigators and manage to solve the case of Susan Berman and almost-solve the case of Kathie Durst while also entertaining the nation in a wildly-enjoyable six part series.
3. Durst is now in jail and unable to murder anyone unless normal law enforcement and the justice system manage to fuck it up again.
The Timeline of Normal Law Enforcement
1. The police fail to stop Robert Durst from murdering anyone and do absolutely nothing for decades and decades.
2. Durst dies of old age, probably having murdered a fourth person along the way, because he’s a murderer.
THE END
****
Tags: ACTUAL MURDERERS, beauty, crime, filthy ingrates, heroes, i’m not mad at cody he did his best and is a lovely man, robert durst, television, the jinx
So I should watch this show? I didn’t listen to Serial, about which I’m glad, because real life is unresolved enough for me, thanks. Plus, no time, really. A satisfying conclusion to a real life murder mystery sounds good, though. I am also Old, so tv>podcasts.
My husband has always been of the “Eff the police” camp and to him the notion of the police officer being your friend, as I was taught to believe, is patently false. I’m coming around to his, and everyone’s, line of thinking.
I had gotten it in my head that The Jinx was a television series about magicians, or more likely witches. I read this piece expecting you to begin talking about the magic truly at any time. Instead I learned about the magic of Television. Truly we live in a glorious age when Television does two jobs.
you could say it is a magical age
i really wanted this show to be about witches
Don’t worry, HBO is working on a pilot about Salem with Jenji Kohan.
I did not listen to Serial. Video kiled the radio star, why pay attention to its animated corpse, the podcast?
Sweet Baby Jeebus, I love this more than anything else in the world right now. Why? It describes my feelings for podcasts so, so perfectly.
“…animated corpse…” PERFECTION! (Strolls off, holding hands and skipping lightly with CBC Radio Canada).
Because some of us can’t watch TV at work and still want someone to tell us about murders while we type.
Terrestrial radio is a beautiful thing, Nicole. Podcasts are fun. Don’t be so teleological. Also this Jinx article is the best thing ever.
l came here to have a good time and I’m honestly feeling so attacked right now
I promise to never have a contradictory opinion about a television show ever again. I’m so sorry Nicole.
LOL it was not you it was the WORLD
Honestly, some of my dearest friends have made reasonable criticisms of the show and I DO NOT ACCEPT IT.
SPOILER ALERTS!! Just kidding, I love spoilers and hate people who whine about them. You can’t spoil news/real life.
By the way, this is the best article on it yet. Thank you.
I think I love you…
What other cold cases can HBO crack? “It’s not just TV….”
I saw the preview for the hbo Scientology documentary last night and wanted so desperately for it to be instantly available because SCIENTOLOGY IS THE WORLDS GREATEST MYSTERY.
Oh, I KNOW!! I’m so deliciously excited for that shit! I saw one of the directors on one of the “Jimmy” shows….Fallon, I think? And just the interview was super intriguing.
HBO is the best.
I read Going Clear, which the doc is totally based on, but I am with you, impatiently waiting for HBO to let me watch this.
I’m probably going to go fetal and blink maniacally and talk to myself in first and third person until it airs.
It’s funny because you just described Robert Durst’s mannerisms and I’m not sure you meant to.
Oh no, it was totally on purpose 🙂
JACK THE RIPPER JACK THE RIPPER
YESSSSS!!
I haven’t watched this yet and have no opinion on anything to do with it, but I’m okay with you calling me a garbage person. Only you and Mallory, though, may ever call me a garbage person.
I’m still kind of reeling after watching all six episodes of The Jinx yesterday. The story is so interesting, the filmmaking and investigation by the people involved was stunning, the personal narratives were moving, everyone was extraordinary (in good and/or bad ways). It’s the story of love and dedication and privilege and incompetence and it is RIVETING. The last ten minutes–regardless of how the information factors into whatever buffoonery the criminal justice system does with it–took my breath away. I watched the last ten minutes at least ten times. Their faces were bright red, their hands were shaking, all the important communication was happening nonverbally. It was INTENSE. And then they offered him a sandwich to go! OH MY GOD.
The Jinx is one of those things that I was blissfully unaware of until the entire Internet exploded with the news that some guy I’d never heard of had been arrested after being involved in a movie? miniseries? documentary? that I had never heard of either. What even is going on? Should I watch it, and if so, where? Is it on TV? Can I torrent it? I am so lost, you guys.
I don’t have HBO! How long until I can rent the DVD’s from the library?
It’s on HBO GO if you have/can get access. You could probably torrent it as well.
I tried to get access to HBO Go, and they wanted me to buy HBO before I could get it. Except I’d have to bundle it with other premium cable channels, and fuck that noise.
At this point, HBO could ask for actual blood from my veins and it would still be worth the subscription fee.
DO NOT TORRENT IT, seriously. If anyone is going to go after you for torrenting something, it’s HBO. They are VICIOUS about that shit.
What is the torrent? Uggggghhhh, I’ll google it. I think I’ll wait until HBO’s free week and stay up late every night. That’s what we did with True Detective and that was 12 episodes! This will be less stressful, but maybe more stressful because it’s real. Oh my God, thank God True Detective wasn’t real.
Eh mostly they don’t go after downloaders these days, just uploaders and torrent hosting sites (which is a losing battle). You can always use a VPN too…
Having felt the same ignorance until now, I am entirely grateful to Nicole and her skillful use of Hot Fuzz to spell it out so I don’t have to wade through hours of internet garbage – or television – to find out.
Inorite?
Yep. I don’t have HBO and I am also not a true crime fan, so until it blew up on Sunday, I had never even heard of it. And now I feel that I know all I need to know.
Can we talk about the terrible jury in Galveston?
SO TERRIBLE
“He only dismembered his friend that no one has evidence was his friend after the gun accidentally went off TWICE and he clearly made up the part about shooting the eviction letter but NOT GUILTY of murder even though he is clearly shady as hell”. Also, why did the prosecutors only go for murder? Why not desecration of a corpse? or probably many other things that he was obviously guilty of?
I also thought it was interesting that RD had to confirm with his attorneys that the jury said “NOT guilty”, like he was too used to hearing what he wanted to hear to trust himself.
Omg, I was hoping he would murder that one jury idiot.
I’m watching part 6 again and I want to murder/self defense/dismember some sense into that moron.
WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT FUCKING LOOPHOLE!? Like, the defense literally just has to get their client to say “self defense!” and if there’s no forensic evidence proving otherwise, you just have to accept that? UTTERLY FUCKED. I wanted to punch every single person who’s ever written a law in the history of the world.
The system of who believes what, and how it written into law, is definitely not gendered at all and has absolutely no implications for sexual assault charges or victims.
OK, so does the DA lady remind anyone else of the comedian lady who does impersonations on Watch What Happens Live? Amy Phillips?
This is her doing Lisa Vanderpump: http://i.ytimg.com/vi/IfUdcZDkzqo/maxresdefault.j…
So, you can just imagine her in the DA lady’s wig and her big leather chair and pink dress.
You have convinced me.
Reading about this creep reminds me of the story A Good Marriage by Stephen King. Except the wife isn’t the victim, the wife is the bringer of justice.
NICOLE I LOVE YOU SO MUCH
This is my Rushmore.
The movie or the mountain?
I got transferred to a new library branch recently and I had to introduce myself at the staff meeting yesterday. They’ve got some great facilities here.
You starting a fencing club?
“Do you remember when the incompetent buffoons of the LAPD failed to put OJ Simpson behind bars?” Incompetent, racist buffoons. It makes me so angry that Mark Fuhrman is still being treated like a reasonable human being whose opinion matters. Thanks, Hannity.
I was wholly unaware of Mark Fuhrman. Wikipedia just provided me his racist rants. ugggggggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhh
As much as he is a racist dick, he also solved a twenty some old murder and we can be thankful for that. Still an asshole though.
This just compounds the ethical dilemma I was already having, originating when a stranger accidentally used my email address last week to set up their HBO GO account. How long do you think it would take them to notice their password was changed, hypothetically?
if you just make it password, can you be blamed if they can’t figure it out? I think not.
I’m getting emails telling me how to track flower deliveries made by a woman who used my email accidentally in her account, and giving me the home addresses of the people getting the flowers. I called the company, twice now to complain. If it happens a third time the only ethical solution is probably to re-route the flowers to myself so she knows something is wrong, right?
Also, ARE WE NOT ENTERTAINED?!?
Somehow I had never heard of this case despite the fact that I have many ties to the town where all the shit with Kathie Durst went down???? My mom was teaching in that school district at the time (and still, but really it seems like high schoolers would be freaking out about that). Every time they showed the creepy fog version of the Katonah train station sign my blood pressure went up even more.
Kathie’s friends are basically the 70s NYC equivalent of the Bletchley Circle, and I love them.
They are beautiful gorgeous beacons of female friendship, I love them to death. And I want a season of True Detective based on them.
So, now that everyone (I mean social media-wise, not Nicole) has pretty much ruined the ending for anyone who has never watched the show, is it worth investing the multiple hours in? Immediately after it ended, FB posted shit tons of spoilers about the ending.
I mean, the news also spoiled the ending for everyone.
Yes! I marathoned it yesterday and was still riveted even tho I knew that Durst totally did it and had been arrested. And it’s only six 45-minute episodes so it’s not a super massive investment of your time.
Seriously? It’s news/real life……you can’t really spoil news or real life…….unless your life is spoiled by reading the news. It’s not really a “show” it’s a documentary series. Real people died. It’s not like it’s True Detective. This shit really happened.
Jesus, of course I know that. I’m just guessing that the person who meticulously crafted the documentary might have wanted there to be a kind of narrative tension to the way he laid out the facts like most documentaries nowadays do.
That’s not really how documentaries work. That’s how crime shows work. You can’t “ruin the ending” of anything, but you especially can’t “ruin the ending” of news. The world isn’t responsible for guarding information from people who can’t keep up with shows as they air, but yet somehow have time to keep up with everything on the internet. If people have time to read the internet, then they have time to catch up on things that they’re worried about being spoiled.
Actual real spoilers are scientifically proven to increase your viewing experience because they help you savor the experience and journey, anyway. Stories are not about the ending, but about the journey.
http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/new…
http://www.cracked.com/article_20330_5-factors-th…
“To the absolute shock of all, the results unanimously proved that overreacting Internet forum members do not, in fact, represent the sum total of human psychology: Test subjects who knew the spoilers beforehand enjoyed the stories significantly more than those who experienced them unspoiled.”
“Researchers theorize that this is because we tend to focus primarily on the plot and the resulting suspense, which prevents us from chilling out and taking in all the other wondrous elements that make up good storytelling. Or, as Jonathan Leavitt of UC San Diego’s psychology department more eloquently put it, “Once you know how it turns out, it’s cognitively easier — you’re more comfortable processing the information — and [you] can focus on a deeper understanding of the story.”
You can keep hating spoilers, and also things that are not actual spoilers, but I’m also going to keep informing people why it’s futile to complain about spoilers…..especially when something is not spoiled. It’s better to enjoy the entire ride than to give up because you have useful information.
Also, knowing spoilers means you’re constantly on the edge of your seat, waiting for [ ] to [ ] and then [ ] before exploding.
Yes! There are still surprises for people who are into surprises.
My main thing is that they (spoilers) help you savor the experience and you catch a lot more of the story and understand more about why things happen, if you know the outcome. I don’t always want to watch something twice, so if I go into it knowing, then I don’t have to worry about missing a million little clues that help enrich the story.
Plus, I have a fingernail/toenail phobia (yeah, yeah, it’s weird, whatever) so it’s best for me knowing that there’s going to be a horrifying scene involving nails so I can look away. Spoilers were very helpful when I saw Black Swan in the theater!
My life is often spoiled by reading the news. Have you seen the news recent;ly? Christ on a bike. It’s the end of days.
Haha, true. I guess that’s why I usually just stick to this place and The Onion for my “news”
Definitely yes, still 100% worth it because this is a real case of “the devil is in the details” – the reveal at the end is intense, but EVERY SINGLE MINUTE LEADING UP TO IT is full of the craziest twists and turns and amazing characters and weirdos and SO MUCH EVERYTHING. You will not be disappointed.
I wish someone would discuss the systemic sexism that hindered investigation of Kathie Durst’s disappearance in the first place. The detective overseeing the investigation was just horrible. His approach was essentially “you know how flaky girls are.” And the dragging of Jeanine Pirro that derailed the Galveston trial. Yes, she may have been ambitious but she was doing her job!
omg and ALL the newspaper reports calling her a “missing beauty” and fixating on her appearance and who she was married to.
I just finished watching it and said the same thing. If not for sexist bullshit, Durst would have been in jail a long time ago.
Nicole did you see that he could be involved in the disappearances of TWO OTHER WOMEN???? Truly, Television is a gift and public service to us all. http://laist.com/2015/03/18/robert_durst_californ…
I saw on a cable news crawl this evening that cold cases everywhere he loved are now being gone over. NY, VT, CA and more. Yay!
As much as he is a racist dick, he also solved a twenty some old murder and we can be thankful for that. Still an asshole though.
I just finished watching it and said the same thing. If not for sexist bullshit, Durst would have been in jail a long time ago.