A serial killer and a switched-at-birth episode? And it prominently features Mac? Seems like it should have scored higher but somehow it manages to not be that interesting.

But maybe the biggest problem is that it’s in completely the wrong place. In the previous episode, we just saw Aaron Echolls stabbed on his own doorstep! We don’t know if he’s alive or dead! And if you waited a whole week (back in the day) to find out the resolution to that cliffhanger, I have bad news for you because it won’t even get mentioned in this episode. That’s because An Echolls Family Christmas was supposed to be episode 11, leaving us on a cliffhanger over the winter break, and coming back strong with episode 12, which picks back up the continuing Echolls family saga. I guess because of the timing of Christmas that year, they swapped EFC and this episode, so that we get a complete non-sequitur breaking up the two episodes we actually care about.

That, and Mac’s birth family will never, ever be mentioned again. What are we even doing here?

1.11 Silence of the Lamb

Score: 13

Characters: +1

• Mac

  
  

Guest stars: +3

• Steve Monroe as the guitar store guy - he's Murphy Brown's son in Miss Congeniality

• Aaron Paul as The Worm/Skeevy Girls Gone Wild Guy - he's Jesse Pinkman in Breaking Bad

• Max Greenfield as Leo D'Amato, the hot new deputy - he's Schmidt in New Girl (more a recurring character than a guest star, but I'll give him points for this first appearance)

  
  

Story quality: 4/5

The E-String Strangler is preying on spring breakers, and the mayor wants Keith - who investigated previous cases while he was sheriff - to come back and join a task force. This means working with Sheriff Lamb, which neither Keith nor Lamb are wild about. There's a brief attempt to make us think that the hot new deputy is the serial killer, but I'm not sure how convincing it is. While Lamb is convinced its the Worm, a guy who videos drunk girls to sell to a Girls Gone Wild type thing (who remembers Girls Gone Wild? What a blast from the misogynistic past.) But while Lamb has that guy in jail, another girl goes missing. Turns out the serial killer is the proprietor of the local guitar store (Guitar players: our modern heroes!)

The E-String Strangler plotline is fine, but the side plot really elevates the episode. Veronica starts a side-gig digging up dirt on on people's parents. Mac suggests they team up and go global by setting up a website, like she did for the purity test. The website she's already created has a little animated skeleton on it. All of Mac's websites are the most Web 1.0 things you've ever seen. But really, Mac wants to know what's wrong with her parents. They just don't share her vibe. Turns out she was switched at birth with Madison SinCLAIR?!?! Veronica, Mac, and Wallace crash Madison Sinclair's birthday party so Mac can see the family she should have grown up in, and meets her little sister, who is a Tina Marjorino clone. Mac strategically(?) leaves her purse behind so that she can go back for it, and she meets her Mom, who knows immediately who Mac is and seems to be the only adult in this whole situation with any misgivings about it. She clearly wants to reach out to Mac - she shows up outside the MacKenzy house later - but in the end she decides not to. And despite Veronica describing this turn of events as "life changing," we will never hear about it again!

Plot relevance: 2/5

Veronica employs Weevil to distract the handsome new deputy while she sneaks into the evidence room and steals the Crime Stoppers hotline tape to find out who shopped Abel Koontz to the cops. (Weevil's "distraction" is a loud speech about how the noise of motorcycle gangs is bringing down the property values in his neighborhood, and he has a mind to run for the town council!) The voice on the recording is distorted, but Veronica gets Mac to un-distort it with some computer programming tricks and recognizes it: Clarence Whedman, head of Security at Kane Software!

Iconic lines/memes: +4

• Guy: I hear you do detective stuff for peopleVeronica: I do favors for friends.Guy: I can pay.Veronica: Sit down, friend.

• With your sleuth prowess and my programming skills, I don't think it's an exaggeration to say we'd rule the entire known universe.

• You leave a sheriff a note: he shouldn't expect Eli Navarro, esquire's vote this year [ding ding!]

• Sheriff Lamb: I say we play to our strengths. Keith: So.... I'm good cop?

  
  

Cringe: -1

• Leo establishes in his first conversation that Veronica is 17 (he has a very "oh shit, jailbait" reaction) and he's 20, but he pursues her anyway. In my day that wouldn't have been that shocking--it's within the Romeo and Juliet law margin--but it's pretty cringe today.

  
  

Outfit of the episode:

The sparkly sweater over cleavage-bearing camisole that Veronica wears when she wants to distract Leo so she can steal the Lilly Kane murder hotline tape. I feel like camisoles-as-shirts AND needless sparkly embellishments are huge 2000s looks.

Song of the episode:

All the Way Around Alone by 46bliss, a techno song that plays as Mac and her mother press their hands to the car window and look at each other soulfully.

Anachronistic reference of the episode:

Birthday. This one was my daughter's choice. There's a string quartet playing this song for Madison at school, so there are no lyrics, but Veronica and the others recognize it as a Beatles song. My daughter is convinced the song is too obscure for millenials to recognize, but she's Gen Z so I'm not sure she knows what she's talking about.

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