Ringer: Let's Kill Bridget (1.19)

Part of the problem with a show that roots its foundation in fake-outs is that you end up spending most of your time trying to spot the fake-out before it arrives. Throughout it's nineteen episodes, Ringer has gone out of its way to set up shock cliffhangers, before pulling back and revealing a frequently annoying sleight of hand. But it's become so routine that any effect they once had has rapidly vanished. Let's Kill Bridget opened with three separate cliffhangers. We saw Andrew making out with Catherine, Henry being interrogated by the police, and Bridget (or is it Siobhan?) lying dead on the ground with a bullet in her chest. Maybe ten episodes ago we would still see all this and be mightily intrigued, but at this point you just wait for the inevitable truth to come flying at you.

As a result, this episode was sort of a drag. Machado once again became a little more interesting, and as he's become one of those '80s-movie style 'renegade ex-cops', he should surely become tougher and more ruthless from here on out. His scene with Bridget was also pretty absorbing, in particular Bridget's realization of his emotional involvement in the case. But it quickly began spiraling out of control soon after, Machado coming up with this ludicrous plan to fake Bridget's death (with Bridget-as-Siobhan 'playing' Bridget... gah) by taking photographs of her (what do you know!) lying dead on the ground with a bullet in her chest. I guess he'd then pass them around among the Wyoming criminal underworld... and this show just got stupider.

Elsewhere, it was clear from the off that Andrew and Juliet were manipulating Catherine, but it was good luck on their part that Catherine has become another Ringer moron, what with not being at all suspicious that the Palm Springs house cost the exact same amount of dollars that she stole from Andrew just a couple of weeks ago. The cliffhanger ending, revealing that Catherine was presumably behind the initial hit on Siobhan way back in the pilot, was naturally pretty juicy, but not exactly the show-rattling twist it probably should have been -- what with Catherine already being a soulless freak-show monster. It's not a surprise to add murderer to her wrap sheet.

Let's Kill Bridget was wall-to-wall stupid, but I appreciate that the show is playing catch-up with all the various plot berries that have been dropped since Ringer first began. And Sarah Michelle Gellar did sell the hell out of that twin confrontation, even if it was naturally another fake-out. C-

Credits
Guest stars Zoey Deutch (Juliet Martin); Sean Patrick Thomas (Solomon Vessida); Gregory Harrison (Tim Arbogast); Matthew Del Negro (Agent Grady Torrence); Christopher Cousins (Tobias Schecht); Nikki DeLoach (Shaylene Briggs); Maximiliano Hernandez (Detective Towers); Andrea Roth (Catherine Martin)
Writers Jay Faerber, Robert Berens Director Jerry Levine