Alcatraz: Episode 3

While watching the show Alcatraz, I take copious notes. These are them:

Two serial killers in a row! Original!

So it's cool if he draws biographical comic books about their adventures? Seems like the people in the secret government conspiracy would frown on that.

Why is it suspicious that he has a police scanner? They're trying to track down famous murderers who are probably killing people all over San Francisco. Also, he's a historian who studies crime. Why wouldn't he have one?

Also a three-day killing time limit two episodes in a row? What is this, Criminal minds?

And two cases in a row where the serial killer was inspired by a childhood grudge to kill someone exactly the age of a sibling? What?

"I pretended to be asleep because I was scared!" And then I didn't mention to my mother about the kidnapping in the morning when my brother was gone!
Why was her grandpa always in the hospital? I know that will be revealed eventually, but why are they treating his reveal like it's a twist? This exact thing happened in the pilot.

If he lets kids pick what they like to do, why would he have stolen the fishing rod before the kidnapping - how could he know? Are you paying attention at all?

Served 'two tours' in the war? Are you kidding? It was WORLD WAR 2. People were drafted and they stayed until it was over.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure they had actual wheelchairs in 1960, and not those giant wicker jobbies from Manhunter.

Thanks for figuring it out, moron.

Why can't you put his picture out! God, this is the worst how. Of course, that's an exaggeration, but come on.

He's going to end up alone? Can't Sam Neill requisition all the cops he needs for this detail?

If you've known these people were coming back all along, is there some reason no one bothered to familiarize themselves with their cases and personas? So maybe they wouldn't have to rely on a flighty would-be comic artist?

You're on your way? CALL THE POLICE AND GET A HUNDRED PEOPLE THERE RIGHT NOW! THERE'S A KIDNAPPER WITH HIS VICTIM IN THE RESTAURANT!

Actual dialogue from the show: "He loved life - Swimming in lakes, miniature golf, cherry pie."

Why didn't you confront him in the diner when there were people around? Or have the diner people call the cops?

Gosh, this is another situation where backup might have helped, huh?

"We've only got a couple of hours left to stop him from killing that kid! Let's take the half-hour ferry back to Alcatraz!"

They're acting like people always leave clues about how to catch them in the present day in their personal effects! That's totally plausible!

This is information you also could have gotten by just checking his employment history. Which Jorge should have already known, or done.

Wait, if they had a tiny "box", shouldn't they have put the sniper in there? Oh wait, if they'd have done that, he wouldn't have had a chance to scope out the city, would he?

How many episodes until we reveal that the warden is still kicking? Although his disappearance seems like something that should have been mentioned either to or by Jorge Garcia.

Also, for the world's foremost expert on Alcatraz, Jorge Garcia sure didn't know that an anachronistically young female Indian doctor worked there.

Wow! A child murderer was evil his whole life? That revelation was totally worth a five minute flashback!

Seriously, most of the flashbacks on this show just establish over and over again how crazy/evil the villains are. Um, we know that. They're killing people all over San Francisco. We can take their evillity as read.

Yeah, I've seen houses that have disappeared into the woods, and there's generally pieces of foundation and such left. Not just the hatch leading to the fallout shelter.

Suddenly it's not important to take them alive, Sam Neill? What?

So it takes 10000 hours to become an expert at something, huh? First off, thanks for that pseudoscientific nonsense, but more importantly, why haven't you spent that kind of time studying Alcatraz!? You know, you worked there and all, and have devoted the last fifty years of your life preparing for this...

This is cute and all, but he could have had a guard drag the corpse in. I guess they're trying to set up that Sam Neill has some kind of superpowers? After all, last week he ran up fifteen floors, then ran back down and up twenty floors all within 90 seconds, and wasn't even slightly winded when he got there.

So can they bring people back from the dead, or not? Or are they talking about a cryo-stasis unit?

I love that the guards are patrolling a cell block with exactly two people in it. That seems like a valuable use of their time.