If you watch ‘The Killing’ and thought that Mitch was going to be able to hold it together through the duration of this season, no doubt you must have had your hopes dashed this week when she almost asphyxiated her two boys with carbon dioxide. Yes, she’s a complete mess.

It’s Day 8, and the investigation is really starting to take its toll on most of the show’s characters. Mitch can’t get over the fact that she’s never going to see her daughter again. When Stan packs up Rosie’s room, she freaks out. I’m with Stan; she’s got to move on. It’s not fair to her family for her to sit grieving in her daughter’s room for the rest of her life.

Stan tries to repress the urge to kill Bennett, but I don’t think he’ll be able to hold back for long. If anything, he’ll end up taking out his frustrations from his wife on Bennett.

Richmond’s story is beginning to be revealed. He’s sick that his wife’s killer is going to walk free from prison, so he has no qualms about releasing damaging material about the Mayor to the media. Even though we have yet to see how exactly the whole campaign ties into the murder, it’s been interesting to watch the path of a wannabe righteous politician forced to follow the same old dirty tactics that everyone else uses to get elected.

The secret about Holder’s anonymous bald friend has been revealed. I’ll forgive the show for intentionally making us think that all those sideways glances exchanged at street corners were more than what they actually are. Apparently, that man is Holder’s sponsor, and he keeps Holder’s paycheck so that Holder can’t buy drugs with it. That’s a reasonable explanation.

Linden tries her hardest to keep her family together, but it’s not going well. Her fiancé won’t answer her calls. To make matters worse, her son emails the confidential creime scene pictures of Rosie Larsen lying dead in a trunk to his friends.

Linden and Holder have also stumbled head-first into a terrorism investigation which might or might not involve Rosie. There isn’t much forward momentum in the investigation in this episode, save for one thing. We know that Rosie was, for some reason, inside that locker Holder and Linden found. We know this because Linden broke a few rules and found out one of the shirts left in there belonged to Rosie. What was she doing with terrorists? And the bigger question is, was she there as a willing participant at first before things got ugly?

We end the episode with another cliffhanger, where Bennett is overheard by his wife making strange comments about passports on the phone to the mysterious Muhammad. He’s up to something.

Other Random Thoughts

• If I were a betting man and the over/under of Mitch cracking a smile during this season was 1.5, I’d bet on the under.
• Was the other missing girl that was mentioned by the mosque leader a simple way of telling the cops they suck, or is that case actually connected to Rosie’s killing somehow?
• When will Mayor Adams find out about the mirror Richmond broke in that bathroom and use it against him in the campaign? “Richmond Vandalizes Bathroom, Declared Public Menace.”