Spoilers

Black Bird

“You Promised”

The finale of Black Bird on Apple TV + was satisfying. It was also sad. I had been cautious to look at any reports about the case, since this is based on a true story of Jimmy Keene and Larry Hall, so I would not know how it turned out. This episode saw Larry draw a map and carve a little bird for each of the girls that he murdered. He sent the map to his brother. I was not sure the reasoning behind that, but Jimmy was able to get a look at the map.

Sadly, the map was not specific enough for Jimmy to get any details outside of a general location and, in the end, none of the girl’s bodies had been recovered.

The final scene between Jimmy and Larry was powerful, as Taron Egerton and Paul Walter Hauser just knocked this scene out of the park. Jimmy tried to convince Larry to let the parents of the victims know where their daughters were buried and Larry did not understand why he would do that. You could see Jimmy slowly reaching the point of breaking from the horrors that Larry was laying out in front of him.

Watching Larry’s face as his evil continued to shine out was a frightening occurrence and showed what kind of actor Paul Walter Hauser could be.

In a fictional tale, ,they would have found the graves of the victims, but, with the true story, those remain a mystery.

I am very pleased with the way Jimmy Keene’s life played out both on screen and in real life. The show added “boxed text” at the end to give us some falling action for this story, including what happened to Jimmy, to his father, Larry and Larry’s brother Gary.

The strength of this series was absolutely the performances of its two lead stars, both who had been nominated for Emmy Awards with Hauser winning Best Supporting Actor in a Limited Series.

Next week, we start a new series for the Sunday Morning Sidewalk. I decided to watch another limited series that won some Emmys, this time on HBO Max entitled DFT St. Louis featuring Jason Bateman, Linda Cardellini, and David Harbour.