Ripper Street Season 3, Episode 3 Review: Ashes and Diamonds

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The last episode of Ripper Street seemed to mark a turning point with Inspector Reid, an honorable police officer, killing an unarmed man because he was led to believe that he had both abducted and abused his daughter which then led to her death. Due to this my excitement for ‘Ashes and Diamonds’ was at an all time high, I assumed we may abandon the procedural format for now because of what had happened and follow Reid while he was on the run, or attempting to somehow clear his name. Instead we had Inspector Drake taking over ‘H’ division in Reids absence, trying to protect Reid when he is questioned by Abberline at the beginning of the episode and after that we don’t hear much about Reid from the force. Instead of following up on Reid we have another case of the week which follows the team as they track down the culprit in the murder of a clairvoyant.

The clairvoyant and his aid were conning people that had lost loved ones in the train crash that kick started the events of the season. In the middle of a séance and in a room full of people he drops dead, that is until Jackson gets his hands on the crime scene and informs Inspector Drake that the man was poisoned so he clearly didn’t upset evil spirits or any other hippy dippy stuff, it was most certainly a murder. It was nice to see Jackson officially back in the fold this episode even if it lacked resolution between him and Reid, but hopefully their time will come fairly soon. One of the suspects of the murder was Mrs. Wakefield whose husband passed away in the train accident, and she happened to be one of the people the clairvoyant was conning. She may have been one of the top suspects for them but Inspector Drake and Jackson traced the murder back to a prostitute named Juniper and William Wakefield who had faked his death, but unfortunately they got to them a little too late, Mrs Wakefield had butchered them by the time the police arrived to cart them off.

Elsewhere Susan had begun to solidify her relationship with Alice/Mathilda, but her darn lawyer Capshaw got involved and convinced her that the child would need to be sent away. Even though Reid had fallen Capshaw believed that his friends in the police force could prove a nuasance if they discovered that Alice/Mathilda was still alive, he is right of course because there is no way that Drake and Jackson would let them get away with it. In this episode Susan showed a lot of regret for what she has done which is probably one of the reasons that she has grown so attached to Alica/Mathilda and they’ve built a trusting relationship with one another. I expected nothing less, in previous seasons we have seen her treat the prostitutes in her employ as family members and was incredibly caring towards them. She also shows anguish towards what happened at the end of her relationship to Jackson, she admits to Rose that her relationship with Jackson was the one thing in her life that she didn’t regret and attempts to extend an olive branch to him, only to witness him falling in love with another.

We’re only three episodes in and Susan has done some truly unforgivable acts but this is the most sympathetic I’ve ever seen her and I do hope that she somehow makes amends with Reid and the others although I don’t know how. She made Reid believe that her daughter was abused and had died at the hands of another, it’ll be a long way till she gets into his good graces and she’d better start attempting to mend relationships soon. Before Susan and Capshaw attempted to cart Alice/Mathilda off to a boarding school Rose spotted her and reported it to Drake (it’s nice to see her finally do something useful in the show) and then Drake reports it back to Reid. Although we didn’t see much of Reid this episode we did get to see his relationship to Drake and how it hasn’t deteriorated with Drakes absence. Drake covered for Reid with the higher ups, and it seemed like he was struggling with the decision to at the beginning of the episode it is revealed that he knew of Reids whereabouts all along. The boys at the ‘H’ division have each others back, so Capshaw and Susan better watch theirs!

‘Ashes and Diamons’ should have been better than the episodes that proceeded it but it wasn’t. I’m not saying it was a bad episode, but I expected a lot more from it that another case of the week. Seeing the parallel between the case and Reid’s situation was enjoyable though, on the surface Mrs. Wakefield’s story was that of a person who had lost a great love but it was actually a story of betrayal. Her actions at the end of the episode mirrored Reid’s when he was fed the lie by Susan and it was beautifully done so it’s hard to put this episode in a completely negative light, although I do hope that next week the action kicks into high gear after everything has been revealed.

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