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25 Essential Episodes of Homicide: Life on the Street
One of TV’s greatest, most under-appreciated series is finally streaming the way it was meant to be seen. Get ready to binge.
Written by Fontana and directed by Martin Campbell of blockbusters GoldenEye, The Mask of Zorro, and Casino Royale, this unbearably tense episode locks Pembleton, Bayliss, and their suspect in Adena Watson’s murder together in the squad unit’s interrogation room, nicknamed “the box,” for 12 hours so that the detectives can secure a confession. Homicide could be very wacky when it wanted to (see also: season four’s Edgar Allan Poe homage, “Heartbeat”), and Levinson returned to direct this wackiest of installments, a Friends of Eddie Coyle– style neo-noir that follows a pair of crummy small-time criminals as one of them aims to get revenge against Pembleton for putting him away years ago. A more extreme version of “Bop Gun” handing over a ton of screen time to Williams, “The Gas Man” lets guest stars Bruno Kirby and Richard Edson run amok, stalking Pembleton, getting involved in a case with a severed head, and yapping wise-guy dialogue back and forth.
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