'Servant' Episode 3 sees Rupert Grint shine in his performance even as disturbing details about the nanny emerge
Before 'Servant' premiered, executive producer M. Night Shyamalan had praised Rupert Grint's performance in the show, saying that he steals every scene. It is in the third episode of the first season that we finally get to see what Shyamalan meant.
In the previous episode, Sean shows Julian that their "reborn doll" had been replaced by a real baby, presumably by the nanny, Leanne Grayson.
When the third episode begins, Sean leaves the house to meet with Julian who is parked outside the Turner house. Julian has come with a private detective, Roscoe, to help with their investigation into Leanne.
Though there are no social media records of Leanne, Roscoe notes that Wisconsin public records do indicate that a Leanne Grayson was born. Julian decides to go with Roscoe to Wisconsin to investigate the Grayson household and he asks Sean not to leave his sister, Dorothy, alone with Leanne.
Sean lost his sense of taste somehow in the last episode, which is a pity since he earns his living as a chef. When he has to cater a big lunch in the third episode, he hires Toby to do the menial jobs as well as be his taste tester.
The specials on the menu are eels, and though we see through Sean's perspective for most of the show, we are shown the extent of his brutality as well when he repeatedly bangs an eel against a kitchen counter, nails its head to the board and skins it as it still flops around.
This scene of Sean killing the eel shocks Leanne as well, so much so that she faints. Meanwhile, Julian is in Wisconsin with Roscoe and calls Sean with some disturbing news.
The Grayson home burnt down in a fire more than 10 years ago and as Julian walks through the remains with Sean on video, Sean sees the weird cross on a wall in the bedroom — the same cross that Leanne hung above the baby's crib.
But it gets worse. When Julian goes to the cemetery, he finds out that the real Leanne died as a little girl during the fire, along with her parents — leaving both Sean and Julian wondering who the nanny really is.
Later in the day, when Sean and Dorothy leave for a night out, Leanne spies on them and watches them kiss. She then dresses up in Dorothy's clothes, jewelry, and make-up and kills the remaining eel as Sean did for dinner.
When Julian comes over while the Turners are out, he tries telling her that whatever is in the house does not belong to the Turners, possibly thinking that Leanne has arrived to scam his sister's family.
He then tells Leanne that if she wants to get through Dorothy, she will have to go through him first. This is when things get weird. Leanne asks Julian if he was at the house when "it happened" or if he saw something.
Julian tries to leave without answering, leading us to believe there is more to the actual baby Jericho's death than we thought previously. Leanne gets really close to Julian and tries to kiss him like she saw Dorothy kissing Sean and by now, Julian is absolutely shaken.
The episode ends remarkably when Sean picks up the baby and comforts it — the first time we have seen him voluntarily doing so without any remorse.
Rupert Grint shined through in his performance in this episode — we saw his tough-guy-entitled-brat persona finally breaking and Grint played it out well.
The first three episodes of 'Servant' are now available to stream on Apple TV+. The following seven episodes will be released weekly.