'The Undoing' Episode 3: Grace could very well be the real killer, what makes her help Jonathan?
'The Undoing' in Episode 3 serves as a great example of how even the most perfect-looking world from the outside could be rotten on the inside. It also goes to show how suspicious the world is of a woman scorned as they continue to be suspicious of Grace Fraser (Nicole Kidman) for assisting and abetting the murder of Elena (Matilda De Angelis) and even harboring a fugitive. This, despite calling the cops on her husband.
The episode begins with Jonathan Fraser (Hugh Grant) getting arrested at the vacation home where he approached his wife to tell her that he did not kill Elena. He does confess to cheating on her but blames Elena for being too obsessive after starting their affair. She is not convinced at that moment by her husband, not enough to keep him safe and that is why she calls it in.
We also see Jonathan get arraigned in court and Grace doesn't appear to ensure that the public doesn't believe that she was in cahoots with him. The more you think of it, the clearer it becomes that there is no way she is going to vouch for her husband's innocence, at least not without being pushed. This could be for two reasons. The first, as her husband's public defender, put it, she is currently experiencing the lows of being betrayed and screwed over by her husband and hence believes that he is capable of doing anything, which may also include murder. Secondly, it could be as fans speculated, that she is the real killer who murdered Elena after learning of her affair with Jonathan and is currently exacting her revenge by setting up Jonathan to take the fall. The theme of the show, many fans had earlier said, was very similar to that of 'Gone Girl', and the more we get to know Grace, we realize that the suspicions that fans have are not unfounded. There is something that she has hidden deep.
After her conversation with the public defender who claims that her husband "maybe a d*** but is no murderer", Grace has second thoughts about her attitude towards Jonathan's case. She tries to convince her father Franklin Reinhardt (Donald Sutherland) to seek out support, to maybe employ a better lawyer for Jonathan so that he had a chance to prove his innocence. However, his father is completely against the idea. Henry (Noah Jupe), Grace, and Jonathan's son, however, is the one to suffer the most in all of this as he sees the public and media's reaction to his father. It is really Henry who moves Grace to go meet Jonathan in the jail where she confronts him about fathering a daughter with Elena.
After meeting him, and hearing his side of the story, Grace struggles to come to terms with what the world is telling about him vs what she knew about him. At a point when the two do not coincide, she begins to dig into who Elena was and if she was really obsessive about Jonathan as he claimed. She uses her knowledge as a therapist to conclude that she must be "open to the idea" of Jonathan being innocent. To this, her father asks whether she is "open to the idea of getting back together with Jonathan". She denies and says that it would be ridiculous. But is it really?
At this point, Grace also learns that her husband had loaned $500,000 so that Henry could continue to be enrolled at Reardon. Of course, Grace's father was requested not to reveal anything about this loan to Grace and the guilt of possibly having had the opportunity to save a woman from death but not using it, is hurting him. He even visits Elena's home where he sees Elena's husband taking care of Jonathan's daughter. However, isn't this intense guilt that Elena's father feeling too much? After all, he did loan the amount to his son in law. How could he have known really?
So, at this moment in the show, we have come to realize that everyone seem suspicious as there are multiple scenarios that could lead to each of them being the real killer. It could be Grace who had known about the affair before, it could be her father who tried to remove an obstacle from his daughter's life, or even Henry for that matter. The one who seems the least bit like a murderer at this point is Jonathan. Not because he is incapable of murder, but because his ego wouldn't allow him. So to see Grace get her husband a better lawyer is hardly surprising. In fact, her decision to do this adds another layer of complex psyche that leaves the audience guessing until the very end -- Who could the killer be?
New episodes of 'The Undoing' air every Sunday at 9 pm ET on HBO.