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I Am The Night: It’s all coming together (kind of) in “Dark Flower” (Recap)

By Lorry Kikta

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In Dark Flower, more veils are being lifted as Jay Singletary (Chris Pine) descends deeper into the mad underworld of George Hodel (Jefferson Mays), while Fauna Hodel meets Singletary at EXACTLY the right time. 

The entire time I’ve been watching I Am The Night, I’ve been waiting for Jay Singletary and Fauna Hodel (India Eisley) to cross paths. I knew it would have to happen eventually, and finally in “Dark Flower.” they do.

By now, it’s been subtly established that George Hodel (Jefferson Mays) is a bit of a creep, to grandly understate the obvious. At the open of “Dark Flower,” we get hit with a lot more evidence to support that this particular doctor is up to no good.

We follow a young Tamar as she spies on her father in the midst of one of his gigantic parties. It’s somewhat reminiscent of Eyes Wide Shut, except this is on basic cable, so it’s not as graphic as it probably was in real life. It is still very creepy. There are a lot of masked men and women, non-consensual S&M elements, and a terrifying bull skull mask that Hodel wears. The scene is made all the more creepy when shown from Tamar’s point of view and imagining a young child witnessing all this madness.

At this point, we catch up with Fauna again, at her aunt’s house, and at this point Fauna has started straightening her hair, perhaps because her step-grandmother Corinna (Connie Nielsen) told her she wasn’t black? Either way, the best part of this scene is Fauna’s cousins conversation after discussing her white relatives.

“All white men is ugly,” cousin Nina (Monique Green) says.

“Not that Mick Jagger,” cousin Tina responds, “He got some brother in him.”

I’m sure Mick Jagger would probably be flattered to hear that considering the Rolling Stones made their career off of “blue-eyed soul”.

Anyway, after a brief check in with Fauna, we join Jay Singletary, passed out drunk on his couch. He is woken up by a not so friendly representative of the LAPD, Detective Billis, who is played by Yul Vazquez, who has been in…basically everything, but most notably recently as an incredibly different character, John Reyes in the INCREDIBLE Netflix series Russian Doll.

Detective Billis sets Singletary straight, both verbally and physically. Turns out that back in “Phenomenon of Interference” when Singletary was following Corinna Hodel in his car, she got his plates and passed them along to the police. Singletary wakes up again in an interrogation room, his hands cuffed to the legs of the chair in which he’s passed out. Just short of getting his eye poked out by Billis, Singletary’s war buddy, Detective Ohis (Jay Paulson) steps in and rescues him….again.

We go back to Fauna at her aunt’s house and she receives a phone call. It’s from a particularly lecherous young man she met at a party with her cousins, Nero (Brian Bradley Jr.). He’s calling her from a phone booth and we then see the call is being recorded. Not only is Nero a misogynist , but he is working for Sepp (Dylan Smith), Hodel’s henchman who has been following Fauna for as long as she can remember.

After this phone call, Fauna decides to go to Corinna’s house again for more answers. No one answers the door, she yells “Tamar”, hoping her mother is there. When no one answers, she sneaks in through the basement. While she doesn’t find Tamar herself, she does find an envelope in a trash can, with a return address in Hawaii. She also finally realizes that the man she saw at the bus station and the art gallery is indeed her grandfather, George Hodel.

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Of course, as soon as Singletary is rescued by Ohis, he goes out and starts spying on Corinna’s house again, while Fauna is there. She is incredibly lucky that this happens because Sepp comes into the house and tells Fauna he has something to show her. He is carrying an unsettling mask that is reminiscent of what we see in the opening scene. Additionally, while Fauna is scouring the house, we see the grotesque bull skull mask of Hodel’s on the wall.

As Fauna is attempting to escape Sepp, Corinna comes home. Everyone is scrambling from her. Sepp is attempting to capture Fauna, but Singletary shows up and she gets into his car, which is a stupid idea but the best she could do at that moment.

What excites me is that this is when Fauna and Jay finally meet, so that we might finally get to know what Singletary’s connection to George Hodel is, even though I have my suspicions.

At the end of the episode, Jay tries to re-enlist in the marine corps for Vietnam but is told he’s too old, and then he buys a Black Dahlia magazine from a bookstore. News comes that Nero has been murdered and Fauna decides to go stay with Terrence Shye (Justin Cornwell), a friend of Nina, Tina, and Nero. While there, she calls her mother, asking her what she knows about Dr. Hodel. Jimmy Lee (Golden Brooks) threatens to come to Los Angeles.

I’m glad that in “Dark Flower” some pieces are finally starting to come together. We only have three episodes left and I personally want to see more of Jefferson Mays because he is really great at playing evil. Connie Nielsen is very fascinating as Corinna as well. We’ll see more of both of them in the next episode; “The Matador.”

dark. Next. Suspense unfolds in Phenomenon of Interference (Recap)

Fan of the talented Chris Pine? Watching TNT’s I Am The Night? Let the other show serpents know what you think in the comment section below.

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