The episode begins with a young couple's romantic evening at a lover's lane being interrupted by a mysterious noise. The boy ends up dangling dead above the car; a re-enactment of one version of the most classic of urban legends: the hook man myth.
However, there is more to the case than that as it also happens to match the memo of E. Jacob Woodcock (Darcy Laurie), the patient of a local mental institution. The only problem - he is well locked up and could not possibly have committed the murder. Frank and Peter Watts investigate as more murders are committed - all with strong similarities to earlier murders committed by inmates at the asylum.
The idea of a Millennium episode based around urban legends is a good one; they are after all the folk tales of the 20th and 21st century and usually feature mentally disturbed killers - typical material for the show. The insane asylum setting offers some fairly colourful characters, like Bear (C. Ernst Harth) - who seems to think he is, well, a bear. There are also some decent thrills and a few more scenarios that aficionados of urban legends should recognize.
But in the end, the episode disappoints: the mental patients are never fleshed out properly and the urban legend scenarios do not explore the phenomenon in any way. Also, there is one scene where Frank totally drops the ball, leaving an innocent man alone even though he knows there is a maniac with a knife in the vicinity, painting Frank as completely thoughtless, irresponsible and incompetent. It is a decent episode, but in the end one would expect more from a Morgan/Wong story centered around an insane asylum and urban legends.
However, there is more to the case than that as it also happens to match the memo of E. Jacob Woodcock (Darcy Laurie), the patient of a local mental institution. The only problem - he is well locked up and could not possibly have committed the murder. Frank and Peter Watts investigate as more murders are committed - all with strong similarities to earlier murders committed by inmates at the asylum.
The idea of a Millennium episode based around urban legends is a good one; they are after all the folk tales of the 20th and 21st century and usually feature mentally disturbed killers - typical material for the show. The insane asylum setting offers some fairly colourful characters, like Bear (C. Ernst Harth) - who seems to think he is, well, a bear. There are also some decent thrills and a few more scenarios that aficionados of urban legends should recognize.
But in the end, the episode disappoints: the mental patients are never fleshed out properly and the urban legend scenarios do not explore the phenomenon in any way. Also, there is one scene where Frank totally drops the ball, leaving an innocent man alone even though he knows there is a maniac with a knife in the vicinity, painting Frank as completely thoughtless, irresponsible and incompetent. It is a decent episode, but in the end one would expect more from a Morgan/Wong story centered around an insane asylum and urban legends.
