Abhiroop Das
Helmed by Lee Haven Jones and Andrew Cumming, ‘Coldwater’ traces John’s journey of making the eponymous Scottish village his new home. Traumatized by an incident of violence in his former, urban neighborhood, John begins doubting his masculinity and his instinct to help others. In the face of such dilemmas, the village of Coldwater initially comes as a relief, but quickly turns into a vessel that furthers his insecurities. His neighbor, Tommy, and his wife, Rebecca, appear to be the model couple, and yet each episode of this psychological thriller drama series reveals a sinister layer to their obsession with faith and family. To that end, John is joined in this quest by his pet cat, Harlequin, but as they close in on the truth about Tommy, the enigmatic neighbor reveals a counterattack of his own, which is potent enough to shake John’s foundations. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Harlequin the Cat is Tragically Killed by Coldwater’s Antagonist
In episode 3 of ‘Coldwater,’ Tommy kills John’s beloved pet cat, Harlequin, both to isolate his neighbor further and to exert his own malicious desires. While the show’s approach to the cat is consistently ominous in the first half, Tommy’s actions still come as a shock. Towards the end of the episode, Tommy walks out of his house to find Harlequin on his doorstep. While the death takes place offscreen, the cat’s squeals can still be heard, loud enough that they wake John up from his sleep. It is at that point he finds Harlequin’s lifeless body at his doorstep, with clear signs of a crushed spine. While John doesn’t see Tommy commit the murder, their shared criminal history is enough to make him doubt his enigmatic neighbor.
Killing Harlequin also serves as Tommy’s way to relieve his murderous fantasies, as well as remind the audience of just how monstrous he can be. However, when Rebecca learns of this, she decides to spin the death in a whole other way. Knowing that questions will be raised about the cat’s final moments sooner or later, she decides to subtly frame John as the murderer of his own cat. Given that he was sleeping outside that night, a case can be made for him being the culprit, and Rebecca, alongside Tommy, uses her position in the community to silently turn John into a public villain. However, he later confirms the truth about Harlequin’s death upon finding the cat’s pet collar in Tommy’s box of murder trophies. Upon being confronted, Tommy ultimately confesses to the killing, alongside the murder of Angus, Nathan, and many others.
Harlequin’s Murder Brings a Drastic Shift to Coldwater
Within ‘Coldwater,’ Harlequin’s not only marks a tonal shift in the narrative, but is also loaded with additional symbolic meaning. Specifically, it extends Tommy’s series-wide attempts to cut off John’s connection to his family and turn him into a figure of pure evil and violence, much like himself. While Tommy and John have been closely involved this entire time, this marks the first instance of the former going for a personal attack. With this, the last bit of warmth in the series is essentially snuffed out, sending John on a path surrounded by darkness. To that end, Harlequin serves as a partial parallel to Angus, Nathan, and the other people Tommy has killed over the years, as he strips them of their individuality and reduces them to tokens of memory, be it a name tag or a necklace.
Notably, Tommy is most likely aware that taking Harlequin’s collar is a dead giveaway for his involvement in the cat’s murder. Still, his decision to take that risk speaks to the larger psychological bends that shape his thought process, particularly his obsession with murder. This finds greater expression later in the series, when we see him let go of all boundaries and go on a spree of violence. The fact that he tries to pin the cat’s murder on John is itself symbolically rich on two levels. On one hand, it shows his tendency to frame his own actions as those molded by others, such as Angus’s death. On the other, it also relates to his belief that he and John are the same people in spirit, and deep down have similar feelings about Harlequin’s passing.
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