Abhiroop Das
Developed by Ed Whitmore and Tracey Malone, Fox’s ‘Memory of a Killer‘ follows Angelo’s day-to-day reality as a man of many colors. While he pretends to be an ordinary copier salesman in front of his loving daughter, in reality, he is a seasoned hitman who has been killing people for decades. However, as symptoms of early-onset Alzheimer’s set in, Angelo finds himself losing touch with reality and letting distorted memories take over. When this begins to have real-life consequences that jeopardize the safety of his family, Angelo tightens his search, only to find an elusive figure named the Ferryman who might be behind it all. This episode, titled ‘Tailored by Fabroni,’ brings the Ferryman’s mystery to its climax, while also accelerating Dave’s investigation into Angelo himself. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Angelo Slowly Gets Caged in by Dave
‘Memory of a Killer’ episode 8 begins with Angelo sneaking into a private MMA arena, not to catch the fight, but to spy on the wealthy old couple watching and betting on it. Just as he manages to click a picture of them, security forces him to step out, but Angelo manages to knock them out before the photo is deleted. Elsewhere, Jeff has a surprise for Maria, as he has built up the baby room from scratch. However, his design choices don’t seem to be in sync with hers, and the highlight of the room, a projector that beams pictures of Maria’s mother, is only met with mixed emotions. Throughout the season, there has been an unspoken rift between the couple, even when nothing seems to be wrong on the surface, and it is only now that Jeff is starting to get troubled by it.
While Maria and Jeff weather the storms in their relationship, Dave is on his course to crack the Henry Bloch case for good. Luck seems to be in his favor as, just a few hours before, Angelo sent his coat to Fabroni’s to get its button fixed. He ends up getting a parking ticket and is barely able to get home and put it on his countertop when Dave rings the doorbell. Initially, his aim is to simply check out Angelo’s Fabroni suits and see if any of them have buttons missing, but then his eye goes to the parking ticket, which is for a Porsche. That was the other major detail he learnt about the hitman, and it seems proof enough that his mystery hitman is none other than Angelo himself. Still, with no actual proof tying things together, all he can do is click a picture and walk out pretending to be normal.
Dave Opens up About His Feelings to Maria
After Dave leaves, Angelo gets back to work with Joe. Their next target is the old man we see at the start, who, in reality, is an embezzler who ran a Ponzi scheme and then escaped. While Angelo plans to kill him in his hotel suite, he has to engage the man’s wife first, who is a prolific gambler, and might get him the ticket to the top floors. This is not the only mission the assassin duo is dealing with, however, as the search for the elusive ferryman is now official. Across all of Joe’s research, one detail pops up the most, that being a local address. While Angelo decides to head out to that location, Joe is tasked with figuring out a way to enter the hotel’s elite gambling circle.
Meanwhile, Dave meets Maria at the shooting range, though it seems that she is now proficient enough not to need a trainer at all. Instead, Dave is there for a more personal confession. Once in the car, he recalls that time in high school when the duo went camping, and the question of Maria moving to a different state came up. While Dave always wanted her to go to the best college possible, a part of him also believed that she would miss home and him and eventually return. That never quite panned out, though, and by the time Maria returned, she was already with Jeff. What this present conversation does, however, is confirm that Dave still has feelings for Maria, and she herself is unsure whether to reciprocate or hold back.
Angelo Meets the Wife of the Man He Killed
Things don’t go much better at home either, as it turns out that Jeff got a call from the Yoga studio Maria pretends to go to, which means that her lie is caught. Jeff immediately assumes the worst, and while he doesn’t state it outright, it becomes clear that he is ready to walk out of the relationship if Maria is not giving her 100% in. The theme continues onto the next scene, with Angelo driving up to what seems like a very ordinary address, except there are people gathering in. As he is swept into the group, he learns that it is a bereavement program led by Julia, who is the wife of the dead scientist, Brian Sparks. As he probes in, Angelo learns that Gilchrist is none other than Brian’s personal lawyer, but that makes Brian’s final words all the more confusing and suspicious.
The session that follows gives Angelo a chance to unload the heavy feelings he has been carrying this entire time, but it also means that he cannot go to the hotel and take care of the assassination on time. All of a sudden, it is Joe’s time to shine, but given that he has never taken a life before, this proves to be more challenging than he expected. From there, the scene unexpectedly shifts to Linda, the FBI agent, who seems to be at a trauma center for children. Her granddaughter, as it turns out, has not spoken a word in almost a year, and we soon learn why: Linda is none other than the mother of Brian Sparks, and she, along with her granddaughter, is one of the many indirect victims of Angelo’s atrocity.
Dave Covers up the Truth, While the Ferryman’s Identity is Revealed at Last
With Jeff giving Maria an ultimatum, things seem to speed up. She rushes back to Dave’s office, confessing how she has been in love with him this entire time as well, at least subconsciously. While the duo shares a kiss, it comes with the acknowledgment that things cannot continue as is, and they either have to part ways or continue being together. Before that is settled, Dave has one more pitstop to check out, which turns out to be Fabroni’s tailor shop. There, he enquires about one Angelo Flannery, but is instead met with our hitman’s alternate name, Angelo Doyle. The moment Dave learns about the missing button on his suit, all the pieces of the puzzle fall into place. However, instead of turning the culprit in, Dave chooses to give Angelo a heads-up and then let it slide, mostly because he understands why a father would be pushed to such limits.
What Dave doesn’t know, however, is that Angelo’s past and present seem to be at the Ferryman’s mercy. Elsewhere, Joe successfully gets into the gambling floor and even wins a huge sum, wooing the old man’s wife in the process. After narrowly making it to the man’s room, Joe gets cold feet in the last minute and has to call Angelo to finish the job. The episode ends with perhaps the show’s most jaw-dropping twist yet, as we realize that Ferryman is none other than Linda herself, who has sworn to take revenge on the people who killed her son, including Angelo. While it still doesn’t make sense how she manages to rake in an army of thugs of this size, this definitely clears out the Hancock connection in the grand scheme of things, proving just how much is going on behind Angelo’s back.
Read More: Is Fox’s Memory of a Killer Based on a True Story?
