Second Sight: “Blood Relatives”

“Blood Relatives” (6 December 1996)

Writer: Chip Johannessen
Director: James Charleston
Editor: George R. Potter

Quote: “I know. I know you had to go in there. Because of who you are. Because you had no choice.” --Catherine Black


Overview: There is a standout moment in “Blood Relatives” when Frank Black, standing on the shore of a glistening lake, his thoughts dominated by the details of a hideous crime, takes a moment to slip off his iconic coat and then tosses it to the waiting Peter Watts. The dedicated viewer knows just what will happen next. Before Bob Bletcher can even cry out a protest, as he did during a similar scene in the pilot, the profiler steps forth and trudges determinedly into the water in search of the case’s next clue. He finds it nearly a dozen feet from the shore, fishing with his arm beneath the surface of the water, fingers combing submerged sand and rocks in search of a reflection. He emerges from the lake soaking wet but grasping the evidence that will lead them onward in their search for a sadistic killer.

Water is often used symbolically in film and fiction. This is especially true in Millennium, a series that used water as a central symbol or metaphor in several episodes, most notably “Seven and One.” Here--as in “Pilot” and “Kingdom Come”--it serves to clearly illustrate a trait that is intrinsic to Frank Black as a character and essential to our ongoing effort to understand the nature of his unique gift. If the meaning of the lakeside scene in “Blood Relatives” is lost on the viewer, it is reiterated just moments later as the investigators storm the halfway house that hides James Dickerson. As Bletcher, Giebelhouse, and Watts follow signs and directions and head for Dickerson’s bedroom on the second floor of the building, Frank Black dashes in an entirely different direction, moving underground, to the house’s darkened basement, where he discovers that the suspect has escaped them via a cellar window. While the Seattle police search obvious or expected terrain, above the surface, Frank Black alone dares venture below.

The very tenacity that Frank demonstrates when he is faced with the barrier of a river, lake, or other body of water is what allows him to dip beneath the murky, seemingly impenetrable surface of the human psyche. In these instances as in others, Lieutenant Bletcher is Inspector Lestrade, representative of a police force possessed of pedestrian thinking and limited imagination; Frank Black is a man of wholly unconventional thinking with the courage to match it. As an investigator, Frank possesses both the ability and willingness to venture beyond the boundaries of the safe or the anticipated, that selfless willingness to immerse himself in darkest depths in search of an answer. When Frank gives himself over to one of his gruesome visions--regardless of whether we believe those visions to be somewhat supernatural or purely intuitive--he is allowing himself to be plunged below the surface of what is known into uncertain territory as uninviting as an icy river, as dark and foreboding as any abandoned basement. From a psychological perspective, his forays into the mind of the killer are no less bold. If Frank Black’s closest friends and colleagues cannot even fathom the nature of his extraordinary gift, it is because they lack that unusual and selfless mindset that shows the hero of Millennium to be so incomparable.

Connections: Cinematically, this episode’s visions are similar to those of “Kingdom Come,” the previous installment, as this is the second episode in a row to feature a death by drowning. Connor, the episode’s jealous serial killer, has been previously profiled in Adam Chamberlain’s What the Killer Sees.

Trances in Total: 3 (0:08)

Gore Score: 6/10

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What the Killer Sees: Connor

Killer: Connor (John Fleck)

Episode: “Blood Relatives” (6 December 1996)

Writer: Chip Johannessen

Director: James Charleston

Quote: “How could anyone abandon a child? But millions of people do it. Millions. God, it’s scary. We have home after home filled with kids like James. And we know they'll turn violent. How do I tell the survivors that no one saw it coming? They're out there, Frank... People full of holes.” --Catherine Black

Profile: The narrative twists of this episode remind us of the shades of grey involved in profiling and the investigative process as a whole. It is for this reason that James Dickerson finds himself under suspicion for so much of the investigation. In addition to insinuating himself into families during their grief at the funerals of men comparable in age to him, he is noted to have been collecting souvenirs from the personal effects of the deceased.

As we have seen before, killers will sometimes collect souvenirs from a kill to remind themselves of the experience, and in a different way Dickerson does the same thing here to remind himself of the personal connection he has made with the families he has encountered. As Catherine Black’s analysis of his history notes, “He's a classic lost child. And there's an army of them just like him. Put up for adoption at one-and-a-half, never placed, in and out of foster care, reform school, abuse. He essentially raised himself... No-one showed him how to connect with the world. Odd as this may sound, going to funerals is his attempt.”

Dickerson’s resulting absence of self-worth and self-concern is so acute that when his mother rejects him again to his face once he is in custody, he even admits to two murders that he never committed. This is the tragedy at the heart of this story, of the psychological damage wrought on him as a child from his experiences. Frank notes to Peter Watts that he fits the profile and that he is capable of committing murder. But, as it turns out, he is not guilty. Capability coupled with behavioural similarities to those exhibited by killers does not imply that someone necessarily has made or ever will make that leap to murderous violence.

We actually know much less about the killer himself: Connor, trustee of the halfway house at which Dickerson resides. From his attitude towards Dickerson and his reaction to the sight of his mother we know that he takes a great interest in him, even to the extent of concealing him from the police. Quite what his motives are we can only guess at, but it seems likely that his own background mirrors Dickerson’s in some way and that he is seeking to compensate for this, to create a family of sorts. They may well also be a sexual component in his apparent special interest in Dickerson, but there is no overt evidence to support this. We can, however, be almost certain that his previous record would have been unblemished in order for him to be able to hold such a position as trustee of the halfway house in the first instance.

We do learn a little more about Connor from his modus operandi, though, and in particular the mutilation of his victims. The nature and physical origin of a wound pattern can often inform an assessment of the motivation behind a murder and the character of the killer. This is true for injuries that represent overkill, control-oriented, defensive or precautionary force, or how or where on the body that force was administered, plus whether it was inflicted before or after death.
Frank is able to discern that the words “STOP LOOKING” that were carved into Tina’s abdomen were done with care and consideration. This mutilation and the same words traced in pollen on the clothing of Jeffrey Cort as discovered by Peter Watts, were both inflicted after death and therefore directed at someone other than the victim. With the style of the “S” copied from the style of the Skorpion Salvage yard where Connor concealed Dickerson and the wording itself copied from the motivational message on a board in the halfway house, there are strong indications that the messages were intended for Dickerson.

This was a warning from Connor to Dickerson to stop looking for a sense of family elsewhere, an attempt to retain control, power and ownership over him, whether or not there is an implied sexual aspect underlying these motivations. It is this same motivation that leads Connor to attack Mrs Dechant, seeking to strike at the heart of Dickerson’s estranged and fractured family. James Dickerson’s entire life has been devoid of any real sense of familial love, and Connor’s unnatural interest in him represents yet another failing of the system to support his welfare in its absence.

Kills: 2

Investigation: James Dickerson remains the prime suspect throughout much of the investigation, with his personal and criminal past plus his stalking of bereaved families all seeming to provide additional evidence of his guilt. Catherine Black also provides good insights into the social care system and the effects of its failings upon those caught up in it. It is only when tracking Dickerson to the halfway house that things begin take a turn, with Connor being obviously obstructive to the police. Discussing the case with Catherine, Frank makes the leap that the message “STOP LOOKING” is not a message from Dickerson but to him, and it is this realisation that leads Frank to visit Dickerson’s mother, narrowly rescuing her from becoming Connor’s next victim.

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