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‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ Season 1 Episode 3 Recap: “A Gorilla Head Will Not Do”

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I Know What You Did Last Summer

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I Know What You Did Last Summer Episode 3 opens with a spider-cam shot of an arachnid skittering down the ear canal of Johnny’s recently severed head, and the former football star’s loose appendage becomes a running bit in both conversation and its various locations. (Johnny’s head eventually winds up on the doorstep of the Wai Huna PD.) And it’s reassuring to see Summer really digging into the black comedy elements of its central conceit, because it’s a safe bet that the flimsy Lennon impersonation gambit Alison has got going on, supported with the inexplicable cooperation of her father Bruce, would undoubtedly be quickly revealed under normal circumstances. In other words, all of the sinister stuff happening in Wai Huna not only isn’t normal, it’s just a skewed reflection of real life. And that includes the O.G.s’ fitful attempts to figure out who knows what they did last summer. 

Once Alison sees Johnny’s head placed at the accident site in a clear violation of her chill, she gathers remaining O.G.’s Margo, Riley, and Dylan at the Snak n’ Stuff to compare notes, which leads to some macabre one-liners about their friend’s demise and not much else. Most of them still believe it’s really Alison messing with them, but for their own reasons. (Dylan, for example, has become a misanthrope, convinced he should be punished for their crime because of his secret hookup with Lennon on the night of the graduation party.) The real Alison, for her part, takes direct action and texts the stalker, asking for a meet. The blacked-out Tacoma that’s been on her tail suddenly boils out of the brush behind Ohana, nearly hitting her, but when Bruce later watches this occur on his security cameras, his reaction is unclear. Maybe he was distracted by the fact that his daughter did some phone-snooping and found a video of he and Police Chief Lyla having a handcuffed sex romp.

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER EP 3 CHOPPED

“How long have you two been playing 50 Shades?” Alison askes her dad, and while Bruce admits his hookups with Lyla have been occurring for quite some time, he also stresses that it had nothing to do with Alison and Lennon’s mom committing suicide. “Your mom was a complicated person.” And we join Dylan and Riley in the oceanside cave, panning their iPhone flashlights across the names carved into its walls. This is where the twins’ mom died, and the names represent the cult members who died here, too. But as yet there’s no clear evidence of the O.G.s’ heinous actions. And speaking of heinous, Alison’s investigation into the mysterious texting stalker leads her back to the Snak n’ Stuff, where the food stand’s skuzzball owner Dale (Spencer Sutherland), who himself encountered the group on the road the night of the murder, is summarily elminated as a stalking suspect when he gets up close and personal with a slushy machine. Blue Crush flavor, if you please. 

The bodies are piling up for Chief Lyla and her deputy, the eccentric Officer Cruise (Eric William Morris). The cops question Kelly Craft (Chrissie Fit), who in addition to being Riley and her mom Courtney’s neighbor is the ex-wife of Coach Eric, who died alongside his new love Johnny. And while group texts, location pins, and consensual follows are natural forms of communication for the young O.G. ‘s, I Know What You Did Last Summer has also begun to emphasize the blanket encroachment of digital churn and surveillance culture into everyday life. There’s Bruce, gazing silently at his Ohana security footage. There are the cameras at Snak n’ Stuff, capturing Dale at work and Alison snooping around. And then there’s the dastardly digital layer to all of this stalking. “Who are you?” Alison texts the stalker. “I am you” comes back the cryptic, threatening answer, and an attached video clip reveals footage from the party and Lennon’s seduction of Dylan. The POV is seemingly bedside, but while it’s true they hooked up in Margo’s bedroom, their flighty rich friend doesn’t seem like the murderous stalker type. So who has the motive, the method, and the digital savvy to reach out and touch these pals in all of the most intensely personal ways? As Dylan drove by the cop shop, making only a casual note of his friend Johnny’s decapitated noggin hanging out on the stoop, perhaps he was asking himself the same question.

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER EP 3 CHOPPED HEAD

Johnny Loftus is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift. Follow him on Twitter: @glennganges

Watch I Know What You Did Last Summer Episode 3 on Amazon Prime