As the third episode of Obsession begins, Anna Barton (Charlie Murphy) writes in her diary. Then, William (Richard Armitage) goes out to eat with them to celebrate their engagement. Ingrid (Indira Varma) shows them the video message she got from Jay’s aunt. Anna follows William into the bathroom to say what happened in Paris is a one-off. She reminds him that all of this will fall apart if they don’t stick to the rules. Anna says there is no version of this with just William. He says the same for Jay. Anna loves everything about what they are so she doesn’t want to lose it. She begins teasing him and asks if he is able to control himself.

William claims he can. Then, he shows her the messages he has been receiving since the night Jay proposed. Anna is confident that she can handle it. She tells William to watch her when they’re with his family. If she touches her hair, it means she is thinking about what they’ll do the next time they’re together. During dinner, Anna touches her hair to tease William. On her way home, she stops the taxi and tells Jay (Rish Shah) that she wants to see a friend. She tells him about her childhood friend named Peggy, but won’t let Jay meet her tonight. Once she goes inside, she accuses Peggy (Pippa Bennett-Warner) of sending the texts before telling her to stop.

Peggy insists it isn’t her and instead suggests someone else knows what is going on. Anna tells her about Jay proposing. They hear the buzzer sound so Peggy decides to let Jay come up so she can say hello. When Peggy sees him, she says she gets it now. Anna quickly claims she gets why she is marrying him. Anna makes them leave in a hurry. Jay tries to explain to her why he came up and why he wanted to meet her friend. He wants the people in her life to be in his life. Jay reminds her that he hasn’t even met her mom yet. Anna promises that he’ll get to meet her at the engagement party. In the middle of the night, Anna is awoken by her phone. Once she answers it, Peggy questions whether she should be worried.

She mentions that Anna has done some really messed up things in the past. Anna claims to have it under control. Peggy says she’ll be at the engagement party because she’ll need her when her mom sees Jay. Later, William visits Anna and they begin discussing who could be sending the messages. William says there is a woman at work who doesn’t like him, but he doubts she is capable of this. Anna wants to invite her to the engagement party. She uses William’s phone to tell the sender that he has nothing to hide before telling William she is surviving. They have sex. Anna and Jay are together at the engagement party. Anna approaches Nadia (Francesca Knight) to see if she can find anything out.

Nadia says they’ve worked together for a long time and William is one of the best they’ve got. Anna says she hasn’t managed to get past the small talk yet. Nadia admits she isn’t alone. Once that conversation ends, Peggy joins Anna. Then, Anna approaches William in private to say Nadia doesn’t know about them. He gets another message threatening to tell her if he doesn’t. Anna urges him to pull it together. Anna begins introducing everyone to her mother Elizabeth (Marion Bailey) who tells William this all felt rather clandestine. When she is introduced to Jay, Elizabeth asks Anna why she didn’t tell her. She explains that Jay looks a lot like her late son Aston, but Anna quickly denies that.

Jay wants to introduce her to his mother. Peggy tells Anna that she’ll keep an eye on her. William gets another message giving him until the end of the speech to come clean. He forwards the message to Anna. Anna joins Sally outside for a cigarette even though she claims not to smoke. Sally (Sonera Angel) asks if she’d be mad if she left after the fireworks, but Anna doesn’t seem to care. Sally reveals that Kelly dumped her so not everything is fine right now. She goes on to tell Anna that Jay really loves her. As Anna comes back inside, she gets the message and Ingrid prepares to speak to the crowd. Ingrid says marriage is about trust before telling William that she has a confession to make.

She has been spying on him. She went to his workplace the other day only to find that he wasn’t there. Nadia let her wait in his office, but he never showed up. As she looked around, she found a set of four grainy passport photos of William and herself in their early days. When they took the photos, they told themselves they’d look at them and feel the love they felt right then. She thinks it is still there since he held onto the photos for so long. Ingrid tells Jay and Anna if they nourish and protect the foundation of their love it will last them for years to come. Elizabeth watches William get angry and squeeze his glass causing it to break in his hand. She follows him and removes a piece of glass from his palm before saying he should be more careful.

In private, Elizabeth tells Anna that she saw the way William was looking at her. After Elizabeth hopes it is nothing, Anna says she needs her to drop it. Elizabeth says of course since she is sure Anna has everything under control. Anna steps outside to watch the fireworks with the others. Later that night, Jay tells her that her mother hasn’t scared him off. He is just learning to love the questions. Jay reminds her that she can tell him about him. Anna confesses she has never felt that close to anyone until she met him. She goes outside to join William and tells him that they were bluffing. She isn’t worried about who it was. William admits he cannot deal with the idea of Anna needing Jay more than she needs him.

Anna says it ends with Jay looking like Aston because he is nothing like him. He isn’t cruel and doesn’t need to possess her. William asks what Aston did and what happened the night he died. Anna finally said no to him. She claims he destroyed himself when she said no. They end up having sex on the ground outside. Anna asks him to hurt her and thanks him once they finish. Sally tries on a dress for Anna. She reveals she thinks her dad is having an affair. Sally admits she has been sending him these texts trying to get him to end it. She had to stop though because she didn’t want to be responsible for messing up her parents’ marriage. After Anna asks how she could know, Sally shows her the page she found from her diary.

Sally tells her how she found it in his pocket before Anna says it was her. Anna says the handwriting is hers and she writes things down so she can process them. Sally asks how her dad had it. Anna says he found it at Hartley and said he’d look after it until he could get it back to her. Anna hopes she knows it doesn’t change her love for Jay. Sally insists she has nothing to explain. Later, Anna meets William to tell him about it and to say that Sally doesn’t know the truth. Anna doesn’t know why he needed to take it when she is his. William asks if she really is. She says he is on every single page. William asks her what she wrote for today. The pages are blank.

Jay visits Peggy so he can learn more about Anna for his upcoming speech. When he asks if she loves him, Peggy thinks that is only something Anna can answer. She explains that Anna will never be ordinary so her love for him will never be ordinary. Peggy wouldn’t blame him if he decided he couldn’t deal with that. If he is going to marry Anna, Peggy urges him not to go looking where Anna tells him not to. William and Anna have sex. They begin working together to plan the wedding. Eventually, Jay asks Anna what she is up to tonight. She responds by saying not much, but it is nothing he needs to know about. Anna claims she is just joking when asked what that means.

Jay says she is everything to him because he has never loved anyone before her. He goes to the pub where he drinks with friends. William joins them moments later. Jay admits he is feeling a bit nervous. He explains that Anna is always holding back so she is complicated. William warns him that marriage isn’t going to be easy because Anna will challenge him in ways he is not prepared for. Jay begins worrying and tries to find out what is going on. William says the next phase of his son’s life is a big deal to him. He says none of them know what is going to happen so they may just need to learn how to love the questions. Jay wants to know where he heard that. William claims it is from a poem before leaving. Jay follows him.

 

Obsession Review

The third episode of Obsession was okay although it set up the finale pretty well. It is just difficult not to feel like the series could’ve been so much more with this cast. Instead, it lacks substance and tries to make it up for it by taking the sexualized scenes a bit too far. The series is watchable and the performances are decent enough to make it seem authentic.

I get the feeling that I am supposed to care for the characters, but it hasn’t been possible to establish a real connection to any of them through three episodes. If that wasn’t the case, there would likely be a lot more to like about Obsession.  However, it is not easy to care about Jay even though viewers should be sympathizing with him right now with everything going on.

If viewers are okay with being disconnected from the characters, Obsession will probably be a decent binge at just four episodes. This one scores a 6 out of 10. Recaps of Obsession are available on Reel Mockery here. Find out how to support our independent site at this link. Learn more about advertising on Reel Mockery here.