Christine (The Victim) – The premiere begins with Christine Labot (Alix Poisson) waking in a field after obviously being attacked, possibly assaulted. After a brief walk into town, she is on the phone with someone named Nathalie (Thais Vauquieres), arranging to be picked up.
The footage then cuts to the autumn of 1988 when Jean-Pierre Blanchot (Julien Frison) arrives for his first day of work. He is immediately welcomed with open arms before briefly explaining his previous stint as a Public Safety Office in Creteil. Captain Bernard Breton (Pasquale D’Inca) wastes little time letting Jean-Pierre know that they like to keep things as simple as possible at the prescient. According to him, this meshes well with the low crime stats in the area. Despite his claim, Bernard is soon ushered off to interview an assault victim, who is revealed to be Christine.
He handles the matter rather delicately as she tells him that the assault occurred sometime in the early morning hours in Maubeuge. According to her, she has been taking the route regularly due to her work as a hairdresser in Maubeuge. She is unable to provide any physical description but claims the attacker had a very deep voice. To make matters worse, this is all she remembers and the attacker apparently wasn’t interested in her personal belongings.
After taking her statement, Bernard and another officer will take Christine and Nathalie to the site of the assault to further document and photograph. Christine has a hard time when she is asked to go back through the story but manages to get through it. Other than photographing and documenting the area, the trip is a complete bust. Bernard will tell Christine that she is lucky as they leave.
Upon returning home, Christine immediately showers and washes her clothes, but decides to throw them out right in the middle of the cycle. Shortly after this, a frantic Laurent Labot (Theo Costa-Marini) returns home with the intent of comforting Christine but appears to make the situation worse with his brasher approach. Christine does mention that her attacker smelled like oil or gas which she didn’t share with police.
Enzo Salina (Jonathan Turnbull) is introduced in the next few scenes as a very knowledgeable and likable local factory worker. Enzo promises to use his influence with management to help the young worker get a permanent position if he proves to be a good worker.
Laurent will get up early to drive Christine to work the following morning. All appears to be going well until she begins cutting Mr. Linart’s (Denis Bauvilain) hair. Christine’s boss will intervene before Mr. Liner even suspects anything but Christine appears to have a panic attack in the backroom.
At nearly the same time, Jennifer Mallory (Lucie Charles-Alfred) files a report with Jean-Pierre that is eerily similar to Christine’s experience, despite several major differences. Although the attack would happen in the same area at around the same time, Jennifer was made to perform fellatio. In addition to this, she was not left unconscious but told to face the opposite direction, close her eyes, and count to 50, at the man left.
Laurent and Christine will later attend an adult birthday party but before doing so, Christine briefly mentions being put on sick leave which only confuses Laurent due to her having already gone back to work. Laurent offers to skip the party but she insists on going and it later appears to do her good. This is until she is surprised from behind by one of her friends with the news that they are leaving. Despite Laurent appears to be the only one who takes note. Things only get worse when they return home later that evening and attempt to get intimate. Even though she is the aggressor at one point, she abruptly stops the interaction. Laurent will ask her what she isn’t telling him but she only responds by rolling over.
Along with being a likable guy, a brief scene of a soccer game shows that he’s a gifted athlete as well. In addition to that, he appears to have several admirers in the fans including, Stephanie Salina (Louis Orry-Diquero). Another is supposedly Enzo’s brother, Fabio Salina (Fredric Tanto), who Eenzo wants nothing to do with. He will later even order Stephanie to tell Fabio to get lost.
Although Christine will have another panic attack while shopping with Laurent, it appears that she’s learned to control them a bit better. After stepping away from the crowd and going to the less crowded magazine station at the front of the store, she will take notice of one of the other shopper’s shoes. Although nothing is definitively explained, it’s implied that recognizes them from the attack. Even more shocking is the fact that they appear to belong to Enzo.
Enzo and Stephanie host what is supposed to be a family cookout but his parents never show. Stephanie’s parents will arrive late due to car issues. Enzo is just as adored amongst his in-laws but things nearly take a bleaker turn when Stephanie’s dad implies that he doesn’t want Enzo working on his vehicle. It apparently isn’t because he doesn’t trust his work but claims that he doesn’t want to bother him with the issue. Enzo lets it go for the moment.
Christine will continue to struggle with the assault and it eventually seeps into her relationship with Laurent. After waking him in the middle of the night, claiming to have heard someone outside, she tells him about the grocery store incident. She also further reveals that at the grocery store, she smelled that same gas/oil scent when close to Enzo. Laurent appears to be more hurt by the fact it took her so long to share the news. This appears to be near a boiling point when he returns home from work to not only discover that Christine has taken on a new remodeling project, but she’s apparently not returning to work.
After the cops arrest a possible suspect caught publicly masturbating where Christine was assaulted, she is called into the station for what Jean-Pierre refers to as a confrontation. Despite his best attempt, she remains on edge throughout the entire encounter. Once she learns that she is being asked to visually identify the suspect, she nearly backs out because she didn’t even see her attacker. Jean-Pierre will eventually end up having the offender read from but the whole thing turns out to be futile.
Laurent and Christine’s relationship reaches its breaking point when she refuses to relocate, claiming that her whole life and family are there. This argument will turn particularly bad with her physically assaulting him. Although he later leaves with a bad, he claims that he’s just going to a friend’s house to clear his head.
The episode ends with Enzo cruising for his next victim.
Sambre/Samber Review
This just being the first episode, I don’t want to jump to harsh conclusions but at 1 and 6 minutes, the series had more than adequate time to for character development and story arcs. I’m not saying that it didn’t do that because it clearly did, very slowly. The pacing would have to be my biggest complaint. Being unfamiliar with the French and its culture, it’s hard to really say much about the acting, but I can say, that I felt that Christine did an incredible job of playing her emotions.
Other than her and Laurent, there really wasn’t much call for acting. It was practically reading the script which there was plenty of. Although the story is as general and typical as it gets, it’s much more depraved and grittier than one would expect. I did enjoy that and other than several incredibly dark scenes, it wasn’t so bad. I’d have to give the opening episode a 5.3 out of 10.
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