When `Killing Eve` began, its title's threat, promise, or intimation (however you want to read it) felt immediate - as if in any episode, at any moment, intelligence officer Eve Polastri (Sandra Oh) could fall prey to the inventive assassin Villanelle (Jodie Comer).
But such immediacy inevitably mitigated; success demanded extending their story, and the plot twisted itself into knots so the cat and mouse could work together (and two award-winning stars could share the screen). A forbidden romance became a dysfunctional relationship, and the enticement of inexplicable attraction turned into a confounding inability to explain why this cop and this killer are drawn to one another.
Season 3 wisely stops trying to explain it, but it also simplifies the story to an all-too-comfortable degree. `Killing Eve` has always been a procedural at heart, first as Eve studied Villanelle's murders to get closer to her, and then as they teamed up to track down a new, unknown killer.
As much as its serialized aspects made the BBC America drama out to be a new kind of crime show, the bones of a procedural have kept it alive. Serialization got everything twisted up, and procedure is the work of detangling. What's left may not provide the anything-can-happen rush of early episodes, but for those happy just to spend a little time with their favorite ex-agent and ultra-assassin, `Killing Eve` Season 3 should suffice.
