Maniac at Large
The price of paranoia is quite hefty.
Crypt Keeper: (dressed as a realtor and seated in front of an open briefcase; positioned below a sign reading "Crypt Keeper Realty") City life got you down, kiddies? Looking for a home on derange? (shuts the briefcase) Well, look no further, because I've got exactly what you want. It's a charming tomb with a view. Think of it as your own little house on the scary. (cackles) You're not interested? What's the matter? Afraid you can't get a morgue-age? Oh well, that's exactly how the woman in tonight's tortured tale feels. She's upset because there's a killer loose in her neighborhood. In a putrid property I call: Maniac at Large.
Margaret (Blythe Danner) is a timid and mousy woman who has recently begun working at an inner-city library, which is often frequented by an assortment of suspicious vagrants and ne'er-do-wells. Margaret soon grows inches away from a nervous breakdown after reading from a newspaper headline that a serial killer is prowling the streets, and then becomes even more frantic when head librarian Mrs. Pritchard (Salome Jens) insists that she's to work late that night. It certainly doesn’t help that she has to deal with Pipkin (Adam Ant), a nutty and eccentric patron who loves to study serial killers. The library's power soon goes out, meaning that Margaret has to go down to the dark and narrow basement to switch it back on. Down there, she sees silhouettes of someone with a knife stabbing something else. Security guard Grady (Clarence Williams III) and Lieutenant Jameson (Obba Babatundé) are able to disprove Margaret's claims of someone in the basement, but it doesn't disprove her claims of a murderer in the building. As Margaret's paranoia climbs higher and higher, it begins to raise a very important question: just who is the killer lurking in the library?
Tropes:
- Ambiguous Situation: Is Margaret genuinely unaware that she kills people out of blind fear? Or is she fully aware that she's a bloodthirsty murderer who's constantly on the run, and only plays up the paranoia to cover her tracks? The monologue she somewhat gives to Grady at the end of the episode, where she casually mentions she'll have to resign after stabbing her boss to death, leans towards the latter.
- Amnesiac Dissonance: Margaret spends the whole episode frightened out of her mind by the fact that a serial killer is loose in her neighborhood. The end of the episode, where she rants about Mrs. Pritchard being "just like all the others" as she stabs her to death, reveals that she's been the serial killer all along, and was so wrapped up in her paranoia that she had no idea. However, her crazed speech at the end hints that she is aware of what she does, as well as how it keeps ruining her life and forces her to go on the run.
- Bookworm: Pipkin is a heavy bibliophile, especially in regards to books on serial killers. The scene where he introduces himself to Margaret even has him asking if he could check out a library-use-only reference book. He's also revealed to have stayed in the library after closing time after having been wrapped up in his reading.
- Chekhov's Gun: The teenagers in the opening scene leave one of their switchblades behind when they flee. Margaret pockets the object, and at the end of the episode, she uses it to kill Mrs. Pritchard after thinking she was going to kill her.
- Crazy Homeless People: A hefty chunk of the library's regular patrons are vagrants who aren't exactly all there, raising Margaret's suspicions that any one of them could be the killer. One suspicious old lady even sings "Old MacDonald" in a soft, unnerving voice right to Margaret's face, doing so until Grady escorts her out.
- Creepy Basement: The library's basement is large, narrow, and poorly lit, and Margaret seems to witness someone or something stabbing something else in silhouette.
- Creepy Red Herring: Pipkin's maniacal interest in serial killers, as well as his interest in Margaret herself, hints that he's the killer who's been running loose and is plotting to kill her next. He isn't the actual killer, but he did manage to predict their next move and motives with (almost) complete accuracy.
- Another example comes in the form of Mr. Gartam, an employee who works the graveyard shift at the library. He appears to Margaret hunched over and dressed as a vagrant, pounding on the door and begging to be let in. When she tells Mrs. Pritchard about him, she clarifies that he wanted to get inside because he had books to drop off, and reveals that his hunching posture is because he suffers from a rare bone disorder.
- The Cuckoolander Was Right: In spite of how eccentric and manic he was, most of Pipkin's advice regarding the killer turns out to be 100% correct, even managing to guess what their weapon of choice is, who their next victim would be, and why they kill in the first place. The only thing he got wrong was the killer's gender.
- The Dog Was the Mastermind: The true identity of the killer prowling the city? It's Margaret, the seemingly-innocent and timid librarian we've been focusing on all episode.
- Everyone Is a Suspect: Everyone who Margaret interacts with seems to have hints and motives that they could be the serial killer. The end of the episode renders all of those people red herrings by revealing that the actual killer is Margaret herself.
- Evil Brit: Averted with Pipkin. Even though he's eccentric and studies serial killers with an intensive passion, he's not actually evil.
- Foreshadowing: There are hints relating to Margaret's actual identity dropped early in the episode:
- It's said that she's been working at the library for only two weeks and she's never once mentioned her family.
- As described above, Pipkin's theories about how the killer operates, who their next victim would be, and their motives for killing all come to fruition when Margaret snaps and stabs Mrs. Pritchard to death.
- Mrs. Pritchard also drops one final hint that leads directly to The Reveal: the killer may not actually be a man.
Mrs. Pritchard: That'd surprise everyone, wouldn't it? - For Want Of A Nail: It's very likely that the events of the episode would've never happened if those young punks hadn't swiped that old man's newspaper and left behind one of their switchblades.
- Hates Being Alone: When Mrs. Pritchard goes out to grab some sandwiches and coffee for the graveyard shift, Margaret begs to not be left alone while there's a potential murderer in the building.
- Hates Being Touched: Pipkin implies that the serial killer murders people because of life in the city, where all sorts of strangers can grope or attack them. Margaret reveals this to be her own motive when she's revealed as the killer, even screaming at Mrs. Pritchard not to touch her.
- It's All About Me: If Grady is to be believed, Mrs. Pritchard is a stern and self-centered employer with a "high and mighty" attitude. The scenes where she and Margaret are alone together seems to suggest otherwise.
- The Killer in Me: An amnesiac version is shown in Margaret, who spends the whole episode panicking when she believes that the killer is out to kill her. It turns out that she herself is the killer and doesn't even know it, killing everyone she comes across because she thinks they're the ones out to kill her. Case in point, Margaret's rant to Mrs. Pritchard reveals that she's borderline insane and thought her boss was "just like all the others".
- Kubrick Stare: The cover of Alone with the Devil, the reference book Pipkin wants to check out, features a man's eyes grimly staring at the reader.
- Library Episode: The episode is set entirely inside the inner-city library where Margaret works, which is often frequented by young delinquents and crazed vagrants.
- Mean Boss: Downplayed with Mrs. Pritchard. According to Grady, she's strict, stingy, and authoritarian, but we see that that's only because she wants what's best for the library. She's actually pretty friendly to Margaret when the two of them are alone, inviting her to her office to talk and share some coffee as her mental state gets progressively worse.
- Mythology Gag: The rowdy teen gang in the opening scene are shown to have scribbled the name "EC Comics" (the source material of the series) onto one of the library's tables.
- New Jobs As The Plot Demands: If Margaret's deranged ending monologue is any indication, she's well aware that her paranoia has led her to kill people, move to a new town, and start a new identity several times before.
- Nice Guy: For all his ineffectiveness, Grady shows that he's pretty decent, hating how Mrs. Pritchard bosses everyone around and even tries to convince her to let the library's largely homeless clientele spend the night there to avoid the killer.
- Nothing Is Scarier: In her growing paranoia, Margaret watches as a silhouetted hand with a knife stabs something in the basement. She finds that there's no one there, but discovers a reference book with its pages slashed. Whatever or whoever it was that actually slashed up the book is never revealed.
- The Paranoiac: Margaret is violently paranoid, to the point where she kills people in blind fear because she thinks they'll kill her first.
- Police Are Useless: Grady, the library's security guard, has a limited attention span and actively drinks while on the clock. Mrs. Pritchard has considered firing him, but she's been unable to do so because he's a civil servant.
- It's subverted with Lt. Jameson, who only comes to the library because of a report of stolen typewriters, and further notes that he can most likely only pick up whoever or whatever slashed the reference book Margaret finds on vandalism charges.
- The Reveal: Margaret herself is the killer that's been terrorizing the city. As alluded by Pipkin, she kills people because she's horrifically paranoid about living in the big city, to the point where she earnestly believes that everyone around her will kill her first (even slashing a homeless man's throat after he innocently asked her for change). When Grady discovers Mrs. Pritchard's body, Margaret, succumbing to her insanity, casually mentions that she'll have to resign, the tone of her voice revealing that she's had to move to different towns and adopt different identities many times before.
- Sanity Slippage: Margaret's deranged monologue at the end hints that she's gone fully insane, admitting that she'll have to resign and move to a new town, like she presumably has several times before.
- Scary Librarian: Margaret is revealed to be one in the end, when it's revealed that she's the serial killer who's been plaguing the city without even being aware of it.
- Shout-Out: The newspaper that reveals the killer is still at large is The Daily Chronicle.
- Sinister Silhouettes: The shadow of a man with a knife stabbing something is glimpsed by Margaret while she's in the basement. She finds no one down there when she restores power to the building, but does discover a reference book with its pages mysteriously slashed.
- Slasher Smile: Margaret gives a deranged one when she reveals herself to be the titular maniac, having succumbed to insanity after stabbing her boss to death.
- Small Role, Big Impact: The teenagers in the opening scene, who swipe a newspaper headlining about the maniac loose in the city, which gets Margaret's paranoia flared up. They also leave one of their switchblades behind, which Margaret uses to kill her boss at the climax of the episode.
- They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: One of Pipkin's books describes how serial killers often act and look just like any other person. It even carries a picture of John Christie
, who Pipkin says looks like an ordinary person by all accounts.- This is also demonstrated properly in the ending, where Margaret, our innocent-but-frightened main character, is revealed to be the episode's titular maniac.
- Title Drop: The episode's title is seen as the headline of a patron's newspaper.
- Tragic Villain: Margaret is a serial killer, yes, but she only kills because she's violently paranoid and thinks that they'll kill her first. It's even revealed that this habit of hers has forced her to take on new identities in new places numerous times.
- Ultimate Job Security: The library's security guard, Grady, has a short attention span, drinks on duty, and is said to think pretty lowly of his boss. The only reason he's still employed is because he's a civil servant, and Mrs. Pritchard has found it impossible to replace him after trying to do so several times.
- "What Now?" Ending: The episode ends as Margaret reveals herself to be the killer and guesses she'll have to move on to another new life, right after Grady discovers his employer's dead body in her office. It could be said that it's up to the viewers to determine what comes from all of this.
Crypt Keeper: (standing in front of a corpse partially stuffed in a meat locker, which rests under a sign reading "SOULED") Well, kiddies, I guess that's knife in the big city for you! (cackles) Boy, do I feel sorry for Margaret. Looks like it's just one dead-end job after another. (cackles) You'll be happy to know that I made a sale. The ne-ghost-iations were fierce (pushes the corpse's leg inside), but after I threw in a couple of ache-rs, the rest was easy. (cackles and shuts the locker) There goes the neigh-boo-hood! (cackles)
