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Summary:
A desperate man embarks on a cross-country killing spree, taking revenge on the holy men he perceives to have led him astray. Frank Black knows that the man's sense of faith—or lack thereof—is
the key to stopping his murderous quest. Soon, however, Frank's
determination puts him in danger when he willingly
walks into a hostage situation at a small town church.
Season One on DVD
Full Transcript Available
Quote:
"And there will be such intense darkness that one can feel
it." —Exodus 10:21
Synopsis:
A man (ultimately
revealed as Galen Calloway) burns a Catholic priest at the
stake outside his church. At the crime scene, Frank reunites
with Millennium Group member Ardis Cohen. They had worked
together on a case four years ago when three men of the cloth were murdered
in a similar ritualistic fashion.
In his research, Frank
identifies a similarity between these modern crimes and the Christian tortures
of church heretics during the Middle Ages. His assumption is confirmed
when the killer grotesquely
drowns a Wyoming minister in an imitation of another
medieval torture. At the scene of the crime, the police retrieve two clues.
A man's wedding ring is found inside the victim's
stomach. Near the corpse is a woman's wedding/engagement
band, engraved JWM.
At a Rockford,
Illinois church, the killer is interrupted while rifling through its files. He was searching
for something so important he acted without his usual
thoroughness, and left bloody fingerprints behind.
All along Frank has been receiving glimpses inside
the killer's mind. A sudden illumination strikes him.
He realizes the murderer is not killing men
— he's
killing faith. The victims must have some religious significance
in the killer's life. He stole the files in order to
choose
his next victim. Frank now believes that the killer experienced
an emotionally catastrophic event — a loss devastating
enough to have destroyed his faith, and transformed him into a homicidal
monster.
Frank and the police are close on the killer's trail, but
too late to save the life of Reverend Harned,
whom Calloway has cruelly tortured. But Frank realizes that
the killer has returned to the place where his life was destroyed. When Frank
sees visions of a woman and child trapped in a house fire, he has the Rockford
police search their records, and they find their man: Galen Calloway, a high
school religious teacher who was the only survivor of a 1989 fire that killed
his wife and daughter. Frank knows Calloway's next stop: the church that held
his family's funeral.
His body wired with
explosives, Calloway invades the church, and takes the everyone inside hostage.
He preaches his loss of faith to the terrified congregation while SWAT
teams and media swarm outside.
Frank is convinced he can reach Calloway, and risks
his life by going in to face him. Calloway holds
Frank at gunpoint, but Frank calmly tells Calloway he can
help him because he knows what Calloway wants. Calloway
believes his pain will end when he kills his faith. Yet
despite everything he has done, Frank points out, Calloway has never lost his
faith in God.
Calloway knows what
Frank is saying is true, but he's never understood it himself before this moment.
Yet instead of embracing his faith as Frank had hoped, Calloway kills his
faith the only way he knows how —
and turns the gun on himself.
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Photographs:
- Frank Black examines a charred corpse
- Frank and fellow consultant Ardis Cohen
- Frank kisses Jordan goodnight
- Calloway reveals a makeshift bomb
- Frank and Ardis look to a victim for clues
- Frank finds himself in the role of hostage
- The remains of a church-side immolation
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Abyss Rating:
(3/5)
Media Review:
"Gripping stuff.
By seeing the strength of Galen's
faith, Black recovers his faith — in faith... In the American
religious climate it intimates that Black has put some flesh on the
ghost of Christianity within him; a ghost that novelist Flannery
O'Connor says haunts so many Americans. The whole episode serves as
something of a metaphor for how Western society's decision to kill off
God has to have consequences for how the fabric of that society holds
together. As Leonard Cohen sang, 'I have seen the future, baby, it is
murder.'" —Paul Mitchell,
Shoot the Messenger
Trivia:
"Kingdom Come" was the first
Millennium episode to be aired out of production order, and for a
very unusual reason. The Fox network announced that the
scheduling change had been made out of respect for
Cardinal Joseph Bernardin,
a 68-year-old senior U.S. Roman
Catholic prelate who died of cancer on November 14,
1996, one day before the episode was set to air. The move was well
publicized, particularly since Millennium's violent subject
matter was still a hot topic. Some of the more savvy minds in
the media, however, came to realize that Fox's decision may have been
motivated by Millennium's disappointing ratings more than out
of any
respect for the Catholic Church.
Guest star Lindsay Crouse has appeared in
a number of prominent television police and legal dramas including
Hill Street Blues, L.A. Law, NYPD Blue, Law &
Order, and L.A. Dragnet. While her Millennium
character, Millennium Group consultant Ardis Cohen, was seemingly
being established as a recurring character she would never appear
again on the series.
"I'm finding out what it is that my gift
is, and I think that there are a couple of them," Crouse commented
while analyzing her character during a promotional interview for the
episode. "One of them, I think, is particularly womanly. I
think that I will turn over every stone and never give up. I
think it's a kind of maternal characteristic, that you'll stand over a
sick child until there's absolutely nothing left to be done, and I
think that kind of tenacity is a part of Ardis Cohen's character. I also think she has an encyclopedic mind. She's a scholar and
she is fascinated by what motivates human behavior."
Death Toll:
4
Title:
When
taking hostages at a
Rockford, Illinois church, Calloway
references the Lord's Prayer and the promise that God's kingdom will
come with the end times. "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on
earth as it is in heaven." Strapped with explosives, it is the
bitter Calloway himself who promises to deliver the end to his victims
after hopelessly waiting for years for proof of God's kingdom to come
to him.
Starring:
Lance Henriksen as Frank Black
Megan Gallagher as Catherine Black
Brittany Tiplady as Jordan Black
Guest Starring:
Lindsay Crouse as Ardis Cohen
Michael Zelniker as Galen Calloway
Tom McBeath as Detective Romero
Terence Kelly as Detective Kerney
Jan Burrell as Jill Harned
Laurie Murdoch as Father Schultz
Peter Haworth as Reverend Jack Harned
Ed Harrington as Reverend Marcus Crane
Arnie Walters as Father Silas Brown
Roger Allford as Golfing Man
Brad Wattum as Reverend
Ralph J. Alderman as Motel Manager
Wanda Wilkinson as Sister Beatrice Crowly
Alan Lehros as John Matewon
Production
Credits:
Production #4C03
Music by Mark Snow
Production Designer Sheila Haley
Director of Photography Robert McLachlan
Associate Producer Jon-Michael Preece
Consulting Producer Ted Mann
Consulting Producer James Wong
Consulting Producer Glen Morgan
Co-Producer Ken Dennis
Co-Producer Chip Johannessen
Co-Producer Frank Spotnitz
Co-Executive Producer Jorge Zamacona
Co-Executive Producer Ken Horton
Co-Executive Producer John Peter Kousakis
Executive Producer Chris Carter
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