The spell – Part Two is a continuation of the 2015 docuseries. The Jinx: The Life and Death of Robert Durst, who captivated the nation with his unprecedented access to the heir of a prominent real estate family, who at the time was accused of three murders. Just before the series finale aired on April 15, 2015, Durst was arrested in New Orleans; he had gone on the run after seeing new evidence against him come to light in the series. The six-part setup follows filmmaker Andrew Jarecki and his team’s further investigation into the Durst case, as well as his trial on charges that he killed Susan Berman in 2000.
THE JINX – PART TWO: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Initial shot: As we move across the water toward a correctional facility in New Orleans, we hear a recording of tones and then the graphic “ROBERT DURST CALLS HIS LAWYER.”
The essence: The new season begins with Durst’s arrest, and we hear about him through phone calls to his lawyer and his interrogation by Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney John Lewin, who took on cold cases and went to New Orleans to question Durst after his arrest. As viewers saw in 2015, Durst seems more like a bewildered old man than someone who has killed several people and gotten away with it for decades. But as Lewin describes what the interrogation was like, he felt that he almost made Durst admit to murdering Berman, but then realizes that Durst would push him over the edge but would never give him what he wanted.
Jarecki then shows the impact that the finale and Durst’s surprising hot mic reveal at the end of the episode had on the family of his first wife Kathleen, whose death in 1982 was connected to Durst but for which he was never tried. They were watching the finale at Jarecki’s house, along with Jeanine Pirro, who investigated Kathleen’s disappearance and appeared in the first season of The curseand Cody Cazalas, the Galveston, Texas, police detective who investigated Durst’s involvement in the death of his then-neighbor Morris Black in 2001; Durst was tried for that murder and was acquitted. When Durst says “I killed them all, of course,” as he goes to the bathroom during an interview session with Jarecki at the end, the entire room is stunned into silence.
We then see Durst rallying support from prison, from his lawyers to the friends who never abandoned him and his second wife, Deborah. Dick DeGuerin, the defense attorney who represented Durst at the Galveston trial, is tasked with assembling a team of lawyers for the Berman case, and we hear from both DeGuerin and David Chesnoff, the famous attorney who was hired for this case.
What shows will it remind you of? As we mentioned before, The spell – Part Two is a continuation of the 2015 docuseries. The curse. Since that series became a model for the true crime docuseries that have emerged since, it’s hard to compare the show to anything else.
Our opinion: Given that Durst was convicted of Berman’s murder in 2021 and died in 2022, and that the machinations involved in the arrest and the delays that delayed the trial for six years are public knowledge, it is difficult to imagine what new information we can glean from a continuation of The curse. It’s not that Jarecki had direct access to Durst, as she did with the original series, which is what made it such a compelling watch. Viewers were stunned that Durst would reveal so much to Jarecki, without considering what evidence Jarecki and his team may have found on his behalf, such as the infamous “corpse note.” That note, and the comparison to an envelope sent by Durst, was the key evidence that led to his arrest.
The first episode of this sequel, considered “Chapter 7” by Jarecki and company, was very meta and discussed how the evidence discovered by the filmmaker influenced Durst’s arrest. Lewin discusses the program with Durst during his interrogation. Then we see the dozens of people watching the end. We’re not sure if Jarecki was doing this to pat himself on the back or simply to reset the story for viewers nine years after the fact. Either way, it didn’t seem to generate any new information about Durst or the case.
Perhaps as we get more involved in the trial and hear from more participants on both sides, we will hear about some behind-the-scenes manipulations that have not been made public up to this point. And it is likely that Jarceki and company have uncovered more evidence that could have helped the prosecution. One of the things we want to know more about is how Durst and his legal team managed to push and delay the trial for six years, perhaps knowing that his deteriorating health could even become a factor. It seems Durst once again used the system to his advantage; We look forward to hearing about claims against his estate from his victims after his death, because these families need to get some kind of justice after all this time.
Sex and skin: None.
Parting Shot: Durst calls a friend from jail and tells him that the DA is calling people he called while he was incarcerated. As he tells the friend to wait for a call from the district attorney, he also tells him, “don’t tell them shit.”
Sleeping star: Lewin is the most compelling person in this first episode, because he knows that Durst was playing with him during his post-arrest interrogation, but he is captivated by the exchanges he had with the killer.
Most pilot line: The “viewer party” scene was very self-indulgent, but at least it showed Pirro as a human being, not the right-wing shouter she became on Fox News.
Our call: TRANSMIT IT. While The spell – Part Two It’s still worth a watch, it doesn’t feel as essential and compelling as the original series was, and some of its more meta moments left us scratching our heads.
Joel Keller@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and technology, but make no mistake: he’s a couch potato. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
