The episode, "There's Something About Mary Lynn," on last week's "Obsession: Dark Desires" take the prize for the season. It is up there with Karen and Carlo from last season, and the episode between Amy and the Fat Lesbian on the first season.
Poor May Lynn Witherspoon (no relation to Reese, I think) had no idea what she was getting herself into. How could she?
You see, following her divorce, Mary Lynn became a social fixture at church and other functions in her beloved Charleston, South Carolina. Eventually, into her life walked Edmonds Brown III, scion of one of the town's most prominent families. But there were cracks in the wall.
Each parent had two children; Mary Lynn had two daughter, while Edmonds had an heir, a son, aged 10, in 1981, who was called Tennent. There was also Molly, aged 10, who could not get along with Mary Lynn's daughter, Jane. Molly was constantly jealous of Jane.
The couple coasted along, Edmonds proposed several times, but Mary Lynn always backed off. Of course, eventually, she came to realize there was something uneasy about his children that made her feel uncomfortable joining the families.
Aside from the Molly-Jane rivalry, Tennent was obsessed with Mary Lynn. He would stare for hours at her, and by aged 12, became a danger, trying to drown Jane in a pool one time. Things got even stranger. Mary Lynn began noticing her underwear missing. I thought, aha, the kid's in puberty, and already he has developed a sexual fetish. But it went way beyond that, when Mary Lynn caught Tennent in her room, dressed in one of her dresses, and putting on make-up. Was he going Norman Bates, perhaps?????????????/
Eventually, the relationship between Mary Lynn and Edmonds broke up, and that was the end of that. Or so she thought. Tennent came around to stare at her...just stare. He did not do well as an adult; eventually doing time in prisons. Upon release, he began stalking Mary Lynn, trying to get back into her life.
What was most unusual was the obsession did not seems so much sexual as personal. Just as Jennifer Jason Leigh's character of Hedy wanted to be Bridget Fonda's character of Ally in the 1992 film, "Single White Female," so Tennent wished to become Mary Lynn.
All this exploded the night of November 15, 2003, when Tennent, a man in his Thirties, broke into Mary Lynn's house, raped and murdered her.
This is when the viewer learns that the person they thought watching was Mary Lynn having survived Tennent--was in fact an actress. This was a departure for the format, because Mary Lynn did not survive her ordeal. Her sister picks up the story from there.
Tennent is where he needs to be--in prison for life.
What I cannot grasp, which programs like this don't often explain is--
what was the nature of Brown's divorce. It was said his wife left him? Why? Did she sense something in her children? And why didn't Edmonds do something about Tennnet, after the swimming pool incident, which was as clear a red flag as I have ever seen??????????
Maybe it was his inability to see these things that cost him his first marriage, and a potential second. But what ever happened to the biological mother? Was there some family mental instability not known about? The story sure hinted at it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But Tennent's story is top prize this season. What he needs is a VOGUE subscription, and a sit down with ANNA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Who will be tougher than any prison warden!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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