![]() She is clearly attracted to Ken and that clouds her judgement. But writer Steven Bochco does a clever thing here by writing Lily as such a lonely widow, running a store in a remote location. These kinds of characters never live very long, and I would be tempted to say it’s bad writing because it’s such an obviously stupid thing to do. ![]() Lily La Sanka makes a decision that’s never going to be a wise one: to blackmail a murderer. The icing on the cake is the list of names of known criminals planted in Jim’s desk, and Ken’s story that Jim was researching true crimes and has ruffled some feathers. ![]() Fake a break in at the office, take Jim to Ken’s cabin, get him to phone home and say he’s still at the office, instead of admitting he’s stood up his wife, and bang. Wisely, each partner has insured the other. So it’s time to collect on his insurance money. Not only does his income stream come to an end (and as Columbo notices, he likes spending money), but it’s going to get noticed that only one member of the writing partnership continues writing after the split. Jim has decided to go it alone, and that presents a problem for Ken. The real writer of the “Mrs Melville” books, Jim Ferris, has finally had enough of that arrangement, and that brings us to… His writing partner does all that, and instead he deals with the business and publicity side of things. A real-life crime devised by a crime writer should be a challenge for Columbo, but this one’s a walk in the park compared to most, and that’s because Ken hasn’t got involved in the writing of his books for years. There’s always something that gives away the murderer, and in the case of not-writer Ken Franklin there are several somethings. He is writing a mystery story, and he’s clearly reached the point where the detective has caught the murderer: In lieu of any opening music, we being this episode of Columbo with the rhythmic sound of a man typing on a typewriter.
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