'The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story' - Review: "The Run of His Life" (Spoilers)

And run he did! My thoughts and recap on this week's American Crime Story after the jump.




We got down to business this week. While this episode put a halt to the more nuanced character observations from the pilot episode, it made up for that with the sheer intensity and absurdity of essentially an hour long chase scene. Even with all the moving pieces and the reactions of everyone around it, there were still some amazing dramatic moments involving O.J. and that gun. We all know that he did not actually kill himself, but this episode almost gave me second thoughts about that in the heat of the moment. Cuba Gooding Jr. gave a powerful performance as a man who may be guilty or may be innocent, but is completely desperate. His pleas to talk to his mother were heartbreaking, even if they did come from the mouth of a criminal (allegedly). The filmmakers are making O.J. a surprisingly sympathetic character. Either that or they are setting him up to be quite the cowardly pathetic one. We will find out soon.

The rest of our supporting cast sort of took a backseat to the shenanigans put up onscreen. They acted as our representation of how everyone reacted at the time. There was never anything like this before when these events actually took place. This event gave birth to the sort of "breaking news" thrills that modern society is obsessed with now. The scene where the championship NBA game was interrupted just to show O.J. in his white Bronco speeding down the highway was truly representative of what the public masses were like. It was fascinating to see in the show and was represented well.

Sarah Paulson is still great so far, but I am hoping that we see some more shades to her by the end of this season. She is fully in feisty justice mode at the moment and has not moved from that since the first episode. Showing some more layers this week though was David Schwimmer as Robert Kardashian. The couple of scenes with him crying on the phone with O.J. were genuinely affecting. It will be interesting to see Kardashian after it calms down a bit and he is forced to truly realize what his best friend could have done. Will his allegiances stay true to O.J. by the end of this? We will find out. Also, how funny was it to see all of the Kardashian sisters watching TV together not caring about the drama involving their family friend but jumping down in joy when they saw their worry stricken father onscreen? If there was a representation of how the Kardashian girls' lives are like, this was it.

There was not a lot of depth to this episode since it was all action and high intensity. There was not a slow moment here to ponder anything. I am sure we will get that time later so I was not concerned at all. This was a fast paced and riveting hour. There have been no missteps with this show yet and I cannot wait to see more.

Grade: A-.