Set in Seattle, Washington, this season follows the investigation into the murder of local teenager Rosie Larsen, with each episode covering approximately 24 hours.
Set in Seattle, Washington, the series follows the investigation into the murder of local teenager Rosie Larsen, with each episode covering approximately 24 hours.
The main character is Sarah Linden (Mireille Enos), an experienced homicide detective who is about to retire at a young age to follow her fiancé (Callum Keith Rennie) to Sonoma, California.
On her last day on the job, Linden is partnered with rookie homicide detective Stephen Holder (Joel Kinnaman), who has recently transferred from an undercover assignment in vice and narcotics.
The two are sent to investigate a possible crime scene in a local wilderness park, where a bloody woman's shirt and a credit card belonging to Stan Larsen (Brent Sexton) have been discovered.
The detectives talk to Larsen's wife Mitch (Michelle Forbes), who reveals that the family has just returned from a weekend camping trip and their seventeen-year-old daughter Rosie had not gone with them.
Eventually, a car belonging to the mayoral campaign of city councilman Darren Richmond (Billy Campbell) is pulled from a lake in the park, and Rosie is discovered dead in the trunk.
Belko Royce (Brendan Sexton III), a family friend of the Larsens, and a suspect in the case, approaches Richmond and draws a gun.
Sud describes the series as "slow-burn storytelling in a sense that every moment that we don't have to prettify or gloss over or make something necessarily easy to digest, that we're able to go to all sorts of places that are honest, and dark, and beautiful and tragic, in a way that is how a story should be told.
"[30] Entertainment Weekly's Ken Tucker gave it a B+, saying "The acting is strikingly good" and that "Some viewers may find The Killing a little too cold and deliberate, but give it time.
"[31] Alex Strachan of The Vancouver Sun says the series "is soaked in atmosphere and steeped in the stark realism of Scandinavian crime novelists Henning Mankell and Stieg Larsson" and that it "is not as much about a young girl's murder as it is a psychological study of what happens afterward, how a tight-knit community tries to recover and how a dead child's mother, father and siblings learn to deal with their pain in their own private ways.
"[32] Matt Roush of TV Guide applauded the series, calling the acting "tremendous" and that he "was instantly hooked by the moody atmosphere of this season-long murder mystery set in Seattle."
He went on to say "What really stands out for me, in this age of cookie-cutter procedurals, is how The Killing dramatizes the devastation a violent death has on a family, a community, on the people involved in the investigation.
The set includes all 13 episodes, an extended version of the season finale, two audio commentaries, a featurette called "An Autopsy of The Killing", deleted scenes and bloopers.