Looking back on this refreshingly ambiguous season of whodunit television, I think I’ll revisit Perry’s reunion with Sister Alice quite a bit. Before he gives up on the case entirely, before he takes out the stitch he saved from baby Charlie’s eyes and blows it into the Pacific Ocean, he tells Alice about her mother’s new ministry and wonders who removed Charlie’s body.
But however much she has questioned her own gifts, Alice is still a woman of faith. What comfort has digging for proof of the truth ever given Perry, she asks? In the end, both of them, with their diametrically opposed views of how the world works, will be alone. (She’s more right than she realizes; Perry has officially called off his relationship with Lupe, though he has finally admitted that her asking price for his family farm was a fair one and given her the land.)
Which leaves Perry with one final question: “Did you really think you could bring Charlie back?”
“I did, didn’t I?” Alice replies. As far as her mother and Charlie’s mother are concerned, the answer is, for all intents and purposes, yes. It’s not true, of course. But maybe it’s right.
I reviewed the season finale of the excellent Perry Mason reboot for the New York Times.
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