Why Does ‘The Jinx Part 2’ Exist at All?

Alan Sepinwall
·8 min read
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Robert Durst, in a scene from 'The Jinx: Part 2' - Credit: Max
Robert Durst, in a scene from 'The Jinx: Part 2' - Credit: Max

The first episode of The Jinx Part Two is titled “Why Are You Still Here?” Like every installment of the true crime docuseries, it’s a quote from the episode itself; in this case, it’s prosecutor John Lewin asking accused murderer Robert Durst why he hadn’t already fled the country by the time the FBI caught and arrested him for the murder of his friend Susan Berman.

But the line unfortunately applies to The Jinx itself. In 2015, it was an absolute sensation, thanks to an improbable coup: Director Andrew Jarecki somehow convinced Durst to be interviewed, repeatedly, and to discuss the circumstances surrounding the three different murders he was accused of committing over the years. At first, the HBO series was fascinating simply because of the shock of Durst agreeing to do this, and because Durst himself was so compellingly weird.

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And then came the ending, where The Jinx vaulted itself to the very top of the investigative documentary genre. Jarecki and the other filmmakers discovered a damning piece of evidence: an envelope with identical handwriting to one sent anonymously to police years earlier to inform them of Berman’s murder. It was a note that only the killer could have written. Jarecki confronted Durst about the matching envelopes. Durst dodged Jarecki’s questions as best he could, then excused himself to go to the bathroom. Not realizing that his microphone was still active, and that his words were being recorded — a mistake he’d already made once before — he began having a conversation with himself, starting with the explosive comment, “There it is. You’re caught.” After beating himself up for various decisions (most memorably that he kept burping on camera), he seemed to answer every question that The Jinx and everyone involved in these cases had, by saying, “What the hell did I do? Killed them all, of course.”

It was a jaw-dropping conclusion — a figurative mic drop involving a man who forgot to literally drop his own mic — especially since that finale aired the day after Durst was arrested.

It’s been nearly a decade since that first season ended. In its aftermath, Durst was tried and convicted for Berman’s murder, and sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. Before he could be charged and tried for the disappearance, and the presumed murder of his first wife, Kathleen McCormack, he died of a heart attack. Durst had already been a figure of infamy prior to The Jinx — the subject of multiple SNL sketches, several thinly-veiled Law & Order episodes, and even a lightly fictionalized film, All Good Things, that Jarecki directed and The Jinx collaborator Marc Smerling co-wrote. But the show had elevated him into Public Enemy Number One. These later events played out under a much larger spotlight than any of the previous investigations.

The Jinx Part Two has several obstacles in its path to begin with. Many of its viewers go into the new season knowing far more about the case than they did the first time, making it more difficult for any details to seem revelatory. More importantly, Durst is not a willing participant in these episodes, having finally recognized what a terrible mistake he made talking to Jarecki the first time.

So when John Lewin asks Durst why he’s still here, he could just as easily be turning the question of Jarecki and company. Critics were given the first four episodes (out of six) to review. While they’re not without interesting moments and characters, they struggle on the whole to justify their existence as anything but a reminder of a show that people really loved a long time ago.

At times, in fact, Part Two has the uncomfortable feeling of a victory lap. The Jinx itself is a huge part of the story now. In the premiere, for instance, we see security footage of a woman pointing the fugitive Durst out to FBI agents, and we learn that she recognized him because she watched the show. Lewin asks Durst why he spoke with Jarecki at all; Durst admits to wondering that himself, and later claims, “I was on meth the whole time.” The first episode climaxes with many of the original season’s central figures — loved ones of Durst’s victims, as well as investigators and prosecutors like Jeanine Piro — gathered together to watch the Season One finale for the first time. When Durst says, “Killed them all, of course,” there are, as you might expect, gasps, tears of relief, and then arguments over whether this could be considered a confession that would be admissible in court.

While it’s powerful to see these responses, there’s also a sense of The Jinx becoming far too much about itself. We see news coverage of the first season, and clips of comedians riffing on the show (John Mulaney admits he still like Durst somehow). In court, Durst’s lawyers accuse the series as being just as scripted as All Good Things. It may as well be a YouTube video at some points: “Jeanine Piro REACTS to crazy Bob Durst confession! Don’t forget to smash that like button!”

All of this might be okay if Part Two was willing to grapple with, or even acknowledge, many of the controversies that sprung up in the aftermath of the first season. There were many questions about the timeline of exactly when the filmmakers gave evidence to the police, and the ethically messy notions that they either withheld it at first to benefit the show, or to help the investigation. Later court proceedings even showed that the final lines of the season were edited out of order: Durst said, “Killed them all, of course,” and only asked, “What the hell did I do?” afterwards. The show made it seem like he was asking and answering a damning question, where in the actual context, “Killed them all” could be, like a lot of the monologue, Durst imagining how people would think of him after seeing this latest interview.

That’s material that would explain why this case is worth revisiting by this particular team. But Jarecki avoided answering most of those questions back in 2015 — he canceled multiple interviews that had been scheduled for the morning after the finale aired — and doesn’t acknowledge them at all here. The Jinx is in full self-congratulatory mode.

Mostly, though, there is the drastic shift in Durst’s role within the documentary. We still see and hear him frequently, thanks to footage of him being interrogated, as well as audio (sometimes with surveillance video, sometimes with a actor filmed in shadow with his back to the camera) of him receiving jailhouse visits from his inner circle, or speaking to them on the phone. But these appearances don’t have nearly the same impact. He goes from a vivid figure at the center of the frame to a grainy, frequently tiny man lurking around the edge of most images. And while Lewin marvels that Durst has still not learned to shut his mouth when it’s in his best interest to do so, a good chunk of Durst’s appearances have him discussing everything but the case. These digressions can be amusing, like a friend walking Durst through that night’s TV listings, but often they seem like the filmmakers just tried to include whatever audio and video they had access to, regardless of how germane it was to the story.

Some of the new material has value, particularly middle chapters that focus on Durst’s remaining friends, and how and why these people refuse to cut him off despite the mounting evidence of his guilt. A few remain in willful denial that their longtime friend could have done these monstrous things, while others are clearly operating from a mercenary point of view — hoping, as Lewin puts it, that staying loyal to a man with so much money means that some of his money will eventually come their way. And several of the new characters are entertaining, particularly a pair of sibling interns for the prosecution who are endlessly delighted by almost everything that happens during the trial.

But without Durst as an interview subject, without any response to the many questions people had about the first season, and without major new revelations, there’s just not enough there for Part Two to remotely approach the power and sheer watchability of the first season. Perhaps Jarecki has some shocking moments coming in the episodes he didn’t give critics in advance, just as he withheld the Season One finale from reviewers. But it’s hard to imagine anything coming anywhere near the level of Durst’s hot mic error, especially after the trial played out so publicly.

Why is The Jinx still here? Because people remain endlessly fascinated by real-life murder cases, and because the first season made as big a splash as any of these documentaries ever has. In a world where that first season didn’t exist — but law-enforcement on its own found enough new evidence to finally bring Durst to trial — these episodes might offer an interesting, if inessential, account of the concluding investigation and trial. But the first season set the bar impossibly high for the second, and the new season can’t come close to clearing it.

The Jinx Part 2 debuts April 21 on HBO and Max, with additional episodes releasing weekly. I’ve seen the first four episodes.

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