On an apparently uneventful night in the Cold Case division, a man known only as John Doe (Željko Ivanek) walks in and confesses to a murder committed in 1980.
Directed by Nicole Kassell
Written by Veena Sud
Tropes:
- Buried Alive: John did this to Steve in the past and it killed him. His second victim survives.
- Extremely Short Time Span: The whole thing takes place in one night - even the flashbacks take place in one night in 1980.
- Evil Cripple: Although John isn't visibly disabled, he has MS and it's stated to be affecting his mobility.
- Five Stages of Grief: John discusses the stages when questioned about his crimes.
- High-School Dance: There are flashbacks to Steve’s prom night in 1980.
- Mistaken for Pedophile: John's apparent penchant for teenage boys results in this—in one flashback, Steve assumes this is the reason he's been kidnapped and practically offers himself to him in exchange for his life. It turns out that this is the age John was when he was diagnosed with MS and he thus resents how much these young men have to live for when he doesn't.
- Sinister Suffocation: Played With; the murderer's MO is to bury adolescents alive. He claims he doesn't want to cause pain, and that the idea is to give them a prolonged death to see them go through the stages of grief for their own life and to eventually accept death as inevitable.
- Terminally-Ill Criminal: After learning that he had MS, John buried a teenage boy alive so he could see what it felt like to watch someone else die. He does the same thing again, twenty years later, after finding out that his MS has progressed.
- Visible Victimology: John is mistaken for being a predator due to kidnapping and apparently murdering two teenage boys of the same age. It's actually revealed that the victims aren't chosen for sexual reasons, but to represent himself.
