Maraşlı Episode 4 Review

Warning: Spoilers ahead!

Plot Summary

We open with Mahur's rescue from Savaş after she was delivered to him by Ozan. We have yet to learn if Ozan is a danger or just a dupe. Celal shoots and wounds Savaş’ driver and their getaway car is halted. Savaş lets Mahur go but not before he tells her that she should be wary of her father and to ask him about his old partner Omer. Seems as if Savaş may not be partnering with the Turel family as much as he is out to take them down. This is an interesting development in the story.

Celal and Mahur are reunited with her family, who have managed to save themselves from the burning car. Aziz decides that they don’t need to call the police, they will clean up the mess themselves and calls the family chauffeur. Ilhan and Ozan complain and point out that they have corpses they can’t explain, meaning the henchmen that Celal has killed, but he tells them that he hasn’t killed anyone. 

Back at the house, Celal is interrogated by the family but points out that Savaş only found where he was hiding Mahur from one of them or they were followed. Outside, Celal questions the chauffeur Sadik about Ozan and asks him to write down Ozan’s contact information for him. Mahur has come to trust Celal and doesn’t allow him to be arrested after Ozan had secretly called the police. Ozan wants very clearly to get Celal out of the picture -- is this strictly romantic jealousy or are there other reasons? Mahur retires to her bedroom to research Omer and uncovers that he was smuggling drugs and was sent to prison. She gets a text from Savaş asking if she’s found anything yet? He is determined to set her on this path. By the way, where did this phone come from, didn’t Celal throw her’s out the car window when he ‘kidnapped’ her? Did Savaş give her a phone? 

The next day, Mahur goes to work with Celal and then ends up having a bit of a heart to heart. Although he’s not much in the counseling department, he tells her that all this will pass, which, while true, isn’t that helpful to her. While at the studio she gets another message from Savaş and arranges a time to meet with him but needs to get Celal out of the way in order to do so. So, she sets him up on a date with the model she’s working with that day. He says yes to the date, which was a surprise, and tells Mahur that it’s going to be at the model’s house. She very quickly tells him that he must be back to pick her up by 10 pm, displaying a bit of possessiveness over Celal. He almost smiles at this. 

During her meeting with Savaş, where he is very flirty in a creepy kind of way, he tells her that he will give her information in exchange for her recanting her testimony against him. He takes a call and she overhears him talking about a location, she threatens him and tells him she won’t testify but before he can tell her anything. Celal shows up and takes her out of the restaurant. Mahur admits to him that she is scared and can’t imagine what she did to want someone in her own family to want to kill her. He takes her back to the studio, they have coffee and talk and she thinks it might be better if she had died that first day when they met, then she wouldn’t have to live through what she is living through right now. He’s not great at reassurance, only says that it will pass, but she tells him she’s glad he’s around. In the morning they watch a video of her mother where it seems like Omer has given her mother a present that she passed on to her telling her that it means a lot to her. Celal questions whether her mother might have had a relationship with Omer.

The Turel company is in huge financial difficulty and Ilhan has asked Ozan to do whatever it takes to get them out of it, at the end we see him make a deal with Savaş as Celal looks on. Celal confronts Ozan and together in the car they are in an accident of Ozan doing. 

Episode Analysis

A rather slower episode this week with a focus on the deeper conspiracy and the burgeoning relationship between Celal and Mahur. 

The Conspiracy

Seemingly Savaş is no longer trying to kill Mahur as he seems to think he can get her to drop her charges by feeding her information. It’s unclear if it’s information that he already has and wants to tease her with, or if he only has his suspicions and wants to know what she can find out. He appears now to have taken an interest in her, and therefore she may not be in mortal danger from him, at least at the moment. 

There is also a shift in the audience's perception of what Savaş’ relationship with the Turel family is. It might be that he’s not working with them but working to take them down. Towards the end of the episode, Celal observes Ozan making a deal with him – is this an ongoing relationship? Is Ozan the family member that is in on the conspiracy or is this something new that Savaş has cooked up because he knows the family company is in peril? There is obviously a big plot going on. What was the command base that Savaş visited all about? He isn’t the top of the chain of command so who does he work for and what is the bigger picture?

What happened all those years ago with Omer and Aziz, did he kill him? Was it jealousy or was there something shady going on in the business? Omer went to prison but maybe Aziz was guilty as well. Are we to believe that maybe one of the Turel siblings is actually Omer’s child? Necati would make the most sense given how Aziz didn’t try and help him get out of the burning car. 

The Players

Who is Celal really? The man who watches his house calls him ‘Commander’, so is he police or armed forces? How much of his story is true and how much is his cover? Who are the Grey Room people and why did they show him a video of the shooting of his daughter? It seems as if they are practicing his undercover story so he can play it, but are they also testing him with the trauma of the shooting? Burak Deniz is giving outstanding performances as Celal, playing him as a solid old-fashioned man only out to do what’s right. Underneath is a tormented father desperate to find the people who hurt his daughter. Has he had to make a deal with some shady organization in order to be a part of the investigation into the shooting and its intended target the prosecutor?

He is Mahur’s bodyguard but is coming to care for her, this given what the Grey Room people said to him last episode, is not part of the plan. Was Mahur who he was supposed to make contact with? Celal obviously suspects everyone and is collecting handwriting samples from the staff and putting them into a book, to compare to what? 

Mahur seems to be exactly as presented and doesn’t have any connections to the past mysteries or current secrets. Was she just in the wrong place at the wrong time? She is already fragile from the death of her mother, how much more is she going to find out about her family and the past? She’s reckless to the point of endangering herself and doesn’t seem to have any problems with confronting people. This is good for driving the story but might get her in real trouble soon. She has come to trust Celal although he annoys her with his heavy-handedness. He still calls her Bayan (lady) even though he knows it drives her crazy. She seems a bit jealous of him when, after she sets him up on the date with the model, he tells her that they are going to her place, she demands that he come right back to the studio afterward. Will this turn into any sort of really romance and how much is he lying to her?

Aziz, Ilhan and Ozan all have the motive to have done shady things, both in the past and in the present. Is there one story to be told here or multiple overlapping stories? Was it just business that Ozan is worried about, could there be something else at play given that he causes a car accident? Is he just trying to get rid of Celal or is he trying to kill himself?

Firuzan and Dilşad don’t seem to have anything to do with what’s going on however Dilşad keeps making secretive phone calls and Firuzan seems to constantly be hovering around trying to listen in on conversations. 

For this week Necati is off the suspicious list, but that can change at any moment.

Cinematography, Music and Literature

Once again Maraşlı has outstanding visuals and there were a few shots that were as beautiful as a painting. The cinematographer for this show has an incredible eye to frame shots and create atmosphere using the sky and the city as backdrops to the drama contained in the story. Also, the use of 'traditional' turkish music is in keeping with the Maraşlı character and him making her stay in the car until that one song had ended was really endearing. 

The book that Necati gave to the maid was Anna Karenina, the story of an extramarital affair, foreshadowing for the story of his mother?

Theory

From his training and preparation, Celal was obviously meant to go undercover somehow. Could it have been Necati who he was supposed to get close to? Celal opened a used bookstore of all things and we have seen that Necati is a great collector of books - Was Necati supposed to be Celal’s 'in' into the Turel family? Remember the early morning phone calls that were asking Celal if he was interested in a bank loan, they were from the Grey Room people, and once he decided to be Mahur’s bodyguard he said yes to the loan and the calls stopped. Was it Necati who was supposed to come to the bookshop? Celal would befriend him and that would be the connection, but instead, Necati mentioned to Mahur about the shop and she ended up in there and Celal saving her was actually a coincidence. If we think back the ‘bank’ phone calls continued until he said yes to being her bodyguard, hence having her be his 'in' with her family. 

The poem that Mahur's mother read:

 O Mahur Beste - Attila Ilhan.