Episode 2: What's in a Motive?

The components I found most compelling in this episode were the interrelationships in Adnaan’s life.  I found it very interesting how Koenig broke down the relationships between Adnaan’s religion, his parents, and his girlfriends.  Each of these elements individually played a large role in Adnaan’s life but it was the clashing of two or more that led to speculation and suspicion about Adnaan’s possible motives for committing murder.  I also think it’s interesting that the prosecution’s case for what would drive Adnaan to murder was not based on his actions, but on those of his parents.  The prosecution stated that the Homecoming episode where his parents confronted him at and took him home from the dance led to the break-up that led to Adnaan’s feelings of rage.  It seems, in fact, like most of the motives don’t rely on the actions of Adnaan himself at all, but those of the people he surrounded himself with.  Adnaan’s parents disproved of his relationship with Hae, and promoted a strict faith that did not allow him to get involved with girlfriends and yet Adnaan was the one painted with the strict ideology and possessing the conflict between Hae and his religion, when this was never indicated by his own actions.  It seems almost like Adnaan was judged based on the people around him and their actions. 

            I also thought it was interesting how the prosecution stated that when Adnaan was allegedly killing Hae, he saw his parents and his religion and all the reasons they couldn’t be together.  This seems to me like a strange approach.  In the snippet they played of the prosecution saying this, they didn’t say he was killing Hae because she kept them from being together, but that his parents did.  I have to wonder after listening to the rest of this episode where Koenig could not find evidence of Adnaan being angry or enraged by the break-up if this was strategic, a way to explain away the lack of rage that Adnaan seemed to have toward Hae.