Villainess Review: Bobbie Burton (Diagnosis Murder)

I absolutely love Diagnosis Murder; the show is filled with amazing villainesses, some of whom I've already written about. In past years, reruns of the show aired on PAX-TV, but currently, Hallmark Movies & Mysteries has the reruns, as well as their streaming site, Hallmark+. I have a theory as to why the latter acquired the episodes: Dick Van Dyke. He's six months away from turning 100.

As I stated, Diagnosis Murder's villainesses are very delicious, and among that collection is one who appears in the episode "Reunion With Murder." The episode opens with various women receiving what seems like an invitation to something. Wealthy Heather Winslow is shown receiving it, and then placing it in the fireplace. Susan Levin, a budding politician received one as well, and she was concerned. The same concern was on talk show host Bobbie Burton when she received the invitation. One more woman received the envelope: Amanda Bentley, who revealed that the invitation was from someone she had known: Nancy Barlow.

Amanda confided in Mark Sloan that she, Heather, Susan, and Bobbie were all involved in a cruel prank against Nancy, which cost Nancy her scholarship. Amanda's remorse was heavy, and it remained heavy as she actually went to meet with Nancy, and before I continue, I have to talk about the cast in the episode. It was a who's who guest cast in this. Heather Winslow was played by Roma Downey, who was months away from beginning her long role in another CBS series, Touched by an Angel. Susan Levin was played by Jessica Tuck, who has done quite a lot of TV, usually as villainesses.

As for Nancy Barlow, she was played by Kathryn Layng, who was a year removed from her four year-run on Doogie Howser, M.D. as nurse Curly Spaulding, and regarding Nancy, she gave a chilly reception to Amanda, as she still had memories of that prank. She adds that while she hated the other girls, she was disappointed in Amanda, as she thought Amanda was different from the others. Nancy revealed the reason for her "meeting": she's writing a tell-all book exposing everything about her former classmates, including (but definitely not limited to) the prank. Amanda's pleas for Nancy to not go through with publishing her book, but her pleas were met by vengeful determination and a slap.

However, Nancy returns to her apartment to see it's been ransacked. She calls Amanda, who allows Nancy to stay at her place. Nancy thinks she has sanctuary, but that's short-lived, as a mysterious cloaked figure with a heart as black as the apparel they're wearing sneaks in, takes out a knife, and plunges it right in Nancy's back. It's followed by a frantic search, escape, and Amanda returning home to find Nancy's body.

Amanda is suspected, but Mark looks for other avenues, in the form of the other college girls. His meeting with Susan only reveals that she lied her way to Harvard, but his meeting with Bobbie is quite fruitful. Bobbie reveals that she and her college professor, Edwards, were seeing each other, but Edwards jumped to his death after Bobbie ended it. As the killer makes an attempt to go after Amanda and search her place, Mark talks to Heather, who is revealed to have a secret daughter. Later on, Amanda's dog is lured out of the house by the culprit, and that leads to chaos, and backup being called, only to find Amanda's dog returned to her.

All the while, the cloaked killer breaks their way into the house, but Mark's right behind to turn on the lights and reveal all:

And there she is, folks: none other than Bobbie Burton. As Mark holds up what Bobbie was searching for, the disk containing the manuscript for Nancy's book, he mentions Bobbie's relationship with Edwards. They did have an affair, that part was true. What wasn't true was who ended it. Bobbie didn't end it, Edwards did, because he found another student: Nancy. Bobbie attempted to deny that Edwards would even look at Nancy, but Mark stated that it was true; they were a thing. There was something else Bobbie lied about: Edwards' death. Turns out, Bobbie was at the rooftop claiming to be suicidal, Edwards appeared, and he ended up shoved to his death by a very vengeful Bobbie.

Nancy's book would reveal all of that (among other things), so Bobbie killed Nancy and made several attempts to search for that manuscript so she could destroy it. After being told that the disk was the only copy in existence, Bobbie took out a gun and ordered Mark to give it to her, only for Steve Sloan to arrive and arrest Bobbie.

"Reunion With Murder" was the 12th episode of Diagnosis Murder's first season, and aired on CBS on February 4, 1994. Among the aforementioned guest cast included Corinne Bohrer as the evil Bobbie Burton, and I remember first seeing this episode a long time ago and actually not being surprised that Bobbie was the villainess. As the saying goes, "It's always the quiet ones." As revealed in that climax, Bobbie was quite deranged. She committed a decades-old murder out of scorn, and then killed again not only out of desperation to keep her evil secret hidden, but also out of revenge. Professor Edwards dumped her for Nancy, and Bobbie had carried decades of anger over what had occurred. Bobbie was introduced as being more subdued in comparison to the other girls, but it was clear that she was unhinged, bloodthirsty, and flat out insane.

Corinne Bohrer played the hell out of this, especially in that reveal. Even when she's revealed as the villainess, we see an eerie calmness from Bobbie that tells us that she's deeply psychotic, and it was amazing to see Bohrer play that part of Bobbie's personality. This isn't the first time Corinne Bohrer's done the villainess thing. She had a memorable appearance in the original The Flash series as villainess Zoey Clark (aka "Prank"), and she actually reprised the role 28 years later on the Arrowverse's version of the show. Bohrer also appeared in three episodes of Murder, She Wrote (playing a villainess in her first appearance), and also appeared in episodes of Party of Five, Criminal Minds, and Grey's Anatomy.

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Check out Bobbie Burton's profile on Villainous Beauties Wiki!