This might be easier for some of you than it is for me, but do you know when for certain Emmett decided to do it, before or after the match in the restaurant? Obviously that flashback of the trash compactor seems to tell you when he thought of the METHOD, but in a way, that's all it tells you. All I know is, when Emmett says that line to Tomlin about the escargot - "It's not going to hurt you, is it?" - I always like to think that that's Emmett's "last little shred" of real fondness for Tomlin, instead of an imitation of it.

I sometimes wonder if that line about the snails not hurting Dudek was maybe Clayton trying to find out if getting Dudek to pig-out on snails could have been a murder method?

I've always felt that Emmett respected and maybe even revered Tomlin since Tomlin was the greatest chess master when he played competitively. Emmett appears to have such a massive ego that when he loses the friendly match that starts in the restaurant and finishes with Tomlin outlining the last few moves plays that both players must make, he decides to kill Tomlin to avoid, what he must have assumed, what would have been a highly publicized loss to a former grand champion.

Emmett Clayton was on the brink of a breakdown from the very first few seconds of the episode with the dream sequence. The loss in the private game seemed to be the point at which he went over the edge. The irony is because the character is supposed to be loosely based on Bobby Fischer. If Fischer lost, he would want to keep playing against the opponent over and over again until he won.