Review: Who Killed Biggie and Tupac? ‘Unsolved’ Might Know

Some myths are too powerful — too necessary — to ever be fully undone, no matter the facts gathered to address them.

Such is the case with the still officially unsolved deaths of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G., Tupac and Biggie, gunned down six months apart two decades ago, a cruel extermination of hip-hop’s elite.

They became martyrs, and also — as the years passed and their killers were never brought to justice — symbols of a kind of institutional neglect, failed originally by the genre they loved and, in death, by police.

So the most conspicuous aspect of “Unsolved: The Murders of Tupac and the Notorious B.I.G.,” a lightly fictionalized 10-part limited series on USA that has its premiere Tuesday, is its certainty. Here is a show that offers answers, a ticktock of the various investigations into the killings that have resulted in no arrests but not, if “Unsolved” is to be believed, in no answers.

The series is inspired by “Murder Rap: The Untold Story of the Biggie Smalls & Tupac Shakur Murder Investigations,” a book by Greg Kading, who led a task force investigating the shootings in the late 2000s. (There is an accompanying documentary as well.) In that book, Kading lays out his theories about who pulled the triggers, and why.

Yet somehow, seeing those theories brought to dramatized life — seven episodes were provided for review — gives them more power.

“Unsolved” is equal parts appealingly pulpy and workmanlike, sometimes paced like a procedural and sometimes like a prestige drama. It weaves together three storylines — the friendship between Tupac (Marcc Rose) and Biggie (Wavyy Jonez), which soured and ultimately collapsed; the original LAPD investigation into Biggie’s murder, steered maniacally by detective Russell Poole (Jimmi Simpson); and the task force convened a decade after the killings, helmed by Kading (Josh Duhamel).

The love story here isn’t between Biggie and Tupac, though ample screentime is given over to their early friendship. It’s between the two detectives who never meet: Poole and Kading, who both begin to unravel in the face of a complex investigation, institutional pressure and family problems.

In this telling, Poole is the true detective, wholly and distractingly absorbed by the case. Simpson plays him as an impatient savant, forever sternly exhaling and chafing against his superiors. (It should be noted, though, that in the “Murder Rap” documentary, Kading makes short work of Poole’s theories about the murders.) By contrast, Duhamel’s Kading is blank. Better is his extended team, which includes Daryn Dupree (a grounded Bokeem Woodbine) and Lee Tucker (Wendell Pierce, testy as ever).

Jonez captures the gentle grandeur of Biggie (born Christopher Wallace), and Rose has Tupac’s familiar seductive glint in his eye. But this show about murdered rappers is really a cop show. What’s more, “Unsolved” did not secure licensing rights for either rapper’s music — though some lyrics are sprinkled into conversation — making them feel even more distant as subjects.

In capturing the two investigations, though, “Unsolved” is effective in an unglamorous, no-frills way. And yet, as the episodes toggle between the ostentation of the hip-hop world and the grayness of police headquarters, it’s hard to overlook that a story of this historical significance is rendered in such proletarian fashion.

Add to that the fact that Kading’s book and documentary were self-released, and that “Unsolved” isn’t on a vanity platform like HBO or Netflix, or delivered with the luxe production values of the “American Crime Story” series, but rather on USA, a basic cable staple.

You would think that a show that advertises a convincing theory about these killings would be lavished with funding, be loudly publicized not just as art, but also as news. But instead, “Unsolved” remains in the shadows. Myth has a way of enduring.

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Additional Information:

‘Unsolved: The Murders of Tupac and the Notorious B.I.G.’

Tuesday on USA