From Upshott With Love
Episode 2 of Slow Horses Season 2 starts with Jackson Lamb arriving to see Nikolai but his façade about working on behalf of Demetrio is shattered completely when Nikolai points out that he made the guy up. “What do you want Jackson Lamb?” He eventually says. Now, Nikolai was actually a traitor to his country, and Jackson’s name is well known among these exiles. Nikolai apparently heard about the cicadas from the man himself, Popov. The conversation he heard was between two men, discussing funding for the cicadas and with instructions to try and keep them in the field from the man himself, Popov. So who was this man speaking? According to Nikolai, his name was Andrei Chernitsky. He looked like a killer – a big, bald bull. Could it be the same man? At Slough House, River heads to the Cotswold and speaks to Shirley and Roddy, who don’t really have much in the way of intel. They’ve told him everything he needs to know, but as fate would have it the taxi firm worker actually remembers the man. He was the last fare of the night and he asked to be taken right back to Oxford Parkway. When River dives a bit deeper and speaks to Kenny, the driver, it turns out he asked for a new destination when he got inside. An airfield, as it turns out, but also with instructions to throw guys off the scent. It would appear that whoever this man is, he flew out on a plane across to Estonia, at least according to Ho’s work tracing the number. Meanwhile, Louisa and Min work their security detail, trying to make sure everything is completely tight. Louisa takes charge of the meeting, but there’s something fishy with the Russian security guards, so Min decides to follow them on his pushbike. He’s not exactly subtle though, but he notices them stop by an Import/Export area before losing them completely, a whole bunch of taxis on the road. Louisa checks out this Nevsky fellow while Min is off on the run, and soon learns that he’s super paranoid. Jackson meets with Diana and feeds back what they’ve found out so far, with cicadas and Dickie potentially killed. He also brings up the fact Webb is poaching his agents, but when Diana speaks to Webb, he points out this meeting it seems to smooth things out. When River eventually makes it back to see Jackson, the former points out everything he’s learned…but Jackson Lamb is, inevitably, already one step ahead. He has a glossy dossier all ready to go with a new alias, IDs and the works. River is tasked with heading back to Upshott and finding out more about these cicadas He even has a shiny new ID too. Meanwhile, Min flies way too close to the sun, and upon following a suspicious bald man, ends up with a gun to the back of his neck. Just before he pulls the trigger, we cut to black.
The Episode Review
Oh dear, Min is in deep trouble! I’d imagine there will be a last second save to prevent Min meeting a messy end, potentially from Louisa sweeping in, but we’ll have to wait and see. The banter between Jackson Lamb and River Cartwright is partly what makes this show so endearing and seeing the former smugly one step ahead of River, who’s just starting to get the hang of how to do this investigative malarkey the Slough House way, is a great inclusion. It would appear that these cicadas are actually real and if that’s the case, it could well be that Popov is too. So far so good, Slow Horses season 2 is just as endearing as the first. Roll on next week’s episode!
