Well that was intense.
We’ve almost reached the end of Apple TV’s Slow Horses Season 4 and that’s making me a bit sad. These six-episode seasons are over so fast! When a show is this good, I can’t help but wish it would go on a little longer.
Spoilers for the current season through Episode 5 follow.
We’re not quite at the end yet, however, and so far this has been my favorite season of Slow Horses since the first. Gary Oldman’s iconic Jackson Lamb remains the most delightful character on TV, and I think I’ve realized a bit more about him this season, especially as we learn more about his former boss, David Cartwright (Jonathan Pryce), who’s made some dodgy deals with very bad people in the past.
Unraveling that past is difficult thanks to Cartwright’s rapidly dilapidating mental state. He’s easily confused. The past and the present blend together as his dementia quickly takes hold. Lamb has no love for the old man, but in this latest episode—as he cruelly makes Cartwright believe that he killed his grandson, River (Jack Lowden)—you can see his scorn for the old man thaw a little.
It turns out, Cartwright may have killed his grandson. It just wasn’t River. More on that one a bit.
The plot so far has focused on a handful of crucial questions. Who is behind the Westacres bombing? Who are these mysterious killers in France and are they connected in some way? Why did they come to kill Cartwright so soon after the attack? Who was River lookalike in the bathroom and why did he look so much like him? Now, at last, we have some answers.
Hugo Weaving’s villain, Frank Harkness (no relation to Agatha) is ex-CIA. His diabolical plan, which he put into motion decades ago, was to impregnate various women, banish them from his French manor, and then raise his sons on his own to be killers—brainwashed from birth, loyal to the death. He raised three sons (that we know of) in this manner. One of them, it turns out, was David Cartwright’s daughter’s. This would explain the resemblance. Cartwright traded guns and money with Harkness decades earlier in order to get his daughter back to England, though she didn’t want to return. Harkness is a masterful manipulator.
The pieces keep falling together. After the bombing, Harkness needed to kill off anyone who could tie him (and his dangerous client) to the attack. Cartwright and Bad Bob Chapman were both “in the know” and had to be removed. Only, things went badly for the killers and River was quickly on the scent, faking his own death and hiding his grandfather with Standish (Saskia Reeves).
In this latest episode, River is in the custody of the Dogs, with their new chief Emma Flyte (Ruth Bradley) finally getting a win. River pleads with her to help save his grandfather’s life, and she finally relents, sending a picture of Harkness and his sons to MI5—to both the analyst, Giti, who’s been digging into the mystery of their identities, and to the new First Desk, Claude Whelan (James Callis). This small act puts an end to Whelan and Taverner’s (Kristin Scott Thomas) attempts to cover the whole thing up—a sneaky move to hide MI5’s culpability.
Which brings me back to my earlier discussion: This episode helped me form a deeper understanding of Jackson Lamb and what drives his character. Lamb is, by all appearances, a terrible spy who’s pretty much let it all go. He drinks. He farts. He hurls abuse at everyone. Between the cigarettes, the booze and the junk food, it’s almost a miracle that he hasn’t snuffed it yet. As far as anyone can tell, Lamb doesn’t care about anything or anyone. Even River calls him a terrible boss. It’s all a front, of course, though one he clearly enjoys. Lamb is playing a part, disguising his true cunning under a veneer of filth.
But it’s not just cunning that’s hiding beneath that whiskey-stained exterior. Lamb, you see, is fundamentally an honest man. This is at the heart of everything he does and, I suspect, everything he did that got him here in the first place. He knows that the powers that be at the Park and in the government will do whatever they can to cover things up, that they have no interest in the truth. This is why he’s at Slough House. Not because he’s a degenerate or bad at his job, but because he wouldn’t play ball. Luckily for him—and his team—he’s also brilliant, always one step ahead of everyone else, quick on his feet and willing to improvise. And despite all his barbs and mockery, he’s fiercely loyal to his team.
This is one reason he’s so thrown by David Cartwright’s confession. Far from being some dastardly act of espionage and double-dealing, Cartwright made his fateful choice out of love.
But even love has consequences. Harkness tricks Molly—the surly records room MI5 lady—and takes her hostage in her home, using threats to force her to help him access MI5 databases and track the location of the Dogs. He’s following River’s progress to the Park, and sends his last remaining son to intercept them.
We’ll refer to this killer as The Terminator from here on out, because Marcus (Kadiff Kirwan) is right: He’s basically a T-800, very nearly unkillable. Harkness tells Molly “Thank you Molly, but you’ve outlived your usefulness” and we—and she—think she’s done for, but just when we think he’s going to pull the trigger, as the poor woman braces herself for the end, the door slams and Harkness is gone. His last word before departing: “I need to send a message.” On the desk, Molly finds a handful of envelopes, each with a name on them. This was not the message we were expecting. What game is Harkness playing at? What message is he sending?
The final scene of the episode is one of its finest and one of the show’s most intense action sequences so far. The Terminator drives a dump truck at full speed into a car just in front of the one Flyte and River are in, blocking their path. They try to turn the car around but find themselves blocked by traffic. River is cuffed to the car and there’s no time to uncuff him before the killer is stalking toward them. He opens fire killing both agents as Flyte scrambles first to shut the door and then to fire back. She puts up a good fight but The Terminator knocks her unconscious and turns to River, who has been doing his level best to help with one hand cuffed to the car. The killer turns his gun on River and then—much to our hero’s surprise—shoots the chain instead.
He grabs River, pulls him from the car and turns his gun on him, walking him steadily, with an icy calm, through the line of cars and their terrified drivers, before hijacking one and throwing River in the trunk. As the credits roll, we hear River’s laboured breathing. It’s an ominous ending to one of the show’s very best episodes. A week is a long time to wait after a cliffhanger like this one.
I have one other very big question: Is Frank Harkness River Cartwright’s father? If his mother was pregnant when she was taken back to London, this would explain a lot of things. Why she abandoned her son. Why David raised him. Why we’ve never heard about his dad at all. And why the man in the bathroom looked so much like him—more than just a half-brother, but a full brother.
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