Slow Horses Season 6 Episode 2 Recap: “Daddy Issues”

If River Cartwright thought burying his grandfather might bring some closure, in Slow Horses Season 6 Episode 2 “Daddy Issues” quickly disabuses him of that notion. Frank Harkness (Hugo Weaving) is back, former Slow Horses are turning up dead, and someone appears to have acquired a shopping list of people connected to Slough House.

And River’s father may be working his way through it.

Frank Harkness Makes a Delivery

The episode opens with Frank visiting former MI5 employee Andrew Nesmith, who stole a file for him and now wants compensation after losing his job. Bad idea. When Nesmith threatens to expose whoever commissioned the theft, Frank strangles him with a wire. But there’s a complication: Nesmith’s young son, Reece, is hiding under a table and witnesses the murder before escaping.

Frank sees him go. That loose end will become very important.

Lamb Has Five Questions. Sort Of.

Back at Slough House, River wants to track Frank immediately. Lamb is less impressed by River’s sudden paternal enthusiasm. With former Slow Horses Struan Loy and Kay White now both dead, Lamb lays out what he calls the “5 Fs”: “Who the fuck, what the fuck, where the fuck and why the fuck.”

J.K. Coe points out that’s only four. “Fuck off. Now that’s five.” Never challenge Jackson Lamb’s arithmetic. Lamb sends Coe and Shirley Dander to investigate Kay White while River and Roddy Ho track Frank’s rental car. Roddy, meanwhile, is busy drinking raw eggs and monitoring Bitcoin because apparently being an MI5 agent isn’t enough when you can also cosplay as Rocky and Warren Buffett.

Diana Taverner Gets Blackmailed Into Television

Diana Taverner (Kristin Scott Thomas) meets disgraced former politician Peter Judd (Samuel West), who introduces her to media mogul Damien Cantor (Harry Lloyd). There’s a catch: Cantor supplied the money Judd previously gave Diana, giving him leverage over the head of MI5. All he wants in return is a television interview. Diana does not do media.

Until, suddenly, Diana does media. The interview quickly turns uncomfortable as she is pressed about British retaliation for nerve-agent attacks and rumors that a former First Desk worked for a foreign power. Taverner escapes without giving much away, but her expression afterward suggests she would happily have everyone in the studio renditioned.

Another Body, Another Connection

River and Lamb track Frank’s rental car to Nesmith’s building and discover Nesmith hanging from the hook that once held his punching bag. Frank has tried to stage the murder, but Lamb immediately spots problems: no cash, cards, phone or laptop. River checks nearby CCTV and finds something much more important — footage of Reece escaping. Frank’s murder has a witness.

Meanwhile, Coe and Shirley search Kay White’s houseboat. Shirley steals some of Kay’s cash — because apparently expense reimbursement at Slough House has become self-service — and they use it to buy lunch. That questionable accounting decision pays off when a nearby vendor reveals he saw a man and a woman leaving Kay’s boat the night she died.

Her “accident” suddenly looks a lot less accidental.

The Killers Strike Again

Those two killers, Jim (Kyle Soller) and Jane (MyAnna Buring) , are already preparing their next job, buying chains, tools and gas masks. Their target is Moira Tregorian (Joanna Scanlan), the former Slough House office manager who recently told Standish that the Horses had mysteriously disappeared from the Park’s payroll. Posing as gas workers, Jim and Jane enter Moira’s home, incapacitate her and stage another apparent accidental death, complete with wine, dinner and leaking gas. But Jane is getting suspicious. “This still seems too easy.”

More importantly, she wonders whether they have the right list.

Frank Has a Boss

Then comes the episode’s biggest connection. Frank visits Damien Cantor. Cantor hired him. Frank explains that the job has produced a witness, a child, and asks whether he still has authority to eliminate the loose end. Cantor leaves the decision to the “expert.”

Suddenly Diana’s forced television appearance, Frank’s return and the killings surrounding Slough House no longer look like separate storylines.

Slough House Has Been Erased

Lamb visits an MI5 contact and asks for the paper files on Struan Loy and Kay White. They’re gone. Not just theirs. Every Slough House file is missing. The digital records have already been wiped, which means someone stole the paper files because they may now be the only surviving record identifying everyone connected to Slough House. Lamb immediately issues Blake’s Grave: everyone disappears, phones off, no contact, and the Slow Horses head for a safe house. The order is to go dark.

Standish, meanwhile, has bought herself a bottle of wine but hasn’t opened it. Lamb picks her up to take her to join the rest and, in typical Lamb fashion, manages to express concern in the least comforting way humanly possible.

Daddy Issues, Indeed

There’s one Slow Horse who doesn’t follow orders. River. Roddy finally traces the mysterious calls River has been receiving and delivers the news: Frank has been calling from David Cartwright’s house. River races there alone, armed with a crowbar, enters and calls out: “Frank!” But Frank isn’t waiting for him. A young woman appears at the top of the stairs.

“Hello, River.”

Cut to black.

So much for going dark.

Episode 2 Takeaway

“Daddy Issues” turns what initially looked like a series of unrelated deaths into something much larger. Someone has erased Slough House from MI5’s digital records, stolen its paper files and apparently handed its personnel list to professional killers.

Frank Harkness is involved. Damien Cantor is paying him. Reece Nesmith witnessed a murder. And River has once again responded to Jackson Lamb’s explicit instruction not to do something by immediately doing exactly that.

In other words, Slough House is operating normally.

Except this time, somebody appears to be trying to erase the Slow Horses for good.

And if you missed “Slow Horses” author Mick Herron hiding in plain sight at Cartwright’s funeral last week, I added the Easter egg to my Episode 1 recap.

Read Slow Horses on Bookshop.org

Questions I’m Still Asking

• Who is the woman waiting for River at David Cartwright’s house? Frank has been calling River from there, so her presence is unlikely to be accidental.
• Who actually ordered the Slough House files stolen, and why? We now know Damien Cantor hired Frank for a job, but it’s not yet clear how much of the larger operation he controls.
• Are the Slow Horses really the targets? Their digital records were erased and their paper files stolen, but Jane’s comment, “Do you know if we have the right list?” raises the possibility that something isn’t adding up.

Slow Horses is streaming on Apple TV