Slow Horses Season 6, Episode 3 Recap: “Resurrection”

Well, the end of last week’s episode explains this title. Episode 3, “Resurrection,” opens with River Cartwright sitting in his grandfather’s house opposite someone he was certain was dead: Sid Baker. River is understandably stunned. He saw Sid in the hospital after she was shot and has spent three years believing she died. Sid, meanwhile, isn’t particularly interested in comforting him.

“So I got shot in the head, but you’re the one that’s traumatized?”

Fair point.

Their reunion doesn’t last long. A car approaches, and River thinks it might be his father, Frank Harkness. Sid quickly corrects him: the people outside are there to kill her. It’s the same man and woman hunting former Slough House agents.

River and Sid Go on the Run

The assassins enter the house while River and Sid escape across the fields and hide in a barn full of cows. When one of the killers spots movement beneath the animals, she starts shooting. A cow takes the bullet. Sid and River escape again, but Sid is visibly shaken by the gunfire. River notices her hand trembling, a reminder that surviving a bullet to the head hasn’t left her untouched.

Sid finally explains that a few weeks earlier, a travel movement order connected to Kazan, Russia, was sent to her home. The Park dismissed it as a glitch. Soon afterward, strangers started asking around for Sid Baker. Someone appears to have used the identity of a supposedly dead MI5 agent for an off-the-books operation in Russia.

And now someone wants the real Sid Baker dead.

Louisa Guy Is Back

Meanwhile, Catherine Standish and Shirley Dander track down Louisa Guy, who has clearly moved on from Slough House and is sitting in a perfectly respectable corporate meeting. That lasts until Shirley bursts in announcing they need Louisa because her “Uncle Blake” has suffered a serious accident. Louisa has no Uncle Blake.

Outside, they tell her the truth: Struan Loy and Kay White have been killed, and someone appears to be targeting everyone who has worked at Slough House. Louisa reluctantly joins them, complete with a nice company Audi and a Bali key ring that Shirley cannot stop touching. Their next stop is Moira Tregorian, whom they find unconscious in a house filled with gas. Moira survives and tells them someone claiming there was a gas leak sprayed something in her face.

The threat is getting very real. Louisa and Shirley then make an after-hours visit to an illegal gun dealer. Louisa buys what they can afford. Shirley would also like a weapon.

“Can you get me a gun?”

“Fuck off.”

“A harpoon then?”

“Fuck off.”

Some things at Slough House never change.

Lamb Gets a New Sidekick

Jackson Lamb and Roddy Ho, meanwhile, collect Reese Nesmith, whose father, Andy Nesmith, was murdered by Frank Harkness. Reese reveals that his father had been trying to blackmail someone over a stolen file and that Harkness arrived with money. Lamb realizes the stolen material may be the hard-copy files containing information about the Slow Horses.

Reese also discovers something important about Lamb: never challenge him to a farting contest in a car with windows that don’t work. Even Roddy looks traumatized.

Sid Baker, Russian Assassin?

River and Sid eventually take refuge in the home of an elderly woman named Anne, where Sid finally gets online. They search for deaths in Kazan and find something suspicious: a woman was shot twice in the head in what was reported as a robbery. River immediately doubts that explanation.

If someone carried out an assassination in Russia using Sid Baker’s identity, it would be very useful for the real Sid to remain officially dead. The assassins catch up with them again, but River manages to set their car on fire, giving him and Sid another chance to escape.

Eventually J.K. Coe finds them. Lamb sent him to collect River. Sid wants to contact Diana Taverner, but River warns her not to.

Why?

Because if the Park told everyone Sid was dead, River suspects Taverner may know exactly why her identity was useful.

Taverner Has Problems of Her Own

Back at Regent’s Park, Diana is dealing with the fallout from her television interview and her use of the word “retaliation.” Emma Flyte questions Diana’s behavior, and Diana responds by effectively demoting her to Slough House.

Flyte’s response?

“With the greatest lack of respect, ma’am, fuck you and fuck your job.”

That went well.

Later, Lamb appears outside Diana’s home and tells her former Slow Horses aren’t simply dying by coincidence. Frank Harkness killed Andy Nesmith, who had apparently taken hard copies of Slough House personnel files. Diana offers to bring Lamb’s people into the Park for protection. Lamb refuses.

“You’ve got a leak Julian Assange would be proud of.”

He believes Harkness is conducting a cleanup operation for someone.

The question is: who hired him?

And Just When River and Sid Think They’re Safe…

Coe drives River and Sid to a retail park so Sid can find a phone and contact Taverner. River still doesn’t trust the idea. Sid still doesn’t trust River’s judgment. Very reassuring. As River and Sid head inside, another car pulls into the parking lot.

The two assassins have found them again. They get out. Guns in hand.

And that’s where Episode 3 leaves us.

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Questions I’m Still Asking

• Who used Sid Baker’s identity for an assassination in Russia?
• Why did the Park allow everyone—including River—to believe Sid was dead for three years?
• Who hired Frank Harkness to clean up the former Slow Horses?
• And perhaps most importantly: how exactly is Sid Baker alive?

“Resurrection” gave us Sid back, but it certainly didn’t give us all the answers.

Slow Horses is streaming on Apple TV