Slow Horses episode reaction S5 E2 Incommunicado

The gang withstand another attack…and they’re more dysfunctional than ever

Penny for the Guy

The opening titles have changed for episode 2, and Rosalind Eleazar is missing. Perhaps Louisa really has been written out? Our straw-clutching makes us think this is perhaps related to what we hope was the temporary unavailability of Eleazar’s availability: according to our calculations series 5 would have been shot around the time that Eleazar was taking the lead in the Harlan Coben series Missing You. I guess that if she were to return to Slow Horses then the opening titles for that episode would change back which would give us an early warning of the plot development.

As a result of Louisa’s absence, Catherine is playing a greater role in the field, rocking up to relieve Shirley on Roddywatch. Not sure Catherine’d have been quite as effective as Dandelion against the gunman.

River crossing

Remember when we all thought that River was the lead character of Slow Horses? From Stansted, to Upshott, to being targeted by the Tiger Team, to rushing to France to track down those who had tried to murder the OB, he’s been front and centre and, as we hear in this episode, expects to be front and centre still. But as J K Coe points out, most of these adventures involve River making catastrophic errors of judgement. And that was before his dad put a grenade in his jacket hood. Since then River has lost all that remained of his empathy, and freely shows his contempt for the rest of his colleagues. His comments in the swanky bar get the slap down from Lamb that they deserve. London Rules is a true ensemble piece and this episode pointed out for viewers and for River exactly why that had to be.

Gimball wizard

It looks as though Dodie Gimball has Claude Whelan in her firing line (in the book, it’s Zafar Jaffrey, but of course the TV series has Jaffrey up against Dennis Gimball for London Mayor so the swaperoo makes sense). I can’t get the measure of Whelan in this series. There are times when he looks as though he has settled into the MI5 role, but he’s seriously rattled by the allegations put to him by Dodie’s gopher, yet surely he would have prepared for such an eventuality? You wouldn’t catch Peter Judd with his trousers down, if you get my drift.

Gullibles’ travels

Slow Horses has no time for idealists. All the main players are in it for themselves. This season’s bad actors are extremely good at manipulating others into doing their dirty work, and are equal opportunity terrorists in that they recruit from both the far left and far right. In Bad Dates (S5 E1), far right fan Rob Trew commits the Abbotsfield atrocity before being himself executed by the terror gang. This week it’s the turn of a troupe of eco-warriors who are dim enough to take selfies while breaking into and sabotaging a refinery. The terrorists can’t quite believe they’ve been able to recruit this bunch. We live in wait for a major non-Horse character who is not manipulative or incompetent.

Here’s how Cafethinking covered the book on which series 5 is based.

And some thoughts on episode 1.