Slow Horses season 4 welcomes us back with Jackson Lamb’s (Gary Oldman) very fitting voicemail box message: “This is Lamb. If I didn’t answer it’s because I don’t want to speak to you.” Someone then calls Marcus (Kadiff Kirwan) and River (Jack Lowden), neither of whom answers. Who’s in dire need of speaking to the Slow Horses?
Turns out it’s just Roddy (Christopher Chung), hanging out in a fast-food chicken restaurant by himself. He finally manages to get hold of Louisa (Rosalind Eleazar) and asks her why no one has shown up for their Christmas party? They don’t have a Christmas party, she tells him. It takes Roddy a minute, but he finally figures Lamb was playing a trick on him. So he heads out of the restaurant onto the crowded street with his headphones on. This keeps him from hearing the massive explosion that goes off behind him.
If you think that was a big way to kick things off, read on to see what other shocking moments get this new season underway.
Lone wolf or the start of something?
The explosion was caused by a car bomb at the Westacres shopping center. Taverner (Kristin Scott Thomas) arrives on the scene, but she’s not alone. She is joined by the new First Desk, Claude Whelan (James Callis). Whelan is nearly in shock from the scene, while Taverner is all business, asking for everything they know.
The bomber was a 28-year-old IT consultant named Robert Winters with no clear background as to why he’d do this. With the address he gave the car rental company being a fake, Taverner believes Winters is an alias as well. Whelan asks if it could be a one-off? Either that or the start of something, Taverner says.
River and Louisa have that same conversation the next day at a pub until River needs to get something off his chest. He stumbles about how close he’s felt with Louisa, making her nervous he is going to ask her out. She nixes that before he gets too far, but to her embarrassment that’s not what River is talking about. He reveals his grandfather, David Cartwright (Jonathan Pryce), is losing his mental facilities. The last time River saw him it took David 10 minutes to remember River. What should he do? She tells him the only thing he can do is to take care of him, starting with going to see him that night.
An accident
River may be right about his grandfather. We see David walking alone back to his house, but he looks very concerned. He believes someone is watching him, yelling at them to reveal themselves, but from what we can tell there is no one there.
He won’t take any chances though. He grabs a shotgun, closes the blinds and waits for any intruders to come. David eventually falls asleep, until he’s woken by a knock at the door. David sees it’s River (though we never see his face), who goes immediately to the bathroom as he enters.
David can’t shake the feeling something isn’t right though. So he grabs the shotgun again and carefully heads upstairs. He enters the bathroom with the gun barrel at the ready, saying this man is not his grandson, despite protests. David pulls the trigger, killing River. Coming to, David asks himself what he has done.
Lamb is woken up by his phone. He’s being called to David’s house by Emma Flyte (Ruth Bradley), Duffy’s replacement as head of the Dogs. After Lamb introduces himself in his own special way, they get down to the business at hand.
Showing Lamb the scene, Emma explains David pushed his panic button at 9:03 pm, but the police didn’t arrive until 9:49 (they apparently have been called needlessly by David before because of his forgetfulness). Despite finding River’s phone and wallet at the scene, Emma wants Lamb to ID River’s body, which is tricky because in addition to the chest wound he was also shot in the face. Lamb makes a few jokes, which raises Emma’s suspicion about why he doesn’t seem concerned. But he assures her he’s lost agents before and he’s certainly not River’s biggest fan. Ultimately, he identifies the body as River.
Lamb now has a question: where’s David? But Emma doesn’t know. She asks if Lamb would know, but he tells her no.
The new guys
There are a number of new members at the Park and Slough House we meet in this episode. We already discussed Flyte and Whelan, but while the former seems quite competent (though we learn she was an outside hire suggested by Whelan), we might want to be worried about the new First Desk. He does not seem to know what he is doing, asking Taverner to give him an idea of what to expect in a big meeting and then just asking her to handle it and report back to him.
Over at Slough House, we meet Moira Tregorian (Joanna Scanlan), who is Standish’s replacement as office manager, as she walks in on Marcus and Shirley (Aimee-Ffion Edwards) betting on how long Shirley can withstand waterboarding (with paperclips as the currency, as Marcus is trying to handle his gambling addiction). Then there’s JK Cole (Tom Brooke), who refuses to talk to anyone.
Escalation
A video of Robert Winters shows the bomber saying, “You have crushed me. Reapped violence upon me. Only now will I be free. You will suffer for the years I spent imprisoned by your system. God willing I will not be the last. You will hear from my brothers soon.” This plays as a specialist unit prepares to check Winters’ apartment.
After getting an update from Flyte on the Cartwright situation and telling her to keep on it, Taverner oversees the operation, with Whelan again deferring to her. Breaking down the door, the specialists don’t find anyone or anything and hand the scene over to forensics. However, someone opens up the window blinds, which pulls the pins on a number of grenades, causing a big explosion and killing multiple people. Taverner not only has to deal with this mess, but council an ashen-faced Whelan on his duties (notifying the families).
The truth about River
Moira and Louisa find Roddy trying to take River’s computer. When they ask him what is going on, he dryly says River is dead. They all think it’s a sick joke, but Roddy shows them a text that Lamb sent saying he ID’d River’s body; Marcus also finds a report confirming a body was found at David’s. Louisa is devastated, blaming herself and saying it can’t be happening again (referring to Min’s death in Slow Horses season 2).
While Roddy just got a text, Lamb decides to personally tell Standish (Saskia Reeves) the news. While she’s reluctant to let him in now that she no longer works for him, Lamb slinks in anyway and informs her River is dead. However, when she doesn’t ask for details, Lamb tries to coax her to admit she knows River is still alive. She denies it, but bluffing was never her strong suit; River’s car is outside. Standish finally admits River was there, but he isn’t now. Lamb isn’t satisfied. He makes his way into the bedroom to find a sleeping David. Lamb wakes him up and asks where River is.
Turns out a very much alive River is in France, trying to track down the man who David shot, having found his French passport.
New episodes of Slow Horses season 4 premieres on Wednesdays exclusively on Apple TV Plus.