Slow Horses
Episode 5 Preview And Review
Episode 5 of Slow Horses begins the penultimate episode of the AppleTV thriller with the group reuniting as agreed at the cemetery, next to Blake’s tombstone. Roddy appears alone, Cartwright is out of breath before long and looks as fast as Roddy drives. What are the odds, huh?
Cartwright confirms that he remembers where he saw Alan Black. She saw him secretly making out with Diana Taverner, and he actually took a photo of the pair together. Only, he doesn’t own it – naturally.
Lamb joins Cartwright when he goes to the latter’s apartment, intending to seize incriminating evidence. In their absence, the rest of the team tries to figure out if they can really trust Lamb. They do this while sitting together in a small cafe. Wait, isn’t MI5 after these guys? Why don’t they check the CCTV cameras? Ah well, go ahead.
With the news burying all of the Sons of Albion’s ordeal, Curly tries to convince the others that the jig is up. He wants to actually kill Hassan to make a name for himself and put them on the map. A tearful Hasan tries to plead with them, even offering to pay them, given his connections in Pakistan.
Touch and go for a while as Roddy and the others try to track down the car used by the Albion sons while working at the diner. At the same time, Lamb is seen in a separate car playing loud music, bringing him back for MI5 to look at. It seems to be working too as he distracts all the guards and refuses to get out of the car. He wants to talk to the big boss (it’s Diana, of course!) Nick shows up and he’s definitely not in the mood to play.
Not even those who kidnapped Hasan, who stopped at the gas station and watched Hasan filling up the gas and paying for it. Hassan is worried, but eventually he pays for the gas and finally sets off for parts unknown.
Lamb finally meets Diana, who confirms to her listeners that Alan Black’s body has been found. Diana wants to blame her death on Lamb and his villains, but Lamb has his own plans. In fact, he casually confirms that there is indeed a bomb in the trunk of his car. Nick is there first, but in his absence, Cartwright sets off to retrieve his incriminating photo from Spider-Web.
The bomb is clearly a dud, and unfortunately Cartwright is caught. Oh wait…no it’s not. Whoever MI5 is down with, it’s definitely not River. He found the correct file and walked up to Diana with it and deleted the file with the word “Fiasco” in front of it. What is this? Well, that’s Cartwright and Lamb’s trump card.
Meanwhile, the Sons of Albion continue driving and convince Hassan to crack some jokes, considering he’s a comedian. Unfortunately, things don’t go according to plan. After spitting out the truth about Albion’s race relations, Curly starts laughing before turning on Zeppo and blowing his brains out. “Now that’s funny.” He says slamming on the brakes.
Episode Review
What is Project Fiasco? And how does this tie into the main storyline? As Lamb and Cartwright manage to outwit MI5, Diana’s plan seems to go awry. The whole story is actually a bit like that, portraying MI5 as both incredibly competent….and incredibly stupid.
We know the group uses surveillance footage, and throughout the season we’ve seen MI5 track Lamb’s location very quickly, sending troops into the general vicinity as soon as there’s trouble. But they still can’t send them to a small diner where Roddy and the others work? I mean, it’s possible, but if we know they work with CCTV cameras, it seems a bit far-fetched.
That’s not to say that Cartwright (who worked for MI5 for a while and is famous for his appearance there) couldn’t sneak past all the security and sneak into Diana’s office while using some sort of doppelganger.
I know there’s an element of suspending your disbelief here, but it feels a little far-fetched that he could do it so easily.
The whole Hasan storyline feels like it’s building up to a big finale, but all we’re seeing now is this guy being driven around for just 2 episodes. All the pieces are here for a grand finale, so let’s hope it ends with a bang.