Echo 3 (Season 1), Episodes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6 Recap: ‘Echo 3’ is a new Apple TV+ series created by Mark Boal, known for writing films such as The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty. This creator, who has two Academy awards under his belt, presents this new riveting action thriller. It is based on the Israeli drama television series – When Heroes Fly, inspired by a novel of the same name. With a fantastic blend of genre elements of thriller and action, it presents a highly absorbing black ops narrative that is one of the more cinematic offerings from this streaming platform. It stars Jessie Collins, Luke Evans, Michiel Huisman, and Martina Gusmán in the lead roles.
Echo 3 (Season 1) Episodes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6 Recap:
Episode 1: Flyaway
Directed by Pablo Trapero, the episode is written by Mark Boal. We get introduced to scientist Amber Chesborough (Jessie Collins) being dragged away by some Latin American folks. She is about to get shot by these people, which is when the narrative switches to a period of 6 months before this incident. At the time, Amber was getting dressed up for her wedding with Prince (Michiel Huisman), who belongs to a wealthy family. While she is getting prepared, her brother – Bambi (Luke Evans), walks in and checks whether she is having second thoughts.
Prince and Bambi are part of the same Special Force Operative unit. Bambi feels secure about his sister marrying someone like Prince because of his upbringing in a powerful & wealthy family. His smug father – Eric Haas (Bradley Whitford) is not too fond of his army ambitions. He sees Amber marrying Prince due to his power and wealth, besides the reputation of marrying a young war hero from a rich family. Unlike him, Amber and Bambi had a not-so-pleasant childhood, with an absent father and a mother engulfed in her own traumas to care about them.
After the booze and party, Prince learns that their troop needs to leave to rescue a hostage the very next morning. Despite it being his wedding night, he goes there the next day with Bambi and others. While they hover around on this foreign land, Prince goes first down the rope. While he is hanging to it, the opposition starts firing, and amidst that, he falls down. The troop lands the helicopter to fulfill its mission, and then a troop member named Drifter decides to enter the field and save Bambi. However, during this attempt, he gets shot, and Prince is left with no other option but to leave him there.
They return home after this assignment, and the memories still haunt River. However, neither he nor Bambi shares exact detail with Amber about what happened. The two keep having arguments over it. Meanwhile, she continues her research about the benefits of psychedelics and decides to go to South America in order to learn from the locals who use it therapeutically without getting addicted to it.
She wishes to study their rituals and practices to share with the world. Before she goes to Colombia, Prince keeps a GPS beacon in her backpack with the thought of her safety. While her mother thinks it is senseless for her to go there, Bambi supports her. During her journey in Colombia, a local guerrilla rebel group notices the same device and captures her and the other scientist. Bambi and Prince do not want to sit around waiting and decide to go to Colombia to bring Amber back safely to the US on their own.
Episode 2: Tora Bora in the City
Directed by Pablo Trapero, the episode is written by Jason Horwitch and Mark Boal. Violeta (Martina Gusman), a renowned journalist, learns from her husband – Ernesto Cadiz, that an American woman named Amber has been abducted. Prince’s father calls this affluent man to inform him about it, and Violeta is supposed to find more intel on Amber’s abduction. She asks her contact from the ministry whether the kidnapping has anything to do with FARC, which he denies. She then meets a rebel called Enrique, who assumes that she is meeting to interview him.
Upon learning that she wants the details of an American, he denies complying with her request. She still warns him of the harmful implications for the culprits, who are guerilla rebels like him. Meanwhile, Bambi and Prince reach Colombia to learn that Amber has been kept captive in Ciudad Bolívar. CIA calls it a business transaction where they will get her in exchange for something they want. Upon reaching the house of Cadiz, they learn that the capture is done by a new rebel group that has unrealistic expectations. Meanwhile, Amber tries to make every effort she can to get out by herself. However, being an American, she keeps seeing their place as a village instead of a country and offers peanuts as a way to get out.
The guerillas bring her back to the reality of the situation and question the device (military beacon), which she notes her husband has added to her backpack. They call her a targeter for the CIA, and she keeps rejecting her relation to anything like that. Meanwhile, Bambi and Prince learn that the authorities will keep waiting for even longer to rescue Amber. So, they decide to take matters into their hands and go save her by themselves and delay keeping her safe. They reach her location with a strategy and, during their search, become sure about Amber’s presence there, but cannot rescue her even after the shootout.
Episode 3: The Gambler
Directed by Claudia Llosa, the episode is written by Mark Boal, André Jacquemetton, and Maria Jacquemetton. In the middle of the night, Amber finds herself in a jungle with the young rebels. Prince goes live on a local news television, pleading with the Colombian military to take more efforts to rescue Amber. The American authorities are not happy with their decision by him to not keep their mission a secret. The Colombian army is not happy with the step he took either. Meanwhile, Amber loses her calm and even goes to strangle one of the rebels – Fami (Sofia Buenaventura). The authorities try to silence Violeta and remind her that she is an immigrant on their land, which is why she should not take any step that goes against them.
On her radio show, Violeta urges the rebels they would get a platform to speak their concerns if they collaborated with the authorities. While Fami is worried that they might get killed, her partner – Graciela (Maria del Rosario) calms her and affirms her belief in their idealist mission. Later, Violeta arrives at their camp and tries to negotiate a deal with them, which goes badly, and she is also taken captive by them since they are not ready to cut any deal with tyrannical Americans. Meanwhile, Prince and Bambi reach the wilderness through helicopters along with the Colombian army and hover around this place. The army asks them to negotiate peacefully, but the rebels do not want to abide by them. The army goes back because of no response, and the rebels sing in the joy of victory.
However, Prince and Bambi do not consider it as a defeat and keep up with their determination to rescue Amber. Early in the morning, their helicopters land near the Colombia/Venezuela border, and during their attempt, Bambi manages to kill a rebel driver with his sniper rifle successfully. The vehicle is toppled, and the army keeps shooting at the rebels and killing them one by one. During this shootout, Prince manages to reach close to one of the vehicles and meet Amber up close, who was horrified by the dead bodies around her. He shoots Fami dead but then gets shot himself. At the end of their rescue mission, Violeta gets rescued, but Amber gets snatched back by the rebels.
Episode 4: Upriver
Directed by Claudia Llosa, the episode is written by André Jacquemetton and Maria Jacquemetton. The rebels cross the border and reach Venezuela. Graciela contemplates killing Amber as revenge for her partner – Fami’s death. Meanwhile, Prince wakes up in Atlanta, Georgia, after the shootout and is not ready to return to save Amber. On the other hand, she is being driven to another place while the soldiers reach a Venezuelan facility. The Columbian army does not find it ideal to shoot toward it since it would harm their image. Bambi is left to work out a plan on his own.
While lost in his memories with Amber, Prince tries to map out a life as his father sees fit for him. Bambi, meanwhile, gets intel that the security he is trying to get into has extremely tight security. While the CIA is not going to help in this case, Bambi is determined to rescue her at any cost. Mitch (James Udom), who informs him of this, is conflicted with the conundrum of choosing between his friend (Amber) and the nation. He rather prefers to defend his nation due to the oath he has taken. Bambi tries to gulp down his worries and traumatic childhood with drinks. Since they were kids, he has taken the role of a protector, and he has caught himself in his expectations of himself.
Enraged by his inability to help, he takes out his rage on a random person, and the woman he met at the bar helps him heal his wounds. He then tries to make friends with local fishermen and be a part of the community. While he earns his bread and butter through laborious chores, Prince follows his father’s stern advice and becomes a careerist by running for the next election. He is advised to use Amber as bait to propagate their ideas toward the South American nations of fearing the American authorities. Meanwhile, Mitch tries to help Amber while deducing that the Venezuelan government sees her as important, which is why they are holding her for that long. While Prince seems to find ways to get over his relationship with Amber, Mitch makes efforts on his level to rescue her.
Episode 5: We Reject Your Influence
Directed by Mark Boal, the episode is written by Jill Blotevogel, Christopher Stetson Boal, and Mark Boal. Amber is taken to her final destination at a Venezuelan black site. She meets a high-ranking bureaucrat named Tommy, who works with the guerillas. He is certain that she is a CIA agent, while she keeps noting she had the GPS beacon only because of her brother & her husband, who are part of the army. Later, he meets the leader of the guerillas and proposes to record Amber saying vile things about America and its disillusionment with democracy. Meanwhile, she is kept in jail with guards all around her to make sure she does not escape.
Over there, she meets Hildy, who has an undiagnosed mental illness. They soon become close friends with each other. She keeps thinking of ways to escape, and upon seeing a small gap in the roof, she keeps making it bigger and bigger. During this period, they share the truth about their lives with each other. By that time, Tommy’s idea of getting a recording of Amber speaking against her own nation is accepted, and he returns to get her to speak in the same direction. However, she keeps rejecting any attempt he makes where she will be portrayed as unpatriotic.
After breaking down during these tapings, Amber finally attempts to escape and rides the ATV of one of the guards while they were busy having some celebration. She travels through thick and thin and manages to stay away from them. However, she gets captured by their army soon after and is brought back to jail. Tommy wants to make a lesson out of it since otherwise, he thinks that there would be no discipline since people won’t fear any rules over there. As a result, she has to see Hildy getting killed and suffering in silence.
Episode 6: Habeas Thumpus
Directed by Pablo Trapero, the episode is written by Nikki Broderick & Jason Horwitch. While Prince was having an affair with Reese (Katherine Hughes), he has a change of heart and decides to head to Venezuela to rescue Amber. Mitch from the CIA also comes there, and they find Bambi engaged in heavy drinking. Despite their sudden visit and their enthusiasm to rescue, Bambi is not hopeful that any plan would work. Prince injects a sedative into his body and drives him along with them.
Once Bambi becomes sober enough to have a sensible conversation, Prince and Mitch propose their plan to get a word with Tariq Marwan (Vicente Peña) with a tradeoff that includes his brother – Momo (Juan Pablo Urrego). They research Momo’s daily life pattern and try to work out a plan to get hold of him. Despite their confidence, Bambi finds it illogical for Prince to risk his identity by committing a heavy crime. However, since their goal is to get Amber out of this foreign land, Bambi agrees to go along with the plan and collaborate.
Prince opens up about his affair, and then Bambi also apologizes for keeping it away from him that Amber is a CIA agent. Finally, on the day of their mission, Prince and Bambi enter the stadium venue of Momo’s concert, while Mitch keeps them updated on the details from the outside and helps them. When one of the guards follows them, Bambi attacks him, and Prince dresses up in his jacket.
Bambi then reaches right next to Momo and has a random conversation as a way to distract him from seeing Prince add a liquid to his water bottle. As a result of that, he soon suffers from stomach pain and rushes to the washroom. His manager stands outside while Prince and Bambi leave her unconscious and then escort him back to the stadium. While he is having sex with his girlfriend, Prince breaks the glass outside the room and escorts him to their van. While all his fans are cheering outside, he is taken away by them.
Echo 3 (Season 1), Episode 6 Ending Explained:
Does Tariq agree to help rescue Amber?
In Caracas, Mitch meets Tariq in his office and talks about the present situation. During their meeting, Mitch asks for the freedom of Amber, who is captive on their land. He says it is impossible since she is a criminal. He mentions Colombia, its relationship with Venezuela, and with the CIA. He notes the weak state of Colombia as a nation in several aspects. While Mitch does not see her eviction as a part of politics, Tariq argues it is that way since it appears as a plan to make Venezuela seem like the enemy in the political conflict with neighboring Colombia.
Only one call from Tariq can help Amber get released from imprisonment. However, Tariq does not seem to agree with his requests in any way. As a result, Mitch goes on to show Momo’s ring and threatens he rescue Amber to get hold of his dear brother. Tit for tat is his current strategy, and it is yet to unravel whether it becomes successful or not in getting her out of this country.
