“Slow Horses” returns, this time adorned with EMMY wins and perhaps a bit more eyeballs as it struts to its fourth season, with a fifth season already in motion and a sixth season greenlit. With Mick Herron producing the Slough House novels at a regular pace and the quality of the show not showing signs of deterioration, the show is quickly on its way to being one of the few permanent fixtures in the arsenal of Apple TV+, along with For All Mankind.
With such an unpredictable era of content, regular, consistent shows need to be the backbone for any streaming service to survive. “Slow Horses” fills that slot quite nicely. But as “Slow Horses” (season 4) episode 1 begins with a literal bang, you would be shocked at the swing the show chooses to take.
Slow Horses (Season 4) Episode 1 “Identity Theft” Recap:
On Christmas Night, Roderick Ho finds himself at the Chickado, at the site of the Slough House Christmas Party. However, there is no Christmas Party because Lamb has sent him off on his merry way, and except Louisa, no one is interested in picking up Ho’s calls. But Ho’s self-served nature helps him not to be offended at being played, instead playing music and gorging on his Chickado while walking home, only to realize a hullabaloo occurring in London—a car bomb at the West Acres Shopping Mall.
The new First Desk of MI5 Claude Whelan (James Callis) reaches the area along with Diana Taverner, where they learn that the car had been registered to one 28-year-old IT professional, driven straight through the mall’s entrance, and detonated. Christmas gathering, though, does occur for two Slough House members—Louisa and River—whose camaraderie has somewhat deepened after the harrowing ordeal of last season. White River hesitates, and Louisa wrongly assumes River is admitting an attraction towards her.
River finally addresses the impending important subplot of last season: Old Man Cartwright’s loss of memory due to Alzheimer’s, forgetting everything, and sleeping with a gun by his bed. While Louisa is sympathetic to his plight, she also applies tough love and urges him to see his grandfather that night.
David Cartwright, or the “old bastard,” as he is affectionately termed by Jackson Lamb, is truly afflicted by paranoia. He takes a while to recognize faces and is always on guard. Worried stoats watch him. He quickly rushes into his cottage and lies in wait as the cloudy day gives way to a cloudy and rainy night. His slumber is broken by River knocking on the door, and as River enters, he immediately greets his grandfather and walks up to the floor above to warm up a bath.
But the confused Cartwright suddenly decides, loads up his hunting rifle, and walks up to the bathroom, emphatically stating that the man in his bathroom is not his grandson, shoots River. Later, he regains his senses and realizes what he had actually done—killed his grandson after mistaking him for an impostor.
Jackson Jamb is woken up from his deep slumber by a late-night call instructing him to appear at a crime scene on the city’s outskirts—the Cartwright Cottage. He meets the new head of the Dogs, the replacement of Duffy, Emma Flyte. Duffy, if viewers don’t remember, had been brutally beaten last season. We learn that Duffy is now brain-dead and in a coma. And even if one replaces Duffy (and according to—Lamb, it is a marked improvement), what doesn’t alter is their loyalty—to the second desk, Diana Taverner.
With each movement and sarcastic dialogue, Lamb tries to gauge his mood and lower the tension while keeping his head raised. His attempts usually highlight his general chubbiness and unkempt attire, belying the steel trap of a mind that Lamb deploys. As Lamb is shown the damage, he watches the scene with his sharp eyes and takes note of the pool of blood and brain matter spattered across the wall while the face is barely recognizable.
According to Flyte, more than 40 minutes passed between the old man pressing the panic button and the local police finally arriving at the crime scene. This was primarily because the old man had pressed the panic button twice in the last week. One was because he had forgotten it had been a panic button and wanted to find out.
But even as Lamb tried to distract Flyte, he was swift to identify (and emphatically so) that the body found at the bathtub is of River Cartwright, fulfilling his responsibility of formal identification. However, if one knows anything about Lamb, they know something is mildly off. Thankfully, Flyte has no idea. He also learns that the “old bastard” is missing. What the “Slow Horses” TV show does so well is allow Gary Oldman to act in moments of solitude, giving Lamb more dimension and allowing for a brief snapshot of what he might be contemplating.
The following day, we are witness to the relationship between the new First Desk and Diana Taverner, and Whelan comes off as an inexperienced newbie, learning the ropes from his junior, with Taverner sharing her somewhat substantial experience, which Whelan is all too eager to let loose. That is why he lets her attend the COBRA meeting in his stead. Something does tell me that Diana is taking a step back is her having the freedom to execute all her plans without being forced into a corner by higher-ups, and that’s how Whelan’s selection was executed. Truthfully, it could be entirely possible that this is all a ruse on Whelan’s part, and the show will reveal that by the end of the season.
Meanwhile, Slough House has been blessed by the addition of two members. Moira had been brought in from the Park to replace Catherine, who would quit last season as a form of protest against Lamb and after learning of the betrayal of Charles Partner, her old boss. JK, meanwhile, is a new addition to Slough House who prefers to remain taciturn and unwilling to talk with his colleagues, which both Shirley and Marcus are happy about. They aren’t satisfied, however, with Moira’s assigning of chores to them, her work ethic being markedly different from what Catherine’s had been.
Meanwhile, The Park manages to trace the bomber to a flat, and as Taverner continues taking updates from Flyte about the Cartwright case, she also instructs an armed SWAT team to storm the flat. As the dogs breach the flat, they find it empty. Winters lived like a monk, presumably because, according to the head Dog, he knew he would die. But as the forensic team enters the flat, one of them opens the window, activating a makeshift bomb system made up of grenades, which all explode together, tearing the apartment apart and leaving three men dead and more injured.
Speaking of men dying, Moira finds Ho calmly disconnecting Cartwright’s computer. When asked and interrogated, Ho responds with unfeeling candor that Cartwright is dead. As no one believes him, he shows the message sent to his phone by Lamb, where Lamb states that he would be late coming in as he had been up all night identifying Cartwright’s body. Marcus and Shirley confirm the news, and Louisa is wracked with guilt, believing that her conversation with River last night had led to his death.
Slow Horses (Season 4) Episode 1 “Identity Theft” Ending Explained:
Who died at the beginning of season 4 of Slow Horses?
After buying a pack of orange biscuits and a seltzer, Lamb ambles his way to Standish’s apartment, where he informs her that River is dead and proceeds to remark upon his feelings about her not being around and trying to quit. Standish, trying to elaborate her feelings of shock and anger, lets slip her incuriousness regarding the details of the death of River Cartwright, which finally leads to Lamb revealing that both he and Standish know that River is alive. Also, Standish has “the old bastard” stashed inside her bedroom because River has urged Standish to protect him.
Lamb, being the acerbic old Joe he is, wakes David up and asks where River is. The last we see of River is him in a taxi bound for the French countryside, carrying a passport that isn’t his own. It is now abundantly clear that River Cartwright had faked his death and is now on a solo covert mission to identify who had tried to sneak into his grandfather’s house, presumably in an attempt to kill him. It could also be reasonably assumed that David Cartwright had shot the impostor, and River had decided immediately to go off the grid. “Slow Horses” season 4 begins with a literal bang, and something tells me the perpetrators of the two attacks—the bombing of Westacres and the attempted attack on David Cartwright are the same.
