“Just because you know you’re playing a game doesn’t mean you don’t chose your moves.”
Ahh, the wisdom of Dirk Gently (Samuel Barnett). Because with this first season’s second episode, “Lost & Found” … well, my goodness, the games have begun, and my goodness, those games aren’t anywhere near your typical hour of Candy Land. Instead, we have girl-dogs (or dog-girls). We have an invincible assassin. We have a burned-down house. We have a brick with a note tied to it. And we have the most humorous hostage negotiation in the history of BBC America.
If the series’ debut was aimed at introducing us to the web of stories that this narrative will presumably weave, then the follow-up was the beginning of the unpacking process. If nothing else, we can now see all our characters split into their own tiny universes. Don’t be fooled, though: this still doesn’t necessarily mean that we know all that much more than what we knew after watching episode one.
So, to move forward, we have to back up. Dirk Gently and Todd Brotzman (Elijah Wood) think they’ve made a breakthrough after Todd returns a dog to some dude who can honestly only be described as the Lost Trailer Park Boy. As he does so, he notices how the Lost Trailer Park Boy is holding Lydia Spring (Alison Thornton) captive. This actually happened at the end of the first episode, but hey: who knew it would lead us to all the fun with which “Lost & Found” ultimately opens?
Nobody. That’s the answer. Nobody.
Anyway, our dynamic duo heads back to the house to attempt to rescue the missing girl, but then a few odd things happen. First, they realize she’s acting like a dog (or that she has somehow become a woman in a dog’s body, perhaps?). Second, Todd stupidly hasn’t cashed in his lottery ticket yet, Dirk throws it into a shower, and the two get holed up in a bathroom. Naturally, the Lost Trailer Park Boy finds them, chases them away, and … whoops, finds his house burned down in the process.
As all this goes down, Todd and Dirk get away with the dog, which, it turns out, is a really, really big deal to Lost Trailer Park Boy. They negotiate a return of the dog if this guy releases the unknown, chained-up African-American woman from episode one, Farah (Jade Esthete). What formulates is a genuinely funny comedy of errors and miscommunication on a bridge late at night. Long story short, Farah gets away, the dog is dropped off said bridge, and an officer is mortally wounded.
Yeah. So let’s see how that plays itself out in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, Bart (Fiona Dourif) and Ken (Mpho Koaho) break down in the middle of the woods, only to presumably be rescued by someone who looks to be a backwoods murderer, who (gasp!) actually turns out to be a backwoods murderer. Still, before attempting to kill the pair, the guy fixes their car and then — spoiler alert! — it’s revealed that Bart can’t be killed. Bullets miss her. Or, as she tells Ken, she’s just “special that way”.
The bad news here (or, well, the bad news for Dirk, at least) is that she’s on a collision course with the holistic detective. This brings to the forefront many a question, including, though not limited to, why does she want to kill him and at what point will their paths cross? Either way, I’m kind of getting used to Ken and Bart trekking around this universe together and I’m kind of/sort of hoping the series doesn’t split them up.
Then there’s Amanda (Hannah Marks), who appears to be weirdly bonding with whatever the hell this Rowdy Three thing is. She somehow gets the gumption to go outside and then, seemingly out of nowhere, the band’s van pulls up to pseudo stalk her. She throws a brick. It doesn’t help. They get rowdier. Her hands turn to ice in this week’s edition of “what odd thing will a part of Amanda’s body turn into”. She gets more curious. That aforementioned brick is thrown through her window as the episode winds down, and it’s fully equipped with a note that reads … “Hi”.
She gives them the middle finger. We fade to black.
None of this really gives us any insight into where the story is heading and while there’s considerable forward movement in some areas, there are just as many questions heading into episode three as there were heading into episode two. So, choose your moves, Dirk. In fact, choose more moves next time. Actually, choose enough moves to allow us, as viewers, begin to decipher how all of this might come together at some point.
Because oftentimes, it’s awfully hard to want to play the game if there appears to be no end in sight.
A Clue, an Accomplice, or an Assistant
Dirk: “You know what they say about bringing a knife to a gun fight.”
Todd: “It’s bad.”
Dirk: “Oh bloody hell, is that what that means?”
All this to say, again, that the stand-off scene on the bridge was much funnier than it had any right to be.
Not so sure I buy into Farah and Dirk knowing each other beforehand. We need a better backstory on that if we want to believe it.
OK, OK, Todd. Enough whining about being Dirk’s partner. If you don’t want to do it at this point, don’t do it. Spare us all the apprehensions. Moving forward, we know how all those conversations and scenes will end.
Did anybody else notice the similarities between what Dirk told Todd and what Bart told Ken when it came to being a leaf in the stream of creation? It sort of all but assured that Bart and Dirk will have their day, but I just wonder what that day will look like. She can’t be killed, but she wants to kill him? So, he ends up dead, right? Or, how does this work?
Related: There’s something that’s becoming stale about this whole “the world will take me where I need to go” bullshit.
Boy, that was a fairly ominous ending, was it not? Sure ain’t looking good for Col. Scott Riggins (Miguel Sandoval) or Dirk Gently, now is it?
Honestly. That dude was a Trailer Park Boy in a different universe, right?
And how does this work with a dead officer/agent/whatever he was? That can’t go unnoticed in future episodes, can it? Rarely can you get away with killing some type of law enforcement something and it not have any impact on whatever happens down the line. I mean, at some point, this series needs to be just a tiny bit believable.
This Week’s MVP: We’re going to go with Farah because a) the actress playing her was kind enough to talk to us here at PopMatters and b) to somehow gain release from the clutches of those weird, mean-looking bad guys seemed to be quite the feat. A lot of sweat, blood and falling over had to happen. Kudos to her.