Lockwood & Co. – Season 1 Episode 2 “Let Go Of Me” Recap & Review

The Ghost in the Ring

Lucy is underwater facing a beautiful young woman with red hair as Lockwood and Co episode 2 begins. She seems to give Lucy some flowers. Lucy suddenly wakes up in a hospital. A nurse informs her that her mother was called but she sounded busy and didn’t ask where Lucy was. She tells Lucy to stay in bed but Lucy gets up and grabs her clothes. She takes a sprig of flowers from a nearby vase and heads out. She enters a room to see it filled with people in hospital beds, all of them ghost-locked and kept alive by machines.

Inspector Barnes admonishes Lockwood at the police station. He shows him a paper that says Lockwood & Co. owe Mrs.Hope 60,000 dollars for burning down the house. Since they didn’t use iron chains, their DEPRAC insurance policy is void. He needs to pay up or lose the agency.

Lucy comes home to be hounded by George about what happened. He says they should have waited for him to come back with his research on the house. In the clippings on the table, Lucy finds a picture of the murdered woman — Annabel Ward. Just as they are talking about how Lockwood made the decision to rush to the house, the man himself arrives. He says he needs sleep and asks George to cook him some food.

Later, Lucy looks at the clippings of Annabel and the ring and seems to lose herself in the underwater vision again. George’s voice wakes her up and she finds herself fully clothed in the bathtub.

She records a message for Norrie talking about where she’s ended up. She says the ghost reminded her of Norrie. She misses her best friend.

The next morning, George shows Lockwood the newspaper article on their mishap. He says something is wrong with Lucy and they should fire her before she gets them into more trouble. Lockwood claims George isn’t any more normal, as he got fired from the Fittes agency.  He says there is no such thing as normal.

In her bedroom, Lucy falls asleep with the ring in her hand. It falls to the floor and Annabel’s ghost rises up from it to hover over Lucy. She wakes up with a start and manages to escape the room. She wakes up Lockwood and they wake up George, who comes out with a belt full of ammunition. They go back to Lucy’s room and manage to lock the ghost back in the ring.

Lucy tries to explain why she took the ring. She feels a unique connection with Annabel and wants to get her justice. She suggests she try connecting with her once more so she can prove it to them. George agrees. Lucy sits in a chair and connects with the ring once again. She can feel what Annabel once felt — the happy relationship she once had with a man which then turned sour, he grew jealous and angry and choked her.

Afterwards, Lockwood tells the other two about the 60 grand they owe Mrs.Hope. He says they need to stop thinking about Annabel and focus on finding a few big cases.

Inspector Barnes then calls Lockwood and tells him to fire Lucy since she hasn’t gotten her fourth grade and is technically illegally employed.

Lockwood changes tracks and realises they can use Annabel’s story and her fame to get them their money. Lucy tells him to keep her name out of the spotlight.

George takes them to the archives, where they find out Annabel acted in a Hamlet production and played the role of Ophelia. This explains the water and the flowers that Lucy was connecting to since Annabel’s story mirrors Ophelia’s. They realise her co-star Hugo Blake, who she was romantically involved with, could be her murderer.

Quill Kipps, a Fittes agent and Lockwood’s rival, comes up to the trio and taunts them. When Lucy calls out the mortality rate of his team, Kipps tells her to beware of Lockwood since everyone leaves him anyway. Lockwood draws his rapier and so does Kipps. Lockwood flips Kipp’s rapier up so it lodges into the ceiling.

They leave the archives. Lockwood heads off to do some other work and tells Lucy and George to grab lunch. Over pizza, George tells Lucy about his family and how he was the odd child in a family of engineers. He tells her he got fired from Fittes for asking too many questions. He’s convinced there’s more to learn about how the Problem started. Lucy opens up too, about having a bad experience and being blamed for the deaths of her friends.

Inspector Barnes watches a news video of Lockwood talking about the Annabel Ward case and how Lucy created a breakthrough.

At home, Lucy is angry with him for doing what she expressly told him not to do. She gets further angrier when he calls her their biggest asset, assuming he only sees her as a means of making money. She leaves the room. George tells Lockwood he was wrong. Lockwood mentions that George was the one who wanted to fire her but George says he changed his mind. Lockwood says maybe his judgement is off. Lucy overhears this outside and leaves right before Lockwood says he did the interview to stop Barnes from making him fire her.

Lucy lets off some steam in the training room. The team are then called to DEPRAC — Barnes has arrested Hugo Blake and wants Lucy to use her connection with Annabel to help find some proof. She says it doesn’t work like that and Blake ends up scaring Lucy from the other side of the one-way mirror. Barnes gives Lucy a train ticket and tells her Lockwood is a charlatan and she’s better off at home.

On the cab ride back home, Lucy tells the driver to stop and gets out, telling Lockwood she quits. He goes after her. She accuses him of not understanding her and wanting her fired anyway. Lucy says she’s drowning in feelings and sometimes thinks she’s better off dead. Lockwood understands but says it’s not true, they need her. Because of who she is. He tells her he only did the news interview so Barnes would not target her. He insists that they can make their own rules. He asks her to stay and she agrees, after making him promise never to lie to her again.

Meanwhile, a hooded figure moves into the house unseen by George. When Lucy and Lockwood come home they find the door bolted from the inside. They enter through a window and see an intruder. Lockwood fights the intruder while Lucy finds George in the basement and unties him. Together, they turn on the intruder who runs away.

George says the intruder took Annabel Ward’s ring. Lucy says no and much to their exasperation and relief, brings out the locket holding the ring from under her shirt.

The Episode Review

Lockwood & Co. episode 2 drives the thrill and excitement of the first even higher. We know Lucy, Lockwood and George much better now. And what’s more, for the first time we get to see them as a team.

At several points during this episode, their dynamic leaps off the screen. The banter and their personalities bounce off of each other in a way that makes it very fun to watch. That moment towards the end when the three of them stood side by side against the intruder genuinely gave me goosebumps. Particularly as a fan of the books, the feeling of seeing these characters come alive is indescribable.

That said, it’s not perfect and the show is clearly taking liberties. There’s an overarching mystery in the books that the show is clearly initiating much earlier.  Inspector Barnes seems a lot harsher than necessary and Lucy’s decision to quit isn’t part of the novels either. Personally, I didn’t think the quarrel between Lockwood and Lucy was so necessary.

Their conversation about why Lucy should stay felt a bit out of place because their relationship is new and doesn’t feel deep enough to warrant it. Their comments about feeling “better off dead” also strike a bit random and hollow. But I can see how all of these fit into the current storytelling, making the highs higher and the lows lower.

One stand-out moment has to be the scene where Lucy channels Annabel’s memories and plays them out in front of Lockwood and George. Not only is it a very well directed scene that indirectly highlights Lucy’s chemistry with Lockwood, but it also turns a written paragraph into a fantastic visual spectacle.

Also, a shout-out to the music choice especially during the last fight scene!