The Rig – Season 2 Episode 4 Recap & Review

Episode 4

Episode 4 of The Rig season 2 starts with Bremner looking over the footage of Cameron killing Coake. The Dive room is coated in blood, and they actually have footage of this too. Dale Cameron is tied up as a result, with Magnus and Rose scrambling to make sense of all this. This will fall into Pictor’s jurisdiction to punish, which isn’t great, while Harish is torn up after seeing his buddy snap like that.

Dale Cameron refuses to talk though, simply scoffing that he knows what he’s doing. Bremner brings up the deal between Fulmer and Coake when Rose presses him for answers, causing further rifts between the duo. However, Fulmer is dead-set on being on her side but he made this “deal” as a way of cozying up to Coake and getting closer to the truth. He was never going to betray them but just played the double-agent without telling anybody. Ah, the misunderstanding trope!

Fulmer wanted to find out about what’s on the drive and this was the best way of doing it. Despite everything, he remained by Rose’s side, loyal to her. However, he’s not going to do this anymore as she just pushes and takes. As a result, he severs ties and looks out for himself.

Lennox is en-route with her next steps, while Rose brings up the Data Drive malarkey and what Pictor are after. However, Darian York also finds out about Coake’s death, thanks to Bremner’s call. He wants this shut down and kept intern, buried so the media doesn’t get hold of it. If they do, they’d have a field day bringing up everything about the Ancestor they’ve been working on.

Askel continues to try and decipher the signal, while Kat and Hutton work to keep the faith and bide their time to reveal the truth about what’s really going on.

Out on the ice, there’s further drama when the gang seem to notice that the ice is bleeding. The movement of the Stac has created pressure ridges in the ice and it has exposed parts previously hidden. It would appear to be the Ancestor, but Askel wants to go out and investigate further, despite a big blizzard raging.

Magnus releases Cameron from his binds and after speaking to Easter about all of this, understands what he’s going through with his grief. He also brings up what Pictor intend to do, but he wants Cameron to make the right choice here and work with them to take down Pictor.

However, with Coake’s death and the other issues occurring, the board have made their decision. When this crisis is over, Lennox is to step down as CEO. York will be taking on operational duties, including finalizing the deal Lennox managed to secure for the Arctic at the Northern Latitude Forum.

Meanwhile, Askel ignores the warnings and heads out to check the ice himself. Magnus decides to get him back, launching a rescue mission alongside Heather. They drive out in a car to catch up, using the GPS signal to find the general location.

Fulmer shows to see Bremner while this is going on and wants to get out. He’s ready to make a deal. Well, Bremner does just that and speaks to Darian York, who offers him a new position with the full protection of Pictor behind him.

We then cut to the ice, where Askel has cut off samples. It would appear that Pictor’s plans with the Rigs are actually contaminating the ocean and it could extend out to the entirety of the Arctic Ocean if they’re allowed to continue.

With the ice unstable but the samples gained, the group try to head back to the Stac. However, the blizzard is obscuring the view and the GPS isn’t working either. They can’t get back and even worse, the Ancestor samples are stirring. It’s going to attack. 

The group floor it on the ice, surprisingly not slipping when they turn from side to side in the car, and even manage to do an emergency stop. What are the odds, eh? Anyway, with the Ancestor surrounding them, Askel decides to communicate with it by dropping some headphones into the water and playing the signal. Luckily these headphones are waterproof and it also seems to do the trick. The signal amplifies out and causes the Ancestor to grow docile.

Meanwhile, over in the UK, Mackendrick speaks to Cat and Hutton at the camp and reveals her research. She’s done some digging and it would appear that if the call was received then it would have been logged, only there was no call the night of the wave. The logs were deleted, so that’s one part of evidence, but it’s not enough to take down Pictor. However, a doctor shows with another casualty. It’s Kacey.

As the episode closes out, Cameron arrives to see Rose. He promises to show her the drive and warns that what’s on here is a delivery system to take out the Ancestor, and if they succeed here, nobody will be able to stop them. Bremner shows and points a gun at Rose and Cameron, and he looks set to fire.

This distracts Harish, who receives a call from Easter who apparently he hasn’t been able to stop thinking about him.

The Episode Review

So we finally see that Kacey is alive but in a rough way, and given all Cat cared about was getting her back, her fight will be against Pictor from here on out I’d assume, NDA or not. Will she end up teaming with Lennox at all?

Meanwhile, the drama onboard the Stac is given a bit of a jump when Askel heads out to the ice, manufacturing more drama in a show rife with these little squabbles and power plays. If that’s not enough, we also find out Easter likes Harish in a twist that absolutely nobody saw coming. Seriously, have these two even had more than a couple of conversations on-screen?

That’s to say nothing of Darian York who’s apparently the real big bad here and that’s because he’s a rich kid and on the board of directors. 

There are big jumps in logic and plenty of plot contrivances here too and that’s plain to see with the way the action on the ice takes place. Being able to just stop a car like that and skid across the ice without seriously spinning out just belies belief and the show hasn’t been particularly good at understanding how the elements work.

Hopefully the final two episodes can pick up as so far this has been a pretty poor showing.