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‘Tracker’ Just Quietly Delivered a ‘Smallville’ Reunion in an Action-Packed Episode
Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for Tracker Season 3, Episode 14.We’re back this week with another Tracker episode that pushes the limit of what action hero Colter Shaw (Justin Hartley) can handle, especially since he’s going up against several stuntmen who know their craft well. “Breakaway” is exciting for fans for a few reasons. For starters, it gives us an on-screen reunion between Justin Hartley and Erica Durance over a decade after Smallville went off the air. Secondly, there’s more action in this episode than there has been in a while, so strap in.
‘Tracker’ Season 3, Episode 14 Begins With a Missing Stuntman
This week’s episode begins on the film set of an indie production titled, well, Breakaway. After a killer opening action sequence, it pivots to stuntman Hale “Rip” Ripley (David Ramsey), who angrily walks off set after being hit too hard one too many times. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Colter is called in soon after. Although, when we first catch up with the rewardist in his Airstream, he’s reminiscing over an old photo of him and his dad, Ashton Shaw (Lee Tergesen), which he’d hidden in a copy of The Old Man and the Sea. Tracker continues to remind us that the mystery behind his father’s murder has not been fully solved, but it also proves a careful touch that speaks subtly to the father-son themes woven throughout the episode.
It’s then that Randy (Chris Lee) calls with a clever Lee Majors-style Fall Guy reference (to the old TV show, not the Ryan Gosling movie) before sending him to Detroit to track down the missing Ripley, who never went back home after the debacle on the film set. Arriving in town, Colter meets with Ripley’s girlfriend, Laura (Durance, who proves that she’s still got it), who offers $12K if Colter can track him down. Little does she know, this show is called Tracker, and that’s exactly what he’ll do. Laura gives “Colt” the rundown on Ripley, who has been struggling with pain pills for years. “Something happened to Ripley after he walked off set, these people are hiding something, I can feel it,” Laura tells him.
‘Tracker’ Is Officially a Different Show Following Its Most Brutal Case
The show’s taken a dark turn and audiences are loving it.
Naturally, Colter’s first step is to try to get onto the set itself, but a security guard stops him. It’s a closed set, after all, but something like that would never in a million years stop Colter Shaw. As usual, he dodges and weaves his way onto the premises anyway without any trouble. By the time he gets to the stunt trailer, Colter runs into a derelict stuntman doing a line of cocaine beside a definitely-too-young girl in his trailer. Colter stops things from going any further, and stunt coordinator Jake Harris (Jacob Turner) shows up and sees that the girl is looked after — and that the stuntman in question is fired. When asked about Ripley’s behavior as of late, Jake tells Colter that he had been distracted long before he walked on set. He isn’t surprised that he never made it home, though, and notes that the producers of the production, namely one Bennett Cranston (Carlo Rota), are not the types of people you’d want to tick off.
With this information locked and loaded, Colter calls his handy personal investigator/technical genius, and it isn’t long before Randy discovers that Cranston is involved with racketeering and other criminal enterprises. As if by magic, he gives Colter the location of the rental suite that the production has put Cranston up in, and the rewardist heads in that direction. After hanging up on our resident tracker, Randy shares a quick moment with Reenie Greene (Fiona Rene) and Mel Day (Cassady McClincy Zhang), as the two prepare for an upcoming dinner meeting with Maxine (Kathleen Robertson).
“Breakaway” Dives Into Strange Territory as Colter Uncovers a Stuntman Conspiracy
Colter makes his way to Cranston’s high-rise and, obviously, breaks in. Despite the fact that he’s clearly caught on camera, it makes no difference to him whatsoever. Inside, Colter finds signs of a struggle, and the security footage likewise reveals that Ripley had been there, only to be forcibly removed and kidnapped by Cranston and his goons. Calling Randy, Colter tries to get a phone trace on Cranston’s phone, but that’s a dead end. Instead, the hacking wizard pulls a positive ID off one of the goons in the video and uses that to trace his cellphone. It seems like this shouldn’t be this easy, but considering the Jeffrey Deaver-penned Colter Shaw novels have more time to tell these sorts of stories than Tracker‘s 40-something minutes, I guess we’ll let it slide. Randy tracks the phone to an industrial zone — and it isn’t long before Colter makes his way there.
Arriving at the scene, Colter finds a phone outside and the producer tied up with his men indoors. Ripley is nowhere to be found, having gained the upper hand against Cranston’s men when he tried to scare the stuntman. Apparently, Ripley was looking for his customized Dodge Charger, which Cranston bought off him two years ago when the stunt performer’s funds had gotten tight. Randy tracks his location via the car, sending Colter on a continued goose chase.
We need some dragons and wizards mixed in with our crime procedurals.
Meanwhile, in Denver, Maxine arrives late for dinner with Reenie and orders drinks. However, the late attorney doesn’t want to talk about work. Apparently, she got a call that her cheating husband (and his Pilates instructor) had used her credit card, thus confirming the affair. “Sometimes it’s easier to ignore it than admit that there’s a problem,” Maxine says at first, before the pair schemes ways to get back at him. Yeah, it’s a weird interlude, and we’re still not sure why we should give Maxine the time of day, but it’s leading to something as Maxine turns the tables on Reenie to ask about how she’s doing. They speak about how the former broke up with Elliott Rusch (Michael Rady) — remember Elliott? — after her abduction at the end of Season 2. Although Reenie claims she’s doing fine with the trauma, Maxine clearly sees through the false bravado.
Back in Detroit, Colter speaks with Laura over the phone and learns that Ripley is the type of “old-fashioned” guy who likes to pretend that he can fix everything. It may be that he’s in trouble that he believes only he can resolve, which might explain why he went off the grid. It becomes even clearer when Colter arrives at the scene of a drag race where the Charger is front-and-center. Without a care in the world, our hero drives his truck right through the middle of the festivities, hoping to derail the whole thing — and somehow he manages to hold his own against these other racers. After stopping the Charger, he finds that Ripley isn’t the one driving. It turns out that Ripley had sold the car to another racer after earning some cash from them. He also learns that Ripley’s son, Dalton (Lovell Adams-Gray), is really the one with the money issues, issues that he and Randy believe the stuntman has been trying to pay off. It turns out, Dalton is working closely with a crew of stuntmen who have active criminal records.
‘Tracker’s Latest Episode Ends With a Shootout in Detroit
“Breakway” pivots back to Ripley, who confronts one of these stunt goons named Virgil Dean (Chris Jericho), the apparent ringleader of an outlaw band of stunt performers. When he tries to pay off Virgil to keep Dalton out of their world, the angry-looking goon tells Ripley that it’s not enough. The only way to get Dalton clear of his debts is for Ripley to take his place as a driver in ae heist. Meanwhile, Colter visits Laura to follow up on the types that Ripley might be involved in. After narrowing their location down to an abandoned warehouse (thank you, social media), Colter is joined by Laura as they break in to search for Ripley. Instead, they knock out one of the guys held up there and discover that the rogue stuntmen plan to rob an armored car. But upon hearing a struggle, they find that Dalton has been kidnapped. The boy begs Colter to let him help find his dad, and the rewardist agrees, so long as they do it his way.
Elsewhere, Ripley and the rest of the stunt crew-turned-gunslingers ready themselves for the armored car robbery. He tries to convince them to back out of the job, but they won’t listen. Thankfully, Colter and his new allies aren’t far behind. Colter and Dalton watch carefully as the robbery begins, and the rewardist leaves the younger man to intervene from a different direction. But Dalton doesn’t listen to Colter’s warnings and soon finds himself under heavy fire from the criminal element. In an action spectacular that likely utilized a lot of stunt performers, Laura arrives and helps take out some guys, but is injured in the process. With the rest of his men taken out, Virgil uses the opportunity to hold Ripley at gunpoint to try and get away, but Colter sneaks up behind him and fires, rescuing the stuntman and his family. A job well done.
Meanwhile, Reenie boxes out her frustrations and anxieties, and it’s clear that she’s not okay. Despite her claims that she’s completely fine, the bravado retreats to the shadows when she’s alone, and nothing seems to help. It’s clear that Reenie needs someone in her life who she can talk to about this, and after last week’s episode, we’re still hoping that Colter can fit the bill. But right now, the rewardist is on the other side of the country, bidding farewell to Ripley and Laura. Although Ripley apologizes for getting Colter involved, our hero is just happy that everything turned out well in the end. “Stay safe,” he tells the two of them — and that’s not the first time he utters those exact words in this episode.
Tracker airs Sundays on CBS and is available on streaming the next day on Paramount+.
- Release Date
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February 11, 2024
- Showrunner
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Elwood Reid
- Writers
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Ben H. Winters, Hilary Weisman Graham
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Justin Hartley
Colter Shaw
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- Seeing Justin Hartley and Erica Durance back together on-screen makes us wish for a true-blue Smallville reunion.
- The action in this episode was great ? more of this, please!
- Weird that the thread with the young girl wasn’t revisited later on. Seemed to foreshadow something regarding the criminal acts of the stuntmen but then wasn’t fully paid off.
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