'D.I. Ray's Case Starts to Hit Too Close To Home Again in "Rivals"

Rachita Ray (Parminder Nagra) is in the thick of it now — the premiere of D.I. Ray Season 2 set up a new gang war case, but Episode 2 introduced new twists that make this investigation even stickier and too reminiscent of last season's chilling plot for comfort. The first order of business in the second episode was to find Rav Mochani (Taha Rahim) after kidnappers took him in an unmarked black van, and Rachita could not keep up with them. Clive told Rachita he wasn't interested in participating in her death-defying attempts to ruin her career, but Rachita blew him off. That may prove to be a mistake later on. 

While the team tried to track down the van, they used Rav's kidnapping to get a warrant for the Mochani household. Liam was able to uncover an email between Frank Chapman, the head of the Chapman gang family who was murdered in the premiere, and Rav that indicated the two were collaborating on the child trafficking business. The photos in the email led Rachita to a woman named Dawn Hughes (Ella Dunlop), who claimed to be Rav's girlfriend. They also found one of the girls pictured in the email in Dawn's closet and took her to the authorities. You can imagine that Rachita had a chill reaction to this case adding in a sex trafficking element (That's sarcasm. She was super pissed.) 

While saving a seven-year-old girl from being trafficked is definitely a win, Rachita was still feeling the pressure at work. Her lawyer pressured her to continue with her racial discrimination case against the department, but Rachita is already in so deep in this case that she wants to drop the whole thing and focus on work. Her lawyer reminded her that change will never come by accepting the department's scrap apologies, but Rachita doesn't seem interested in continuing a confrontation. 

She didn't have much time to make a pro-con list because soon enough, Liam was about to track down Rav's exact location using CCTV footage and an eyewitness spotting of the van. Surprise! Dave Chapman (Michael Socha) was the one who took Rav, but only because his previous interactions with the police led Dave to discover Rav and his father were working together. Rav refused to give any details about what he and Frank were working on together, and things turned violent. 

Meanwhile, Rachita arrived on the scene before backup (of course). Despite multiple warnings to stay put until the armed team arrived, Rachita entered the abandoned gym after she heard a lone gunshot. Inside, she found Dave Chapman left for dead, and Rav was nowhere to be seen. That provoked a lot of questions, like, did Dave's men turn on him? Were they always working for Rav? If the Chapman soldiers have that much loyalty to Rav, why would Rav need to kill Frank? Did Rav kill Frank? 

Those questions immediately were sent to the backburner because right after Rachita took Dave's pulse, footsteps echoed on the stairs leading into the gym, where she was crouched, defenseless. The last shot of the episode was Rachita looking behind her as a gun cocked in her direction. Next week's episode will reveal whether Rav or whoever shot Dave returned or whether it was the police team finally arriving to sweep the premises. Either way, Rachita will have to explain why she went inside the gym to someone and admit that this case has gotten a lot more complicated than expected. 

The ballistics report from Frank's body also came back during the search for Rav and revealed that Frank was shot by one person, but executed a completely different second shooter. That means the team is looking for who shot Frank in his home before he drove to the hospital, and who knew about that encounter soon enough to follow Frank to the hospital and finish the job. And what do either of those people have to do with the Mochani family?

It's a real mess! And Rachita is already going rogue instead of trusting her team. We can't blame her, after the way she was treated last season, but she's going to get herself killed or seriously harmed if she keeps taking unnecessary risks without backup. She needs to get her head on straight as this case gets messier and even more dangerous.  

D.I. Ray Season 2 will continue to air new episodes on Sundays, at 10 p.m. E.T. on most PBS stations, the PBS app, and the PBS Masterpiece Prime Video Channel. All six episodes will be available on premiere day on PBS Passport for members to stream. As always, check your local listings. Season 1 is streaming now on PBS Passport.