'Slow Horses' Season 3 Discovers It's Not Fun to Negotiate with Tigers

After last week’s mile-a-minute thriller antics, it’s fitting for Slow Horses to focus on recalibrating itself as we near the story’s midpoint. With River in the custody of the humiliated and furious Dogs, Lamb takes more of a center stage, taking an investigatory role as he checks in (not out of compassion, of course) with his agents in the hunt for Catherine Standish – who should have been released without a problem, but hasn’t been.

The Big Regent’s Park Heist that River was hurriedly sent on last week was a set-up. Home Secretary Peter Judd (Samuel West) confirms to MI5 Director-General Ingrid Tearney (Sophie Okonedo) that he wanted to test the security of the agency, and having found clear faults (see: River parading through the Park on the hunt for the PM’s vetting list) he wants to bring in private security firm Chieftain, responsible for the Tiger Team, to beef up (and privatize) MI5. Despite her clipped sheepishness, Ingrid still accuses him of securing private contracts for a close friend, who happens to be the CEO of Chieftain. Welcome to Britain!

Standish isn’t out of the woods yet, though. When Sean and his team prepare to hand her over to Chieftain, they instead kidnap their agent and retreat back to the cottage safe house. As Taverner informs Ingrid about the sudden development (they agree to keep MI5’s hand out of this mess), Lamb surprises Chieftain CEO Sly Monteith (Gavin Spokes) outside his home. Monteith, it becomes clear, knows nothing about Sean’s move. Some security firm!