More Death, More Terror & More Misses in 'Trigger Point'

Things are not going well for Lana as Trigger Point Season 2 hits the halfway point, and frankly, I don’t know how much more this poor woman can take. I took the liberty of looking at possible Starbucks jobs in the London area because I really think a career making pumpkin lattes would be good for her. As the third episode begins, Lana is in shock after Thom falls to his death, barely registering that the team discovers the authorized elevator repairman was kidnapped; the terrorist used his credentials to get into the office building.

Meanwhile, a mysterious woman who calls herself Hope (Bethan Cullinane) chats up her mark, a businessman by the name of Oliver (Jon Tarcy), having breakfast at a local diner. As she low-key flirts with him, someone takes his briefcase and returns it before he even notices it is gone. Before Oliver heads off to work, Hope asks for his email address so they can make a plan to meet up. The pair emails back and forth during the day, making plans to meet up after Oliver’s evening meeting.

The mysterious man Alex, whom we met in the first two episodes helping the terrorists, reaches out to law enforcement. Alex explains to Lana and Helen that he didn’t know what he was getting into. He was strictly on comms, but now the people he’s working with want him to do more. He offers to help Lana and Helen catch the terrorists if they can offer him a deal.

The terrorists keep dropping cryptic clues like “Welcome to the Labyrinth.” Nicholas Hood, the PhD student the team took into custody last week, screams something in French to Helen, which she translates to “under the streets, the beach.” The immediate assumption is that this indicates there’s a bomb planted somewhere that’s going to go off underground. This turns out to be surprisingly correct; Lana leads the team to find the device and disarm it, but, like the countdown clock sent to a journalist at the top of the episode, it’s not a real bomb but merely a decoy. 

Meanwhile, Alex seems to have convinced Lana he’s telling the truth by sending her a photo he’s found via a secure message system, which turns out to be our flirty friend Oliver. Oliver works as a special advisor to one of the cabinet ministers. Lana and Helen race to his office, but they are too late. Just as the two arrive on the correct floor and bear down on the conference room where Oliver is meeting with the minister, he opens the email from Hope. The explosion it triggers kills him and the cabinet minister. 

Alex’s next piece of information is a similar story: it sends the team drone hunting, but the bombs are planted on the e-scooters (which are definitely not Voi). Lana chases after an unsuspecting woman with headphones on as she rides away, trying to warn her. However, the bomb goes off before Lana can reach her, making it the second round of deaths (since Thom died!) that Lana was mere seconds away from stopping. (Starbucks, Lana, Starbucks!)  Understandably, Commander Francis is not convinced Alex isn’t just toying with them since, so far, his intel is a little too late to help. When Lana defends Alex, Francis snarks that Lana has no idea what is going on in Alex’s head unless she’s “suddenly an expert in criminal psychology.”

Helen tries to advise Lana on dealing with Francis, telling her she has to act like “the sun shines out of his ass” and to “make him feel like the best ideas are his.” Much like Thom telling her to give the man some slack, this doesn’t go over well. (And that’s not even getting into the weird vibe between them because they are both grieving/in love with the same man.) It also doesn’t help that Commander Francis thinks the terrorists’ next target is Buckingham Palace, whereas Lana, Helen, and the team have determined the most likely target is billionaire Webster King. 

King owns the properties the previous bombs have gone off in, and he’s getting married at his swanky estate that very day. Tons of other billionaires and greedy corporate executives will be there. It’s the perfect target. Ignoring Francis, Helen and Lana race to the estate, where they are greeted by a very smug head of security who thinks he’s done his job and there is no concern. The only new item that has arrived is the wedding cake. (But is it cake?) Lana checks out the cake, and, blessedly, it is, in fact, cake.

However, as the two head for the exit, Lana notices the bay of mobile bathrooms, one of which looks like it’s been recently repaired. Naturally, she walks over,  unscrews the cover, and finds a bomb about to go off. Always the quick thinker, Lana hitches the portoloos to a car and drives them out into an open field as fast as the vehicle will go. She’s running away as the bomb goes off. Instead of appreciating her help, King immediately starts complaining, “Better to arrive late than not to come at all.” He laments that by saving his hundreds of guests, she also destroyed his grandfather’s car, which was his “pride and joy.”

On the flip side, all this activity has managed to keep Lana occupied from dealing with her parents collapsing relationship. Her mom, Val (Tamzin Griffin), is the only one who seems to truly get how hard Lana is taking Thom’s death and comes to see her at work early on. However, from that point on, both parents keep calling Lana on her mobile as if she's not constantly walking straight into a bomb threat. (I mean, it's not like she works from home writing about TV! Of course, she hangs up on them.) Finally, after being yelled at by an ungrateful billionaire, Lana manages to go visit her parents, only to learn Val has asked for a divorce. (I guess poor Lana's stuck with Jeff as a roommate for the foreseeable.)

Alex uses his tech guru to dox Lana's full identity and shows up at her place. (Maybe Francis isn't totally wrong about the guy being a creep.) He claims his 13-year-old daughter was the victim of cyberbullying and committed suicide. However, the tech companies didn’t care and would not help him, and in his grief, Alex decided to bring the tech companies down. He swears he had no idea what kind of people he was getting involved with and never imagined anyone would be killed. His real name is Benjamin, and he promises he will do whatever he can to help her. 

Trigger Point Season 2 continues with two episodes every Thursday through September 18, 2024, on BritBox.