Critic’s Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
4.5
If you’re not a Cousin Randy fan after Tracker Season 2 Episode 17, you’re missing out because the character has been a brilliant addition to the Tracker family.
Bobby’s cousin has mostly been relegated to Bobby-like duties since he was introduced this season, but he’s made an impact with his funny one-liners and generally low-key attitude, which is in major contrast to Colter’s more stoic approach.
The two have made a good team thus far, so teaming them up in person was a clever decision. It paid off in delivering one of the funnier episodes of the series in a while.
Chris Lee has made the absolute most of his time on Tracker Season 2, no matter how big or small the appearance each week.
Justin Hartley could have chemistry with a brick wall, so it’s safe to pair him up with just about anyone and expect something good to come from it, but Colter and Randy’s chemistry surpassed anything I could have hoped for.
As nice as it can be to see Colter bonding with people similar to him, like we’ve seen numerous times this season with fellow survivalists or other reward seekers, it’s better to see him paired up with people whose personalities seem entirely at odds with his.
By nature, Colter is very realistic and even-keeled. I’m not sure he’s ever once thought about manifesting anything in his life. Not that he would ever discredit that, either.
Colter’s a lot of things, but even when he wants to be his judgiest self, he’s humble enough to acknowledge that there are other ways of thinking.
Randy is optimistic and a genius techie, and he and Colter bounce off each other very well. Their buddy-cop routine turned out to be such a fun vibe in a very fun hour.
And it’s one the series desperately needing coming out of Tracker Season 2 Episode 16, which was one of the worst of the series short run.
Everybody has someone who got away, according to the ultimate romantic Randy, and when Megan came calling after a seemingly Hangover-type night and discovered her best friend Sonya was missing.
The cases where Colter helps someone from his little team are usually some of the better ones, and this one was immediately great because we were dropped into Reno, Nevada, and Colter didn’t need to go deep in the woods for once!
When Megan woke up and realized she couldn’t remember much of the night before, it became very likely she was drugged, and with a missing best friend, it did start to feel like we were watching a small screen version of The Hangover without the lion or Bradley Cooper.
As in The Hangover, the very first thing to do when you’re trying to find anything is to re-trace your steps, and for Megan, that meant returning to the club from the night before, which was able to paint a much bigger picture of what potentially happened.
Colter’s ability to walk into pretty much any place and just get information is always outstanding, but the people at the club weren’t having it.
But Colter and company were able to start piecing together the fact that Megan’s ex-Troy had something to do with everything that happened that night.
Even on the road, Randy used his computer skills for good use, and I’ve mentioned this numerous times in the past, but as good as Colter is, he can’t do it all without the help of his trusted people.
Everything from Colter finding Ricky The Stallion in the trunk of Troy’s car to heading to the strip club for more information was hilarious for how great Justin Hartley plays these kinds of scenes.
He does so much with his facial expressions, and the whole conversation with the lady doing the stripper auditions was peak comedy.
In most Tracker episodes, there’s always a turning point where we get on the path of the REAL person Colter needs to track down, and it was never going to be Troy.
Troy taking off with Sonya didn’t make any sense on the surface, and once Randy ran into him at the hospital, that only solidified that Troy had been a red herring all along.
It wouldn’t be a trip to a casino town like Reno with a trip to a wedding chapel, now would it? And finding out that Sonya got married added an extra layer to things because who the hell did she marry?
The crew got lucky that the couple splurged for the video package, and whoever was filming ignored the fact that women were being drugged and men were in there with guns! That’s comforting.
I didn’t love how Randy referred to Sonya the entire hour because how often did we need to be reminded she was “crazy?”
And sure, impulsively getting hitched to a random man you met at a strip club isn’t a sign of stellar life choices, but she didn’t know she was getting involved with a murderous family and instead just thought she was having a good time.
The way Megan talked about her, she wasn’t a bad person or anything of the sort, but it did sound like she tended to get into some sticky situations. But it was more than clear that Megan adored her, so she called Randy because she trusted him and knew he’d do his best to help her find her best friend.
Nicholas and Peter were a strange set of brothers.
Sonya was truly at the wrong place and the wrong time because if she had gotten out of there a few minutes earlier, she would have found Megan, gotten an annulment, and hopefully never had to see those brothers again.
But once she witnessed the elder brother shooting a man dead, she became a liability and a loose end, thus her kidnapping.
Colter getting into the house, untying Peter, and then getting back outside to the car was peak Colter mixed in with the power of television because how?
Randy getting picked up and sent inside the house was obviously going to happen since he wasn’t even trying to be sneaky sitting right outside the gates, but he really did his best to try to talk himself out of being killed.
He did enough for them to leave him alone for a few minutes, giving him enough time to escape, which was a surprise.
Seeing Randy running down the driveway had no business being as funny as it turned out.
From this point, things just sped up toward the conclusion, which has become a staple of Tracker.
You think you’re going to get some drawn-out showdown between Colter and the bad guys? Guess again!
Was anyone else majorly confused about what happened between Sonya and those men in the field before the guys showed up? Had we not gotten that information dump from Sonya in the car, I would have remained confused because it didn’t make any sense.
But it didn’t need to make sense, I guess, because everything was leading to a showdown with Nicholas. It may have been over too quickly, but the way they decided to have all four of them strike in unison to take out those men was great.
Randy finally got to show off his moves, and Sonya and Megan got to tag team the one guy. Then Colter stepped in to save Randy’s life. It was a perfect way to end a truly great storyline.
Randy and Megan danced around things the whole hour because they had more important things to figure out besides their lingering feelings for one another. And while we never got the whole picture of what happened with them, you could see the feelings were still there.
If we’re honest with ourselves, we will likely never see or hear from Megan again, but I like to think that she and Randy will find their way back to each other and learn from their past mistakes to achieve a different outcome this time.
Maybe it’ll work out, or maybe it won’t, but at least they’ll have tried since love was never their issue.
Tracker Notes
- So, who’s the one that got away for Colter? Or THE ONE out there for him? I think the show wants us to believe it’s Billie, but I’m still not convinced.
- While it’s nice to see Bobby back, something has been off since he returned. Or I’m reading too much into things!
- Colter reminiscing about his childhood at the gun store was very random, but considering only a few hours remain, we must be getting closer to the return of the Shaw family drama! Please?
This one was a winner, and I typically like the darker hours.
They desperately needed something a little lighter, and this one delivered!
Agree? Disagree? Have a theory?
Let us know in the comments, or share this article with someone who will want to argue about it with you. That’s what makes it fun.
So come chat!
You can watch Tracker on CBS at 8/7c on Sundays.
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