Inside Man – Season 1 Episode 2 Recap & Review

Episode 2

Jefferson meets with Beth but offers her a tough choice at the start of Inside Man episode 2. He allows Beth to sit in on his next case, record it, and then publish it without any alterations or censorship. But for that to happen, she can never mention her friend Janice again.

Jefferson will not be taking her case. He does so to test her moral fortitude: her friend or her career, what will she choose? Beth does what any sane person would do and chooses the latter. The reward in that option is too skewed to even think about it twice. Jefferson has a smug smile but honors his commitment. He calls her back in another hour for the case to be heard in person.

The Vicar takes bedding and gives a pair of handcuffs to Janice. He asks her to chain herself to the pipe but also says he doesn’t want it to be unpleasant for her. Ben will be back soon and that is why he does not want to leave anything to chance. He once again pleads with her to believe that the flash drive isn’t Ben’s, but Janice certainly doesn’t seem to think so. She throws her faeces in a polybag to him and asks for more plastic bags and loo paper. But a moment later, she angrily rattles the cuffs and demands to be let out. Anyway, the Skype call is her time to get out and she is confident of it.

Mary actually googles “how to kill a person”, despite the Vicar making it clear nothing will happen to her. The discussion shows how tense she is and how dire the situation is. She says that Janice will not be let out of the house in any case. That will destroy their family’s reputation and any chance of them living a normal life. Harry says he will talk to Edgar and ask him to confess. The husband-wife pair is quite united in this struggle. Jefferson’s case is up, and it is about a missing husband and father. A real estate agent wins an award and after accepting it, just vanishes from the face of the earth. Jefferson asks some questions to the wife, like “what time was it in the day”, and remarks like “a husband and wife often love each other”.

Well, Jefferson says he knows where the missing man went but where he now remains a question he cannot answer. The family is desperate for any answers that the professor can give them. He asks Beth to take Hanna’s, the wife, hand as he tells her an inevitable possibility. He might be dead and asks if she is ready to accept whatever he finds while investigating. Beth asks how Jefferson came to his findings, to which the professor replies that she needs to take a closer look at the video. He sends her on the road to do “Research” for him.

The Vicar goes to Ed’s phone and Hilde answers the door. She says he went for drinks with his friends. He confronts Ed in the bar with the flash drive and secretly records the conversation, waiting for the confession. Harry presses hard but Ed denies any knowledge of it, quivering and crying at the same time. Edgar leaves under the pressure and Harry chases after him. He asks Ed to come with him to the church, as Mary looks at a golf club and contemplates what she might have to do to keep her family safe. Beth has been sent toward Glanville. Jeff is on the phone with her throughout. He asks her to make a stop at Barny B’s, a mechanic’s stop. Barney gives Beth an envelope. He also tells her to tell Jeff that “the subject is meant to make a Skype call the next day at 9 pm”. Beth does not Jeff is secretly pursuing Janice’s case. We later see her Facebook profile open on Barney’s laptop.

Mary takes the club and a bottle of whiskey downstairs. She offers Janice the whiskey and the two women talk heart-to-heart. Janice anticipates that Mary will kill her and asks how she will get away with it. She offers her a way out. She tells Mary about the Skype call and says that Janice is the only person who can help Mary in getting away with her own murder.

Her plan is that once she gives Mary the password to sign into her account, she can cancel the call and send an apologetic email to her sister. Janice then suggests Mary can say that she went on a walking trip, where she does not contact anyone for an entire week. And that is how they get away. But surprisingly, she asks Mary to make her an offer – give something in return.

Janice then lashes out saying that she has everything to give in return – her life and freedom. Mary is sent away by Janice as she mulls over the options. Ben’s home and sees his mother lock away the cellar. He asks why but Mary is able to divert him. Ben casually remarks that Janice is home as he sees her handbag still there by the coat stand. He says he will be the one to contact Janice and leaves a voice mail for her.

In the series’ best scene yet, we see Edgar being confronted by Harry in the church with the fear of God his lash. He tries hard, so hard that Edgar falls to the ground, crying and squirming, asking for his death from God. The Vicar looks around at God’s symbols in the church and throws away his phone. He realizes his moral duty to God and instead picks up Edgar to take to his chambers.

He gives the drive to Ed and his laptop. He asks him to hide away the photos in an obscure place to make it look like they belong to him and not Ed. It is a sacrifice he must make to protect Ed and do God’s work. Jefferson’s conclusion is this: Conor, the missing man, left for the Glanville train station right after the awards and at the same time, the opera’s symphony also finished, which is audible in the video.

The reason why he was not seen by anybody was that he mixed in with the crowd of musicians wearing tuxedos leaving the concert. He then sends Beth to take one of the trains and go to Conor’s house. Beth gives Conor’s wife the envelope. It is a photo of the award that Conor received that night with some dust photoshopped over it. The wife quickly leaves from the backdoor, to which Jeff deduces that she herself murdered him because he was cheating on her.

Harry drops off Ed at his house and demands that he does not repeat this feat again. He has given up his own life to save Ed’s and he must make the most of his chance. Janice just gives away the password to Harry when he visits her downstairs. He takes the information to Mary. But she is surprised.

She says if Harry goes ahead with it, this will be the end for them together. But harry remarks that at least Ed is safe, and he has held his standards up to God. In the next scene, we see Hilde going up to Ed’s room and finding that he has committed suicide. With his body is a note that the Vicar is not a paedophile and the police are not to believe him.

The Episode Review

Mark Quartley, take a bow! The actor has delivered one of the finest moments in television this year. Edgar’s pleading scene in the church with Harry (David Tenant) shows how potent Inside Man’s arsenal of characterizations is.

If not for that scene, this episode would have been quite unwatchable. If episode 1 was forgivable, episode 2 isn’t. It hardly does anything different from what we see in the first chapter. The mistakes are repeated again and we have no tangibly excitable material. It all fell flat as things turned out to be exactly what was expected of them.