Summary
It’s official: Lioness Season 2 is excelling over the first installment with excellent writing and heightened stakes.
Lioness Season 2, Episode 6 seriously considers the following: What if Joe has truly exhausted this life? What if a life-threatening situation makes her believe she has no more to give?
And the start of “2381” hints at Joe’s psyche. Following the failed excursion at the U.S.-Mexican Border to save a young girl who was being human trafficked, Joe looks exhausted and shellshocked. The energy seems sapped from her soul. A lot of people died after she broke various protocols to save a young girl that she tracked.
She immediately has to provide a cover story for the press, which Bobby squeezes out. They have to give a statement that means nothing: “Details of what happened cannot be revealed as it will risk the lives of undercover agents.”
Little did Joe know at this point that she was carrying a life-threatening injury-adrenaline is one hell of a drug.
Josie Finally Tells Her Father The Truth
We can all admit that, due to inter-agency and geopolitics, Josie’s mission in Lioness Season 2 is paper thin and set up for failure, and reality hits in Episode 6.
Josie understandably is struggling with the fact that she’s about to destroy her father and change the course of her family’s future forever. Cruz, the experienced counterpart, tells Josie to hold on to her fondest memory of her father to remind her that he is not the same person.
Josie plucks up the courage and tells her father, Pablo Carrillo, the real reason that she has been discharged and how the CIA wants to use her to get closer to his brother, Alvaro Carrillo, the cartel leader. She raises how the CIA knows that his wealth is not a coincidence and will likely be funded by the Mexican cartel.
This must have shocked Pablo as he had expected Josie to tell him Cruz was her girlfriend. The shock turns to anger as he enters a rant about the CIA and how they helped increase heroin in America and how they do not care about drugs or the Congresswoman.
The DEA compromises the Lioness Mission
We always knew Cruz would have to intervene, especially when Pabo kept slapping his daughter Josie after bringing up the real purpose of being at home. However, episode 6 brings a twist that no one saw coming, but ideally, the CIA should have seen it from a mile away.
When Cruz enters the scene and throws Pablo to the ground, she gives him the reality of his predicament. She states that she knows he launders money for the cartel and gives him two options:
- He’s arrested.
- Reveal the foreign operative who planned the kidnapping of the US Congresswoman.
Cruz makes it clear that they do not care about his brother, the cartel leader and offers Pablo witness protection for him and his family.
However, the mission turns on its head when the QRF team finds out that one of the maids is wired. They ring Joe on her personal phone (as she did not realize her secure work phone was destroyed during the last mission) and tell her the cover is blown and they need to reinvent the deal. The maid’s contact is DEA officer Gutierrez. Joe asks Cruz and the QRF team to move Pablo and the maid to a secure place.
Joe Is In Real Trouble With Life-Threatening Injury
While returning on a plane back to the CIA (they are furious at her at this point for partaking in an unauthorized mission), Joe realizes she’s severely hurt from a gunshot. She rings Kaitlyn and asks for a surgical response team as soon as she lands – it’s a dark wound with no exit. In desperate measures, the co-pilot provides medical assistance to provide temporary relief.
Fearing for her life, Joe calls her husband Neal and tells him that the girls will need him before falling unconscious, leaving Neal an absolute mess.
It’s certainly a watershed moment for Lioness, and it teases with the idea that Joe is either going to die or she’s going to be out of action for life. But with Cruz’s importance growing, they may be fronting the passing of the baton.
A Shitshow Moment For The US Government
The meeting with the United States Secretary of State, Edwin Mullins, after the disaster at the border and the failings of the Lioness mission, may be the best scene in Season 2 after the “DO YOU LOVE YOUR COUNTRY” moment.
Kaitlyn and Byron meet with Edwin and the government officials, but they are already watching the news: there’s a joint statement from the FBI, DOJ, and DEA on CBA News about multiple agents killed at the border, but that information cannot be revealed at it would risk the lives of more undercover agents. It’s declared the largest loss of life for a federal agency for 30 years.
What we are witnessing here is a shitshow of epic proportions. What follows is a tense and heated argument and plenty of pointing fingers – the usual political behavior we’d expect from Western governments: shifting accountability. You can tell Byron gets paid an awful amount of money because he handles it well, defending himself in key areas and attempting to reroute the talks to the critical mission.
But then we learn why Edwin Mullins is the United States Secretary of State. He’s a calm figure. He refocuses conversations on the mission and wants to know if the operation is executable.
Kaitlyn provides a recap from the audience and Edwin:
The Lioness is embedded, but the mission is compromised. Security personnel already knew of their presence because the DEA agent had an informant working in the Carrillo estate. The informant withheld information intentionally. QRF Team One has removed Carrillo and the informant, and QRF Team Two has the DEA agent in custody. She also sadly announces that there’s no prognosis on Joe’s condition.
Edwin Mullins knows a successful mission will benefit their efforts against the Chinese, but it’s not worth anything if public perception is different. However, Byron says they cannot slow down, given their predicament. He suggests transporting Josie and Pablo Carrillo to Mexico to meet the cartel leader.
Joe learns of her life-threatening injury after the shock wears off, and Kaitlyn and Byron have to improvise on the mission in Lioness Season 2, Episode 6 (Paramount)
Edwin leaves the room, presumably so unauthorized decisions can be made without him witnessing it, protecting his job. The government officials tell Kaitlyn and Byron that they cannot authorize the next phase of the mission, but that does not mean it should not happen (this is an implied greenlight without official authorization).
The QRF Team Has a Loophole To Torture Gutierrez
Kyle and the QRF team torture Gutierrez to obtain information from him. They use a technicality that he aided the enemy of the state to follow through with the interrogation and torture.
Kaitlyn enters the room, and she lists all of his family members, including his children. She asks him to spare the fate of his family and to surrender all the information he has. Gutierrez reminds Kaitlyn that half his team is dead, including the best man from his wedding. He explains that the maid at the Carrillo estate nannied his oldest son, and he did not wire her until the CIA got involved. He claims to have no information from her as Pablo does zero business at his house; no phone calls, emails, nothing. He then raises how difficult it is to prove that Pablo launders for the carte,l which led to his house purchase because a man named “Peter Ramon” built the house and left it to him as part of the will – there’s not a shred of evidence to how he gained that house.
Kaitlyn listens intently but tells the QRF team to polygraph him.
It’s at this moment that Kaitlyn reveals to the team that Joe is on the way to Walter Reed Hospital, which means her condition is severe. She tells them that if Gutierrez fails the polygraph, dump him in the river. She reminds Gutierrez that Joe is her best friend.
Meanwhile, Pablo’s wife is with the other QRF team and wants to know where her husband is. Lioness Season 2, Episode 6 ends with Josie looking tearful while her father looks at her angrily.
It could not have been predicted back in Lioness Season 1 that the second season would reach these heights, but it did. The story has reached a boiling point. There’s a real chance of failure. The writing has excelled in Season 2.
Read More: Lioness Season 2, Episode 7 Recap
