Summary
The ending of The Recruit Season 2 leaves a few loose ends, but the finale is lots of fun and offers some surprising double crosses for good measure.
If you thought the first season of The Recruit built to a chaotic conclusion, you haven’t seen anything yet. The Season 2 finale is absolutely chock full of double crosses, hair-raising turns, last-minute escapes, and split-second decisions, all of which amount to the closest thing to a happy ending this show was ever going to achieve. But I suppose that depends on who you’re rooting for.
Nevertheless, all of the narrative’s chickens come home to roost here in Episode 6, which is quite miraculously coherent given how short the season has been relative to the plot’s complexity. There are still several loose ends, and it’s hard to tell what’s an accidental oversight and what’s a deliberate tease for a sequel, but that’s the nature of the beast when it comes to Netflix finales.
There’s a lot to go over here, so let’s get on with it.
Last Minute Preparations
After the events of the penultimate episode, all roads converge in Vladivostok, Russia. Nichka is already there trying to figure out where Nan Hee is being held, while Owen, Lester, Jang Kyun, Yoo Jin, and Dawn’s Operations team arrive by boat, pretending to the Russian coast guard that they’re on a fishing expedition (Owen is still paying people off with the Agency’s money, which remains hilarious.)
The CIA is preparing for the operation too. West is pretty adamant it’s all going to go wrong, so the Agency’s main task is covering their rear ends. Salazar is forced to draft up a damning report blaming everything on Owen and Lester, who, as far as the CIA is concerned, have been operating as rogue agents for the duration of the season. We see that the NIS has prepared some similar legal excuses.
Nichka, flexing her power as a mob enforcer, has a nosy around the Yakuza compound and finds Nan Hee being stored in the closest thing to a coffin a living person will ever find themselves in. We also learn that she was kidnapped and held for ransom because she got wind of a drug deal that has now been completed, so it isn’t like the Yakuza even need her anymore.
But getting her out will prove incredibly problematic since she’s being kept in an impenetrable marina fortress surrounded by armed guards, which Nichka reports to Owen. His bright idea is for him and Jang Kyun to pose as the insurance agents again and pretend that they’ve been authorized to pay Kenta’s ridiculous asking price, luring Nan Hee out into international waters where she can be more safely snatched.
It All Goes Wrong
The plan runs thusly. With Owen and Jang Kyun aboard Kenta’s boat, Dawn’s team waiting nearby, and the CIA watching from a drone, as soon as Nan Hee’s presence is confirmed the team will swoop in and snatch her, taking down the Yakuza for good measure. None of this happens.
Owen and Jang do get aboard, and the latter has had the good sense this time to write a note on his hand telling his wife to pretend she doesn’t know him, but just as Dawn’s team is about to make their move, the Russian coast guard appears out of nowhere and they’re forced to abort. Without backup, Kenta realizes that he’s being duped and a fight breaks out. Jang is shot, and Owen is forced to leap from the boat into the water.
The CIA believes Owen was killed in the firefight, so a tearful Salazar is instructed to pad out his file with his various failings and bury it somewhere to await its inevitable discovery by the CEG. He’s the perfect fall guy. Salazar can barely square this with her conscience, and it still isn’t entirely clear even by the end whether she actually went through with this. Violet also offers to help Cho and the NIS pin everything on Owen too, so it seems like his career – and potentially his freedom – remains in jeopardy either way.
Nichka Double Crosses Owen
(L to R) Colton Dunn as Lester Kitchens, Noah Centineo as Owen Hendricks in Episode 206 of The Recruit. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2024
Owen manages to pull himself from the freezing water and take shelter in a houseboat for all of five minutes before he’s set upon by a couple of Russian goons, one of whom he’s forced to kill and the other he ties up. Owen calls Lester and tells him that he’s going after Jang Kyun and Nan Hee, so Lester offers to instruct Nichka to help. But it turns out Nichka has already sold Owen and Jang out to the FSB. The Russian coastguard turning up to ruin the operation was her doing.
Nichka goes to meet Owen and “assist” him in going after Nan Hee, but she points a gun at his back the second he turns around. If she hands an American and a South Korean intelligence agent over to the FSB she’ll be well compensated and likely promoted, which is all she cares about. But Owen is able to fight her off, knock her out, and stuff her in her own trunk.
Owen fills Lester in on Nichka playing both sides, but he’s still determined to save Nan Hee and Jang Kyun – alone, if necessary.
Nichka Kills Dawn
Director West calls Lester to tell him that they’ve cracked Jang’s dead man’s switch, but the news that he has been captured by the Russians is worrying. West thinks he’ll break under torture and reveal state secrets, so Dawn volunteers to take him out in exchange for being made Moscow Station Chief, snatching the promotion from under Lester’s nose just when it looked like they were going to let bygones be bygones.
Dawn later takes up position with a sniper rifle, ready to kill Jang as soon as Owen springs him from captivity, but Nichka, who has escaped from the trunk, finds her. Since she needs Owen and Jang alive to give to the FSB, she and Dawn get into a knife fight, which Nickha wins, leaving Dawn face down, dead, in the murky water.
Owen and Yoo Jin Save Jang Kyun and Nan Hee
Owen is able to infiltrate the airfield and rescue Jang Kyun and Nan Hee fairly easily, but it’s getting them out that proves to be the problem. Nichka arrives just in time to start all kinds of chaos as they’re trying to escape inconspicuously, leading to them rushing to the water with armed gunmen in hot pursuit.
Luckily, Yoo Jin had earlier escaped from the bathroom Lester had locked her in and saved Lester from Dodge, who Dawn had instructed to clean up any loose ends. So she arrives in the nick of time in the trawler to pick up Owen, Jang Kyun, and Nan Hee. The Russian Coast Guard give chase but, just as it seems like they have the heroes cornered, a giant U.S. Navy submarine breaks the surface, scaring the Russkies off.
Who sent the sub? I have no idea. It could be something to do with Salazar or Nyland, who had also taken a moral issue with West’s handling of the situation. Or maybe I missed something. Who knows?
Either way, Owen gets his final moment with Jang Kyun, who I reckon will finally consider him a friend. Of course, Owen is always on the job. He suggests that the CIA will fake his and Nan Hee’s deaths and give them both a comfortable life in the U.S. in exchange for some of what he knows about Korean intelligence. Owen’s recruiting him. But that’s better than prison, right?
