This Red Eye episode 2 recap contains spoilers... When his colleague from the conference in Beijing is found dead, Matthew is convinced there's a killer aboard, but who is it? Meanwhile a shadowy figure from Whitehall has arrived at Thames houser to oversee MI5 Director General Madeline Delaney...
Who killed Steven Hurst?
At The Westminster Lux Hotel, Director Delaney and her lover Mike, who works in the CIA, discuss the Nolan case. He thinks sending the surgeon back to China was a bad idea and she agrees. “Why do you think the Chinese want this Nolan guy so badly?” wonders Max, before news filters through about the death aboard Flight 357
On the plane, Matthew urges the captain to divert the flight so the blood of the deceased passenger can be properly analysed. The captain refuses, but it’s clear Hana is becoming slightly more sympathetic to Nolan's claims of innocence.
Back in London, Jess has called the editor of the London Echo after recognising her sister Hana in the footage from Heathrow. “Will your sister talk to you on the record?” asks the newspaper's editor, Jess takes a massive risk by saying she will.
On Flight 357, Hana gets a call, but it’s not from her sister, it’s from Director Delaney’s assistant who asks if she believes the passenger died of natural causes. Matthew uses her absence to try and borrow his colleague Steven’s phone, yet Hana returns before he can use it.
Despite her doubts, Hana says there was nothing suspicious about Daniel Lomax’s demise. “Why would MI5 be interested in a passenger’s heart failure?” wonders her boss when she calls him to ask if the deceased had a pre-existing heart condition. At Thames House, Delaney discovers Lomax was a marathon-running sports teacher, so we’re guessing he didn’t.
Meanwhile, across the aisle from Matthew and Hana, a Chinese lady’s dog, which ate some of Daniel Lomax’s food, has died. Realising it’s unlikely the dog also died of a heart attack, Hana asks to speak to the captain again, yet before she can get there, the plane hits some serious turbulence.
However something far scarier is waiting downstairs, where a stewardess discovers Steven’s body. Who killed him and was the turbulence staged as a distraction while the murder was committed? We suspect so, but by who?
The captain doesn’t know and he’s soon on his way to find out what’s happened to Steven. “Did anyone see or hear him fall?” he asks, before moving the body into the flight attendant’s quarters. Hana strongly protests against moving the body, but no matter. Either way, Steven’s wife Amber blames Matthew for the ‘accident’.
“This is the second death in two hours,” says Hana. “It’s time to turn this plane around so it can be investigated, it’s a crime scene.”
Meanwhile back in London Jess has managed to get some info out of Hana’s boss with alarming ease and when she’s left alone in his office she sneaks a peek at his emails. She learns about the second death and who it was, before realising Steven and Matthew both share a connection with World Pacific Medicine.
What does the captain of Flight 357 know?
At Thames House, Delaney drills down into the facts with her team. “Why were these men ordered back to Beijing if they were only to be killed in flight?” she asks, before explaining the killer is still on board. “I want background checks on everyone on this flight. No possibility is off the table.”
In the cockpit of Flight 357, the co-pilot questions whether the turbulence was created artificially by a piece of machinery being turned off, yet receives a short and sharp rebuke from his boss. We suspect he may know what's going on and from the way he keeps gazing at the photo of his family, is being blackmailed somehow.
Yet at Thames House, Director Delaney is shocked to hear about the second death and agrees to speak to Hana on the phone. “I don’t think the deaths were accidental,” says Hana, but she’s warned there are people in the British government who were keen to see Nolan extradited.
Hana then speaks to Steven’s widow Amber, who tells her why they were flying back to China. “I think we were the only ones the girl who died talked to,” she explains, before revealing the dead girl didn’t leave with Matthew, as the police in Britain believed.
This really tweaks Hana’s suspicions and she takes Matthew downstairs to examine Steven’s body, to find a man doing something to the body. A fight ensues, which ends with Li pulling the man’s gun on him. “Easy Detective Li,” he says. “I’m officer Zhang, the Air Marshall.” He tells them the flight attendant saw Steven arguing with one of his female colleagues just before his accident. “It seemed like a break-up,” he explains.
When Mathew is finally able to examine the body, he discovers evidence that Steven’s death was no accident and that he probably had his hands bound when he died. Meanwhile upstairs Dr Kate Ward offers Steven’s wife Amber her condolences, yet it seems she was having an affair with Steven and a fight ensues. Hana tells Kate Ward she was the last person to see Steven alive. “He told me things were over between us,” she explains. “He thought it would be suspicious us both returning at the same time so I left first.” So who killed Steven then?
Meanwhile underneath Steven’s body, Matthew discovers the holdall the flight attendant stashed and pinches Steven’s phone. When Hana arrives she sends images of Steven’s body to Delaney. “Whatever’s happening is clearly bigger than you,” she says to Matthew.
Can we trust John Tennant?
Hana then receives a call from her sister asking for quotes on the story. “You tried to kickstart your career by throwing mine under the bus,” says Hana, referring to Jess’ most recent piece, before hanging up.
At Thames House, John Tennant has arrived to speak to Delaney. “You’re colouring well outside your lines on this one!” he says. “The PM just wants some oversight on this due to its delicate political implications.” It seems the Home Office has asked him to oversee all her operations.
Back on Flight 357, Kate Ward goes downstairs to check on Amber and finds her asleep next to her husband’s body. After she leaves we see someone is unscrewing the panelling of the room. We can only presume it’s the person who disappeared in the hold before the flight took off. Eeek!
