As the second series of Black Snow: Jack of Clubs begins, it is Moorevale, Queensland in 2003. Nadja Jacobs (Victoria Haralabidou) brings in a birthday cake for Zoe. The attendees watch the fireworks above them. Detective James Cormack (Travis Fimmel) walks down the street possibly drunk. James returns and finds Tommy Doyle (Nicholas Hope) sitting in his residence. Tommy calls him son and says he should’ve locked his door. He explains he’s there because of James’s brother. James reminds him that Richie is dead. Tommy suspects he pulled the security tapes and saw him. He says Richie owes money to some nasty people. He set him up with a job with a cellmate and it went to crap. Now, Richie has disappeared. James admits he doesn’t believe him. He wants his father to leave. Tommy claims he’s not the same man.

He believes James cares about Richie. Tommy reveals that Richie is using the name Richard Vogel now. Two police search a rundown building. Constable Matt Thorpe (Toby Carey) pulls a baton when he finds a girl with a metal pipe. Samara Kahlil (Megan Smart) tries to speak to the woman who says her name is Daisy (Lilliana Bowrey). She is seven months pregnant. Samara hears something and asks if the person who hurt her is still around. Samara and Matt begin looking for whoever is making the noise. She believes she sees someone hiding so she yells that she’s with the Moorevale Police. It’s just a pair of boots. Once she finds something, she tells Thorpe to seal off the building. James’s boss calls to ask if he’s been using his suspension productively. He’s told he’s been cleared to return to operational duty but there is one condition. James is forced to see Doctor Nina Hirsh (Ella Scott Lynch). She asks about the allegation of excessive force. James says the suspect ran and he pursued him.

He reveals there was a nine-year-old with his throat cut in the bathtub and a man in the next room eating ice cream. James tells Nina how he felt. She points out that James fractured the suspect’s ribs and broke his jaw, but James claims the stairs broke his jaw. Nina asks if he believes his dad’s release has had an impact on him. James says his dad killed his mother. He thinks it’d be odd if he wasn’t angry. Nina says he carries a weapon so she needs to make sure he’s in control of it. James denies having contact with his father since his release. He eventually arrives at the office and tells Angie Zhang (Renee Lim) that he’s returning to duty. Angie reminds him he has to keep attending the sessions. She shows him the case file for Zoe Jacobs (Jana McKinnon) who went missing in Moorvale. James arrives and wakes up Samara who is sleeping in her cruiser. They go inside and Samara shows James the bag with Zoe’s name on it. She explains that Zoe disappeared with the bag in 2003 on the night of her 21st birthday.

The building has been abandoned since 2004 after they found asbestos in the roof. James says they’ll reopen the case if they can confirm the bag belonged to Zoe. In 2003, Zoe speaks to Samara (Alana Mansour). Zoe shows her the tattoo she got. Cody Neilson (Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke) joins them. Zoe wants Cody to shower because she’s not spending hours in the studio with someone who smells bad. Zoe hears a banging when she’s alone outside. She finds a rose on her dashboard. She tells Joseph Rua (Vinnie Bennett) about the rose. Samara interrupts because Cody wants Zoe to hurry up. Then, she goes inside and does a radio show with Cody. He says he got an email from Zoe’s number one fan, deepblue32@yahoo.com. They’re still using cassettes for some reason. Zoe gets upset and asks Cody to stop reading the email. Later, they talk about the show. In private, Sam and Cody talk about finding a place. Cody says he’s not going to leave his mom and the girls alone with Brad.

When Zoe goes inside, Nadja asks her to finish the cupcakes for her father. Nadja turns off a news report about Baghdad. Leo Jacobs (Dan Spielman) enters and asks Zoe about the show last night. When Nadja says the quote was a complete mess, Leo immediately blames Will Jacobs (Josh McConville). Nadja insists it’s fine. Once Leo leaves, Nadja asks Zoe to help her clean up but Zoe wants to sleep. Zoe says she’ll be gone as soon as she gets the money Granddad left her. Nadja suggests moving out will eventually force her to grow up. Zoe goes for a run. Then, she goes swimming. Joseph yells at her and says he’s staying at Melody’s place while she’s away. He invites Zoe over to check out Melody’s record collection. In the present, James speaks to Samara about being at Zoe’s party. Samara admits she wishes people would just stop looking for Zoe. She thinks Zoe took her inheritance the money it was available and left a note saying goodbye. Her phone was active in Brisbane a week later.

James doesn’t think she just left and severed all ties with her family. James learns the forensic team finished at the radio station. They didn’t find anything to indicate foul play. James speaks to the forensics officer (Luisa Prosser) who says they managed to retrieve hair samples and fingerprints from the backpack and items inside. He learns that $25,000 is missing. Samara asks him if the money was in there. He says no. Samara suggests Zoe took what she needed to start over. They discuss whether Zoe took the money voluntarily. James invites her to come with him but she refuses. He visits the residence of Leo and Nadja Jacobs. Leo’s new wife, Gita (Amali Golden), answers the door. Gita says Nadja and Leo divorced years ago. James steps inside and speaks to them. Leo doesn’t think Zoe would’ve left him. James shows him a letter suggesting otherwise. Leo claims the guy she worked with at the radio station killed her.

Nadja arrives and speaks to James. She asks why he’d come there first when she’s the one who has been looking for Zoe for all these years. Nadja claims Leo wants to forget she existed. Leo says he was busy raising their son who is still alive. Nadja doesn’t want to believe Zoe is dead. Leo claims Nadja is ashamed because she drove Zoe out of their house. In a flashback, Zoe returns home and finds Nadja and Leo arguing. She takes care of her younger brother. Then, she speaks to Cody. When they go into the back, Zoe learns that Cody sleeps there on Tuesdays after his solo shows. Cody thanks her for looking after his stuff. He confesses that they got evicted. Zoe offers to get her dad to help, but Cody thinks it’s already done. They see Brad (Radek Jonak) drinking outside when they arrive. Cody offers to hang out tonight. Zoe says she can’t because she needs to study. Cody says she doesn’t need uni because she can get a job with her dad. He thinks she’ll take the money like everything else does.

Cody says you can’t rage against the machine when you are the machine. Zoe gets upset and curses him before leaving. Later, Zoe hangs out with Joseph who asks her to promise not to go just yet. Zoe returns and joins Will outside while her parents fight. Will admits his brother isn’t easy to live with. Zoe says she’s over it and she’ll get her inheritance in a week. She might take off and see the world. Zoe realizes how stupid her fight with Cody was. She finds out that Will has drugs. He asks her not to tell her dad. Zoe pleads with him to get her some for her 21st. Will says he’ll think about it. Zoe tries to visit Cody only to learn he’s out. Brad invites her in for a drink. Mandy Neilson (Alice Ansara) speaks to Zoe. She says Cody had to get some stuff from the old place. Mandy claims she’s fine. Zoe leaves and goes looking for Cody. She finds out that he’s hung himself. In the present, Nadja grills James about the evidence that reopened the case.

They go to an encampment that Nadja has called home for about a year. Val (Paula Nazarski) comes over to speak with them. James leaves moments later. James returns and goes through the evidence. He looks at a pamphlet for Mont Vista Estates. James also finds drugs and a receipt from Al’s Convenience Store. Samara tells him the store was in the same strip as the radio station. James says the timeline is funny. He shows her how her phone left her house and ended up at the service station. James wonders if it was only her phone. Later, James listens to the radio show and follows his father. James watches his dad give money to a homeless man before continuing on his way. Samara gets a call from an unknown number. She hears breathing on the other end. Samara says Zoe’s name before saying she knows it’s her. She asks where she is. The call ends.

 

Black Snow Review

The opening episode of Black Snow’s second season started off okay although it leaves a lot to be desired. There’s a lot going on here with many separate stories meaning the core story moves at a snail’s pace. This makes things a little boring because some aspects of the show are less interesting than others.

Another issue here is the overall lack of originality in the story. Travis Fimmel’s character and performances are the only things setting Black Snow apart from so many other shows in an already bloated genre. The victim had family drama and wanted to get away from everything.

She was involved in a relationship with one guy with a possible link to another guy. Even the character of James Cormack is a little cliché with all personal drama, shrink visit, and so on. It just feels like we’ve been through this before and we can pretty much figure out what red herrings we’ll encounter before we reach the conclusion.

A bigger issue here is the casting of the Samara Kahlil character. It really looks like very little effort was put into that at all and it just about ruins the believability of the time jumps. It’s unfortunate but Megan Smart and Alana Mansour look pretty much nothing alike. It might even take viewers a bit to realize they’re playing the same character because of the visible differences.

At this point, it would actually make more sense if Samara was the killer and she switched places with someone else at some point. The series may actually be more compelling if it focused more on James Cormack and his family dramas because the Zoe storyline is fairly bland and they’ve given us no reason to care about her or where she may be.

In fact, Zoe and her whole family are a bit unsympathetic in the opening episode. This is Travis Fimmel’s show and that seems to be even clearer in the second series. However, it was a bit odd that James didn’t do any background research before jumping in. Surely, he would’ve known about Leo and Nadja’s split.

Hopefully, James’s father and brother receive a lot more screen time than the investigation into Zoe’s disappearance. The opening episode scores a 6 out of 10. Recaps of Black Snow can be found here. Find out how to support our independent site at this link. Learn more about advertising with us here. Join the discussion here.