As the second episode of Redemption begins, Colette Cunningham (Paula Malcomson) wakes up, gets out of bed, and looks through the black bag again. After the intro, Colette looks through the family’s overdue bills. When Cara (Abby Fitz) and Liam (Evan O’Connor) join her for breakfast, Cara seems very standoffish. She offers to make them something for lunch before noticing that Cara’s boyfriend Ross (Scott Graham) has been cursing her through texts. Cara rushes out the door and ignores Colette’s offer to walk with her. Colette walks with Liam and tells him something his mom did to a boy. She knew how to stand up for herself. Before he goes, he insists he is okay and it is fine to be going back to the school this son. They also see Cara arguing with her boyfriend. Liam says they fight a lot and Ross isn’t in uniform because he is expelled.

Colette goes into the office where she sits down with Jane Connolly (Siobhan McSweeney). She says the funeral went as well as these things go. Colette doesn’t need more time off because it has been a relief to be back. She is asked about not charging Aisling from the Loftus Hill case despite Jane telling her to do so. Colette says she is just a kid at 15 so it would’ve been too harsh to throw the book at her. Jane asks if she expected her officers to do what she said in Liverpool. Siobhan Wilson (Thaddea Graham) apologizes to Colette for being three minutes later. Colette tells her that Anthony Blake is in critical condition after being stabbed. Siobhan asks if she looks like crap because she had a massive row with her girlfriend last night. Priya is annoyed at her for not holding her hand in front of her parents.

She just doesn’t know if her parents are there yet. Colette tells her that they love her so they’ll come around. They can get her a coffee at the hospital. Moments later, they arrive at the hospital to talk to Dr. Hashemi (Trevor Kaneswaran) about Anthony Blake. Colette realizes she is at the hospital where her daughter worked. CT scans show contusions on both of his wrists as well as multiple stab wounds to his abdomen and chest. If he had to guess, he’d say a kitchen knife caused the wounds. He is in an induced coma so they won’t be able to speak to him, but they can try talking to his mother Fiona Blake. He warns them that she is in a state because she is going through withdrawal. She was taking Oxycodone. A nurse tells him that Fiona is hyperventilating and tachycardic.

Colette asks Siobhan to get in touch with social protection to see if the family is known to them or if there is a history of domestic abuse. Siobhan also promises to text her when Fiona comes to. Colette speaks to Stacey’s boss who gives her some of her daughter’s belongings. It is standard procedure to suspend employees when an investigation is being carried out. They had discovered that some prescription medication has gone missing and Stacey’s records didn’t tally with her stock list. About four or five bottles were missing. The hospital is no longer carrying out an investigation into Stacey since they didn’t find any evidence that she stole anything. They only recently decided to drop Stacey from the investigation.

Colette asks whether she thought this might’ve been playing on her mind. Moments later, Colette goes through her daughter’s items. She finds a picture of Stacey with another employee and begins looking for that woman. She sits down with Debbie Gleeson (Jade Jordan) as she tries to piece together what happened. Stacey had her struggles, but Debbie didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. It must’ve been hard for Stacey once she was suspended without pay. Colette wonders if Stacey might’ve done something illegal to make ends meet. Debbie admits that she doesn’t know because they had drifted apart. She hadn’t heard from Stacey in ages so she was surprised when she called and asked her to watch the kids. Debbie didn’t really know Eoin. She promises to pop over soon to see the kids before leaving.

Cara storms out of class after refusing to remove her earbuds. Liam finds her in the bathroom stall once Niamh tells him that she was freaking out in class. He comforts her while Fiona Blake (Louise McCann) wakes up. She learns that Anthony is unconscious but alive. Fiona says she was watching television when she heard banging upstairs. She also heard screams. When she ran into Anthony’s room, she found blood everywhere around two. He was lying there and not moving. After Siobhan says she called for an ambulance at 5:43 AM, Fiona changes the time to five. She claims there was a man upstairs, but he ran past her and she didn’t get to see his face. Colette explains that Anthony has been put into an induced coma because someone hurt him very, very badly.

They need to find out who, but Fiona isn’t willing to say. Outside, Siobhan confirms she was on social protection’s radar for drugs but nothing about domestic abuse. Colette calls Patrick (Keith McErlean) to tell him what Fiona had to say. Patrick doesn’t think anyone could’ve gained access to the home without using the front door. They’re speaking to neighbors and getting local CCTV footage. At school, Kevin (Sean Hughes) sits down with Liam to show him the video game Grand Turismo that came yesterday. Liam asks what they’re waiting for since there is no one at his place. Colette meets with Patrick who says a neighbor saw Fiona’s boyfriend, Jay McPherson, enter the house around midnight. Patrick put the word out so he’ll turn up. As for the knife, they’ve searched the gardens and are going through the bins now. Patrick heard that she was Stacey’s mother and it didn’t click the other day.

He tells her he is sorry for her loss. While they find and deal with the knife, Liam plays the video game with Kevin. It looks like someone is watching them from the doorway. When Colette gets back, she finds Eoin (Moe Dunford) in the house getting some of his stuff from Stacey’s room. He admits that Stacey gave him keys to get inside. When they sit down, Eoin is a bit shocked because Stacey never talked about her mother. He always assumed that her mother was dead. Colette says they didn’t see much of each other because she was in Liverpool. Eoin believes they were together for nine months or so. When she asks whether they were happy, Eoin says they were solid. It breaks him that she was in so much pain. Colette asks how Stacey felt about being suspended.

She was devastated since she had worked there for years. Eoin isn’t sure what to make of the allegations, but it doesn’t seem like something she’d do. He doesn’t know of any reasons for Stacey to steal the drugs. The kids’ dad did not pay maintenance. Stacey was angry that he was demanding access to see the kids again. Later, she meets with Shane Kinsella (Sean Duggan) to talk to him about the ex who was supposedly in London. Shane makes it clear that there is little chance he’ll swoop in and take the kids. Colette just wants what is best for the kids. If the court accepts her application, she’ll receive full custodial rights. Shane also received a letter from St. Peter’s General Hospital saying they’ve shut down the investigation into Stacey. Shane says they were fighting the suspension since she was suspended for a minor discrepancy.

Plus, they suspended her without pay and that is illegal. Since Stacey had a solid case, he believes he could’ve gotten her decent compensation. By the time she gets back in her car, she receives a call from Cara. Once she picked her up, Cara asks her to just drive since she doesn’t want to talk. She won’t even tell her how much she has had to drink. Colette doesn’t mind driving her home, but she’d like to know what happened. She asks about the test message from this morning leading Cara to believe she has been reading her messages. Colette is adamant that she needs to know if someone is threatening her. Cara says it was just Ross being a dick although it isn’t any of her business. Cara gets sick and throws up before they make it home. Colette tends to her and puts her to bed. Then, she uses the computer to search for drug thefts.

She finds an article about a Hibernian pharmaceutical van being robbed in a drug heist. In the morning, Colette tells Cara her mother used to drink from the cartoon too. Cara thanks her for the glass of orange juice. She runs into Ross later and says she didn’t blurt out their secrets to everyone. He apologizes and promises he wanted to be there, but it wasn’t his fault they rostered him on at the pub. She wanted him there to have some fun and forget everything. At work, Colette tries to access information about the pharmaceutical heist, but it is only accessible to Organized Crime. Patrick tells her that he just checked the forensics on the Blake case and will get it to her right away. She asks what she should do if she wants to find out about a case being handled by Organized Crime.

He warns her that they’re not great at sharing so they’d probably take it off her hands. Siobhan pulls her away. They question Fiona in an interview room as she denies Jay being at her house when Anthony was stabbed. She is shown CCTV of a man they believe is Jay only for her to claim she doesn’t know who it is. She is asked about the home delivery Jay ordered to her house. She claims that was probably her using his card. Colette reminds her that Anthony is in critical condition and could die. He is her son and it could turn into a murder inquiry. Fiona eventually says he was angry after they finished the gear they had. He thought a bit more would do the trick, but he had hidden it. Anthony hides it to try to stop her from using it. Fiona told him time and again not to mess with her gear because it winds her up.

It winds Jay up too and he wasn’t going to stand for it. He grabbed the knife, went upstairs, and Fiona heard a scream. Once she entered the room, she saw Jay standing over him and stabbing him. Colette asks who was holding Anthony down. Fiona pretends to know nothing before Patrick interrupts. He tells Siobhan and Colette that they’ve found Jay and the prints are back. They interview Jay (Maghnus Foy) who claims Fiona wouldn’t say he stabbed Anthony. Colette reveals his fingerprints were on the knife although Fiona’s were. However, Anthony had extensive bruising on his wrists and chest because he struggled against his attacker. Colette believes it would be difficult to hold down a 6’2” lad while driving a knife in his chest. She accuses him of holding Anthony down while his mother stabbed him. Jay eventually admits to it while saying Anthony got everything he deserved.

Before the interview ends, she reminds him that he was just a kid. She gets a call from the hospital and immediately tells Fiona that Anthony has died. Later, Jane joins Colette and says some people just shouldn’t have kids. Colette argues that she wasn’t a bad mother. Jane promises she didn’t mean to imply that. Colette knows and asks for a cigarette. She says you sometimes don’t realize the mistakes you make until it is too late. As Colette gets home, she finds that the home has been ransacked and nobody is home. The black bag is still under the couch where she put it. She dumps everything out onto the table and finds a strange key among the drugs and money.

 

Redemption Review

While Redemption isn’t perfect, it is a decent drama that is progressively improving with each episode. The acting from the main characters especially Paula Malcomson is good although the accent has been criticized. Certain aspects of the story are difficult to believe, but some things can be overlooked if the story and action are good enough.

Some of the dialogue is odd and out of place as if it was just added to tick boxes. In a way, I wish it would focus on Stacey’s case more. On the other hand, the two side cases have been good so far. The second episode scores a 6.5 out of 10. Catch up with past recaps of Redemption on Reel Mockery here. Find out how to support our work at this link.