‘Tracker’ Season 3 Episode 3 Recap: Colter Shaw’s Most Horrifying Episode To Date Goes Back to Business

t’s a bit too late to say “Happy Halloween,” but this week’s episode of Tracker leans into the late October festivities as Colter Shaw (Justin Hartley) has returned to his regularly scheduled program. After the two-part opener that pushed our hero back into the CBS spotlight, we couldn’t be happier to see our favorite rewardist back on the job. This one goes in a bit of a strange direction, so here’s what you need to know about the third episode of Season 3, “First Fire.”

“First Fire” Starts Off as a Halloween Episode of ‘Tracker’

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“First Fire” begins in a psychiatric hospital in Wyndam, Massachussetts, on Halloween, and it’s definitely the scariest thing we could think of a Halloween-centric episode of Tracker. We’ve never really had a Halloween episode of the show before, and while there have been a few Colter Shaw adventures that have pushed the boundaries of network TV horror (looking at you “The Mercy Seat”), this one takes the idea in a completely different direction. After a nurse is killed by a patient named Heston Koontz (Samuel Hoeksema), who was once convicted of burning an entire family alive, Colter arrives in town to investigate. Meeting with Heston’s parents, Lawrence (Taylor Nichols) and Molly (Molly Hagan, of Walker fame), who lay out Heston’s slow mental decine. Eventually, Heston became obsessed with Emily Collins (Lisa Kimberley), and they’re afraid that, now that he’s escaped, he’ll be after her again. After meeting with Detective Dundee (Derek Richardson), Colter comes to the conclusion that Heston was working with an accomplice to escape, and it all feels like the 2018 Halloween.

Upon finding an employee keycard at the scene of the crime, Randy (Chris Lee) helps Colter track down a man named Bill Prugalidad, who also ran Bible studies at the facility. But things get weird when Colter pulls up at Prugalidad’s place. Heading some preaching from a local radio station, he enters the property and finds a shed out back. Colter discovers Prugalidad dead, with several bullet holes in his back. As this is all going, Tracker hasn’t forgotten about Reenie (Fiona Rene). With the cast paring down between seasons, Reenie needs a new assistant to replace Velma (Abby McEnany). Enter Melany “Mel” Day (Cassady McClincy Zhang), a spry legal aid who desperately wants to work for someone like Reenie, especially after all her heroics last season. Mel’s an interesting addition considering the show’s efforts to slim down its cast, but we’re interested to see how she’ll contribute to Reenie’s legal side plot later this season.

‘Tracker’ Season 3, Episode 3 Throws In Some Bizarre Twists

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Back in Wyndam, Colter and Dundee recognize that something is wrong. Colter believes that Prugalidad has been dead for days, meaning whoever killed him has stolen his car for Heston. Heading to Emily’s after hearing nothing back from her, they find that she is missing. The only clue? The van that’s been abandoned out front, a van with a sticker with the symbol for the Sisters of the Sacred Fire, a local convent that works with the church. Colter saw this symbol first in Heston’s Bible, as well as in Prugalidad’s garage, so the TV rule of three suggests that if something is seen thrice, it’s probably important. Reenie connects this to Sister Carlotta, who lives on the convent’s grounds, and here’s where things begin to get weird. Upon arriving, they meet Sister Barbara (Karin Konoval), who protects Carlotta until Colter reveals the extent of Heston’s rampage.

In Sister Carlotta’s room, Colter finds a journal concerning the nun’s time ministering to Heston, as well as the plans for where he was being held. It isn’t long before Colter and the detective discover that Jared (John Gillich), the local groundskeeper who tried to shoo them away the moment they arrived, was also involved. This takes them to Jared’s quarters in the basement of the convent, where Colter realizes that two people were being held there against their will. As it turns out, Heston didn’t escape from Wyndam Psychiatric, he was abducted and drugged — as was Emily. Colter believes that Jared was the one who murdered the nurse, and Sister Barbara connects Jared’s secret shrine to a splinter sect called Fideles, which she thought to be stamped out long ago. The nun explains that this group took it upon themselves to take out those they believed were inhabited by demons.

‘Tracker’ Season 3, Episode 3 Opens the Door for New Cast Members

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In case you were at all concerned that Tracker Season 3 didn’t have enough cast members interacting with each other, “First Fire” makes a point to introduce Randy to Mel, bringing the two of them and Reenie all together in the same space. This is our new team, and while we can’t imagine that Mel will have much to do with Colter’s weekly adventures, it’s obvious that she’s a new face we ought to be getting used to. And if you were worried that Randy wasn’t going to stick around after his previous comments in the two-part opener, Reenie puts those fears to rest as well. “He’s staying,” she informs Mel, which appears to be news to Randy too. Guess it’s time for him to move on from the Windy City. More than that, it seems like a workplace romance may bud between Randy and Mel in the future, though the jury’s still out on that.

Pivoting back to the main plot, Colter and Dundee leave the convent, but the rewardist isn’t confident that they’re going to the right place. Though they first believe the Fideles cult is taking Heston and Emily to the original church location, they quickly put two-and-two together to see that they should’ve been (obviously) going to the site of Heston’s first fire, the one that killed Emily’s family, after all. For as smart as Colter is sometimes, you’d think that something like that would’ve been obvious from the get-go. But by the time they arrive, Sister Carlotta and the group have already begun their ritual, which includes burning their victims alive. Although Detective Dundee is wounded, Colter manages to get Emily out alive, though Heston is killed after he breaks out of his restraints and tackles the nun to the ground.

In the end, Colter doesn’t collect his reward money from Heston’s family, believing himself to be undeserving since he was not successful in bringing Heston back alive. However, before he leaves town, he manages to convince Lawrence and Molly to give Emily the reward money instead. Perhaps with that in her corner, she’ll be able to start a new life and finally move on from these horrors. We also get a bit of a tease that Detective Dundee could make it back to the show sometime in the future, especially if Colter finds himself in the Wyndam area on a new case. As far as being a semi-holiday episode, “First Fire” was a compelling mystery that felt like a bit of a riff on Halloween and your standard cult thriller, but it largely delivers in the end (even if it dumbed Colter down ever-so-slightly to get there).