Joe's feeling the heat in this week's episode of Special Ops: Lioness, "The Choice Of Failure," which finds her not only keeping an eye on Cruz and Aaliyah's antics in the Hamptons, but also dealing with an emergency back home. There's also the little matter of how she lent her crew out for an unsanctioned extraction down in Texas in Episode 3, which, of course, has come back to bite her in the ass. Things aren't all sunshine and roses for the rest of the Lioness crew either, and Cruz is attacked when she least expects it. We're halfway through the show's first season, though, so we have to think the drama is only going to ramp up from here.
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Another episode penned by Taylor Sheridan and directed by Anthony Byrne (The Last Kingdom, Peaky Blinders), "The Choice of Failure" is an action-packed ride for the audience as well as the major Lioness players until the closing scene. Below, we dive into everything that happened this week and offer up a few questions and predictions about what's to come.
Warning: Spoilers ahead for Special Ops: Lioness season 1, episode 4
Cruz hits the beach
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When last we saw Cruz (Laysla de Oliveira), she was whisked away to parts unknown via private jet. As it turns out, she was Hamptons bound, and this week we get to see her partying it up on the beach with her mark Aaliyah (1883's Stephanie Nur), her fiancé Ehsan, and the rest of the hanger-on gang. I still question how Aaliyah doesn't know that Cruz isn't what she seems, given how often she seems awkward or confused by questions about the backstory she offered up, but somehow she's still managing to skate through, even becoming privy to a little bit of gossip about how, actually, Aaliyah really doesn't want to get married, but it's her father's decision.
There are lots of eyes on Cruz this whole time, from security spotters on the girls' team to Cruz's crew, which is stationed both on the beach and on a yacht. It's there that they get a good glimpse at Aaliyah's intended, who they realize is part of the Saudi royal family. Why, Joe (Zoe Saldana) asks, would a Saudi royal want to marry the daughter of a known terrorist, especially considering it's an arranged marriage and not a love match? We're not sure yet, but it doesn't feel like things are on the up and up.
Joe feels the heat
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While on the boat, Joe gets a call from Kyle (Thad Luckinbill), who led part of her crew into danger last week in Texas. It's clear that Joe didn't really know what she was agreeing to when she lent the firepower and now Kyle is feeling the heat, so he decides to sell her down the river, telling Kaitlyn (Nicole Kidman) and Byron Westfield (Jack Ryan's Michael Kelly) that it was part of the Lioness gang.
Kyle tries to sell the op by saying that it was to thwart a group of Al-Qaeda terrorists who are holed up in Chihuahua and bound for the states, and Kaitlyn says that while she can maybe sell that to the government and the people down the road, if it's not true, everyone's in deep, deep shit. She heads off to meet up with Joe, who you know is going to get put through the wringer. We finally see them rendez-vous at the end of the episode, and really all Joe does is vent and muse about how Kaitlyn and her husband Errol (Weeds alum Martin Donovan) were able to raise a nice family and have a good marriage, a conceit that—given what we saw of them last week—feels pretty false.
Kate crashes
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Speaking of Joe's home drama: While riding in a car with a bunch of distracted, texting teen girls, her daughter Kate (Road House's Hannah Love Lanier) is T-Boned. She's in the back passenger seat, so she doesn't get the worst of it—her friend Holly, who we presume was the driver, dies—but she comes away with a broken femur, a few cracked vertebrae, and a concussion. She also finds out she's pregnant—or, rather, her dad Neil (Dave Annable) finds out when his doctor friend runs Kate's blood pre-surgery.
Kate is just 14, and there's a good chance the fetus isn't viable after all the trauma and anesthesia, but her dad tells her she'll have a choice to make once her surgery is over. He also gives her the business, telling her that she broke their pact not just by having sex but by riding in cars with teenagers, something that he and Joe had strictly forbidden. She apologizes, but he says, "At least you can learn the consequences of your actions while still benefiting from a second chance," noting that Holly won't get one of those. That's some stone-cold parenting right there.
Cruz gets snatched
William Gray/Paramount+
After the beach, the Hamptons gang gets dolled up to head out to eat at a club chock full of investment bankers. Joe's on hand inside to keep an eye on Cruz, but she looks away for a second when she gets the news about Kate's pregnancy, and some dude roofies Cruz's drink. When she starts to look faint, he walks her out of an exit. Luckily Joe spots him, and the crew uses Cruz's tracker to trace them into the woods. There, the crew pounces on the rapist just as he's getting his pants down, delivering not just a pretty good beating and some well-placed crotch stomps, but also a threat that, if he tells anyone at the hospital, he'll inevitably end up at that he saw them, that he'll end up dead. You've got to believe it's true, too, especially once they rip out a big chunk of his hair "for DNA" and take his ID.
The crew wakes Cruz with a shot of adrenaline, an IV, and some water, but she's pretty badly messed up. Regardless, she thinks she has to get back to the house with the marks ASAP, though Joe wavers, saying it was too soon to send her into clandestine work. A newly arrived Kaitlyn also seems dubious, but Joe gives in when Cruz drops the news about Aaliyah's wedding happening in Dubai, where the team will be able to protect her. Joe tells Kaitlyn that they've "never had anyone this close to a tier one target before," and Kaitlyn begrudgingly agrees, though later, in the car, she tells Joe the harsh truth that her team is "on border patrol surveillance footage performing a hot extraction with multiple casualties." Things could get really hot for them really quickly. Here's hoping they don't all end up doing time in some Texas prison.
Questions and predictions
We've learned a lot about the Lioness gang in these past four episodes, but there are still a few unknowns. Here are some questions we have about what's to come, plus a prediction about where things could go.
- Why is a Saudi royal marrying the daughter of a known terrorist? We have to imagine there's some big money at play in regards to Aaliyah's wedding, but why? Who's funding who, and for what purpose? And how aware is Aaliyah about any of it?
- Will Joe stick it out in the service? On the phone, Joe tells Neil that, "we're sacrificing our children. We're trading them for professions," a statement that he agrees with. It feels like something has to give in their relationship and with their family, and I'm wondering if that means that Joe will leave Lioness. Neil's work with sick kids is admirable and close to home, and Joe's constant travel means she's put a lot on his plate already. Could she maybe assume a role like Kaitlyn's instead and make it home more nights than not? And is that even something she wants?
- Is anyone onto Cruz? I've said this before, but I'm still skeptical that no one on Aaliyah's team is at least a little convinced that Cruz is up to no good. They're surveilling her, so they don't entirely believe her, but do they know why she's really there?
- Prediction: Something goes down at Aaliyah's wedding. We know now that Aaliyah is getting married in Dubai and that Cruz will no doubt get an invitation to the inner circle. The team thinks it'll be able to protect her there, but I bet she'll be asked to investigate the reasons behind the wedding, the dealings happening behind closed, male doors, and everything else. It's a hairy situation, to say the least, and it could be a dangerous one as well.
New episodes of Special Ops: Lioness premiere Sundays on Paramount+.
