Critic’s Rating: 4.3 / 5.0
4.3
Someone decided to team Justin Hartley up with a dog on Tracker Season 2 Episode 7, and it was one of the best decisions ever made.
As Tracker continues its solid second act, this hour is less about Colter being hired to find a missing person or thing and more about him being at the right place at the right time.
Or maybe it was the wrong place, considering how many guns were pointed at him as a result of his trying to do the right thing, but that’s also par for the course at this point.
Of course, the show finally listened to me and was going to put Colter and Velma in the same room together, but on the way to Reenie’s office (where Velma lives now, apparently!), he happened to come across a sweet dog at a gas station that was far from home.
For someone who lives his life away from people and is completely comfortable with his nomad lifestyle, Colter can have a very calming presence. We’ve seen him meet countless people for the first time in the worst moments of their lives and provide comfort and care that makes them feel comfortable.
Colter did the same for Barkley, a lost dog in pain and probably impossibly confused, looking for sustenance in the trash.
You like to think that most people would see a dog with a collar and do their best to get it back to their owner, but not everyone would. Colter was obviously the person you want to find your lost pet because he immediately sought to look after Barkley and return him.
But because he’s Colter Shaw, he unknowingly got involved in a super convoluted situation involving a home invasion, stolen artifacts, and an adorable child willing to give up his hard-earned piggy bank money just to get his dog back.
Imagine you find a lost dog, and you’re just gearing up to bring him home, and suddenly, someone has broken into your car to steal said dog. My mind would be whirling, and I’d go right to the police, but Colter isn’t me or you, and he, of course, took matters into his own hands.
Colter makes a living visiting homes that have recently been broken into, but it’s good he was the one to find Barkley and get the address for the Westons because who knows how much longer they would have been tied up there before someone noticed.
Tracker’s cases typically veer from the norm, and this one was no different.
When a dog gets stolen, one of the first things you may think of is maybe it’s been taken to be sold illegally for fighting or something else nefarious, but Colter, having already seen the lengths someone would go to to get this particular dog, knew that this case was much bigger than a robbery home invasion.
But why was someone so insistent on getting Barkley? Surely, if it were to get dogs for a fighting ring or something else, then you wouldn’t go through so much trouble to get this one specific dog.
Someone needed Barkley for a reason, and Colter needed to find that connection.
Enter Bobby.
Thanks to Aidan being a kid in 2024, he had a video set-up for his gaming, and without that, they may have never made the connection to Max.
I mentioned it before, but it bears repeating: Colter is OFTEN finding himself at the front door of houses that have recently been burglarized, or murders have taken place, or any other host of situations, and the ease with which he enters, gun first, is impressive if not scary.
Colter has no idea what he’s getting himself into each time he enters, but he’s always heading right on in so he can peek around like he’s not the one entering a stranger’s home.
When I saw the picture of Barkley with the service members, it became clear that Barkley’s capture had something to do with the military. But what?
Colter’s perfect timing continued when Nate showed up and made the mistake of trying to get the drop on Colter. It’s not amusing that people with all kinds of training, whether through the military or other forms of physical combat, never stand a chance when it comes to Colter.
You may get the drop on him, but he will find a way!
Colter was a bit more trusting of Nate than I expected, and every time he turned his back to him, I held my breath because what if he was lying? It’s not like it’d be the first time Colter encountered someone lying to protect themselves during one of these cases.
He could have easily been looking for Max for his own reasons, or maybe he was connected to Lawson!
Or maybe I watch too much television because Nate was actually a lovely man who cared about Max and was genuinely concerned about his well-being.
Tracker ALWAYS adds something you’ll never guess in a million years, and this week, it was African artifacts that were of utter importance to a master criminal who took Max’s wife until Max found those pesky statues!
As things started to slot into place, one part wasn’t crystal clear immediately: why Max needed to kidnap Barkley.
What part did Barkley play in any of this?
Well, Barkley served as Max’s memory essentially because he had no recollection of where he buried those statues. Cue the dog who could lead him to the exact spot he needed.
That poor dog who was kidnapped from a loving home and forced to find a needle in a haystack, breaking free for a few precious moments to meet Colter, only to be brought out into the thorn-infested woods yet again!
Everything from there played out like a typical Tracker hour, meaning that there was a high-stakes climax involving guns and dangerous people and Colter developing a risky plan that had to work if any of those people sought to escape that situation alive.
I did not at all understand why they brought Barkley along to the meeting point with Lawson because what business does a loud dog have at a meeting like this? The reason would make itself known soon enough, but the whole meeting between Max and Lawson was kind of nonsensical from the start.
Why was Lawson so sure that Max would show up alone? He had zero backup and was a sitting duck in the situation.
Yes, he moved Chelsea as a bit of an insurance plan, but he was walking into the meet-up blind. Did they even need Nate to set up sniper-style to take him out?
Colter managed to sneak up and open the damn trunk of the truck without Lawson noticing, so he could have just shot him in the leg or something before Nate swooped him to shoot him in the head.
The whole thing was unnecessarily messy, but Barkley saved the day by tracking Chelsea’s scent, and that’s clearly what the point of all of this was about.
I’ll forgive Tracker for some eye-rolling I gave it at the end because the story was decent overall and involved a cute dog, which automatically made things more exciting.
Colter may have agreed to take on the case of finding Barkley because Aidan offered him his allowance money, but Colter was never going to take that. And there’s always something so wholesome about Colter circling back to say goodbye to the people he helps.
Aidan and his mother were thrust into something beyond them, and all they wanted was their dog back — a dog that had helped and was continuing to help them through a tough time.
Colter wasn’t anticipating this job, but sometimes those are the ones that mean the most.
Tracker Notes
Colter got out of there quickly once Chelsea was fine and reunited with Max and Nate, but Max should still be in trouble, correct? Lawson was a terrible man, but Max DID steal those artifacts.
The only thing that would have made that ending scene at Reenie’s office better was them Face Timing Bobby. Can I get one scene this season with them all together, working a case and bantering in person? Is that too much to ask?
I’m going to put up a Missing Persons sign for the Shaw Family drama.
I better see that Charles Barkley scene played out in ridiculous fashion on this week’s Inside the NBA. If not, then what was even the point?
Another fun Tracker episode in the books!
I’m throwing it over to you guys now, so let me know your thoughts about this one in the comments!
You can watch Tracker on CBS on Sundays at 8/7c.
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