Colter Shaw, that wandering fixer of other people’s messes, finally put a bow on the Gina Pickett case, a festering wound that’s been gnawing at him for a decade. “Tracker” returned from its midseason hiatus with a grim efficiency, wasting no time in ramping up the tension and delivering answers – or at least, some version of them.
Shaw, never one to let sleeping dogs lie, doubled down on his obsession with Gina’s disappearance. His dogged pursuit, fueled by a mixture of guilt and professional compulsion, led him back to Detective Keaton, a partnership built on grudging respect and shared frustration. Their combined efforts unearthed Frank, a key player in Gina’s story, though his involvement initially seemed more like pathetic desperation than calculated malice.
Frank’s tale painted a picture of indoctrination and manipulation, a story revolving around a shadowy figure known only as “The Teacher” and a secluded location called “The Farm.” It became clear that The Teacher, a master manipulator, had recruited Frank as one of his “disciples,” using him as bait to lure young women to The Farm.
The Farm itself proved to be a dead end, literally. Shaw located the property, but instead of Gina’s remains, he found the skeleton of a young man—another disciple of The Teacher, apparently discarded when no longer useful. This discovery shifted the investigation from a simple missing person case to something far more sinister, suggesting a pattern of manipulation and murder.
The puzzle pieces started to click into place with maddening slowness. Patrick Campbell, the Farm’s owner, initially seemed like a prime suspect, but his advanced dementia and 15-year residency at a nursing home effectively eliminated him from the equation. The Teacher’s true identity, however, was lurking closer than anyone suspected. Turns out, “The Teacher” was Noah, Patrick’s son-in-law, a seemingly respectable anesthesiologist operating out of a now-abandoned hospital.
Noah’s confession, while providing a measure of closure for Gina’s sister Camille, felt somewhat perfunctory, almost anticlimactic. Perhaps this is intentional, a reflection of the often-messy reality of such cases. The show, to its credit, doesn’t shy away from the lingering trauma and unanswered questions that often accompany even “solved” cases. Shaw, still operating in his morally gray zone, managed to extract a more recent victim from the abandoned hospital, a small victory in a landscape of loss.
Tracker airs Sundays at 10/9c on CBS.
