The Flight Attendant officially premiered on Thanksgiving with three episodes, the first of which we recapped during the HBO Max series’ free preview.
What all did the titular Cassie confeess to the FBI in Episode 2? And what was she able to find out about the mysterious Miranda?
Confronted along with her colleagues by FBI agents Kim and Van upon deplaning at JFK, Cassie offered precious little about murder victim Alex Sokolov, and eventually asserted she was too jet-lagged/loopy to be of immediate assistance. Afterward, Cassie fretted that fellow flight attendant Megan had said too much to the feds, by claiming that she and Alex had been flirting. As such, once back home, Cassie downed copious months of vodka before slipping into a bubble bath to calm down — though her being vexed about Miranda caused her to accidentally shatter the barware in her hand.
The next morning, Cassie sweats through a spin class when the Alex in her head reminds her that she has his business card, and she thus knows where he works — and maybe Miranda, the associate who joined them for drinks at the hotel, works there too. So with a changed-up ‘do and going by “Alessandra Ricci,” Cassie shows up at Unisphere to meet with Alex. But when Cassie brings up the name Miranda with receptionist Sabrina, red flags start to get raised. Then, when HR honcho Jean Miller presses “Alessandra” about the exact nature of her business with Alex — and claims she knows of no “Miranda” — Cassie makes a run for it, down the fire stairs and to the street.
When FBI agent Van rings Cassie, inviting her to come by the next morning, she swings by gal pal Annie’s law firm, to shed a bit more light on her wild situation. Annie, to put it mildly, is apoplectic about the misguided moves her friend has made thus far. But as her lawyer, she is ready to make things right, provided Cassie gets a good night’s sleep and isn’t late for their morning with the FBI.
Self-destructive Cassie, of course, sets course for a laaaate, wild night, meeting up with coworker Shane and his friends, and eventually chatting up/hooking up with a guy named Barkley, who she meets at the bar. As such, Cassie meets up with Annie late the next morning, looking disheveled and reeking of booze. Annie lays out a simple plan, whereby Cassie will plead the fifth any time her lawyer gives the nod. And that works fine enough… for a hot minute. But when Van slaps down a graphic photo of bloodied Alex, followed by curious photos of Cassie disguised in her headscarf, and then in the Unisphere elevator, she snaps and admits that she had dinner with Alex and had lots of sex with him, but she definitely didn’t kill him. But maybe this mysterious Miranda knows something, she suggests…?
Cassie is rightly chided by Annie afterwards, but she suggests that now the feds think she is simply a drunk, slutty flight attendant and not a killer. (Though technically she could be both, Annie reminds.) Annie urges Cassie to stick with her regular routine and head off her next flight, to Rome. Which Cassie intends to do. But first, sparked by the theory that someone slipped into Alex’s room to kill him when Cassie tried/failed to head home that night, she “bumps into” Sabrina the receptionist, who is rightly guarded at first after the odd events of the previous day. But after a round (or a few) of drinks, Sabrina is willing to give her new pal alllll the hot goss, including how Miranda used to date Alex (possibly at the time of his and Cassie’s Bangkok bangin’), and how she also was not a “stalker,” but you know, a stalker. And a potentially volatile/violent one at that!
Which is not good for Cassie, seeing as on her way home that night, little does she know that Miranda — having obtained Cassie’s identity via a Bangkok bar receipt — is now in New York, and walking right next to her.
Elsewhere in Episode 2:
* When agents Kim and Van locked horns over the latter’s aggressive approach — he jumped the gun by bringing Cassie in, assuming the hotel surveillance tapes would incriminate her (but instead had been erased) — he reckoned the brass must like his tactics if in half the time he rose to the same rank as his partner. This set Kim off on a brilliant monologue about how Van, fitting the Bureau’s “male and pale” archetype, had a far easier ascension than she did as a Black woman who would never be given the latitude to make such bold plays.
* Megan met up at night with a clerk at some kind of store to train prescription drugs she has on hand for… non-scanned flash drives? (Despite multiple replays, the exact nature of this transaction, perhaps purposely, eluded me.)
* Cassie’s brother Davey is very worried about her — namely, her drinking — and whether it’s prudent for her to be around his kids anymore.
TVLine readers gave The Flight Attendant premiere episode an average grade of “B.” What did you think of Episode 2?
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