Dig - Catch You Later and Meet the Rosenbergs – Recap and Review

First, apologies for missing last week’s review. I’m going to combine this recap of the latest episode with some recapping of the previous episode - which I think works as both were mostly plot-development, building to what looks like some fun times ahead from what I can tell of the previews. Dig is a 10-episode mini-series on USA Network.

Recap - Catch You Later and Meet the Rosenbergs

With the various shows I review, I tend to experiment a little and eventually settle into a style that fits the particular show. I’m finding "Dig" so plot intensive that even after a couple of watches, I’m still having to refer a lot to my notes to keep track of the various moving parts, so I’m going to try structuring these write-ups with a recap first.

We started Catch You Later with a refreshing bit of truth – even if what passed for truth was still only partial truths. FBI agent Peter Connelly had been caught by Jerusalem police in the apartment of murder victim Emma Wilson after chasing escaped robbery and murder suspect Yussef Khalid there. Connelly is starting to put together that Wilson and Khalid were connected (as was I, I didn’t initially recognize the apartment as Wilson’s).

While Connelly is still initially hiding from police detective Golan Cohen that he was the man with Wilson in a street photo from shortly before she died (which Cohen already has figured out, even though he hasn’t told Connelly that he knows yet), he does tell Cohen that he believes Wilson and Khalid are connected, and that Khalid had stolen a stone from him (Wilson had dropped it into his pocket). Cohen figures out that it was from the high priest’s breast plate that Khalid had stolen.

And in a follow up conversation with FBI supervisor Lynn Monahan, Connelly discloses that he was the man in the photo with Wilson. I liked that at least this part was confessed early and not dragged out to create forced tension.  He tells Lynn that he knows it’s only a matter of time before Cohen identifies him in the photo, but he doesn’t want to get pulled off the case.  We know it’s especially personal for him because Wilson reminds him of his daughter. Cohen, aware that Connelly is lying about knowing Wilson but wanting to keep him close because he is a suspect, agrees to release Connelly and continue to work with him. This subterfuge is gradually worn down as Connelly later in the episode admits to Cohen to being with Wilson, and the two law enforcement agents begin to establish a more truthful partnership.

The two follow clues left behind in Wilson’s journal to the Jerusalem Heritage Center, a location already under surveillance by the Israeli secret police and seeming to be a central location for those integral to the conspiracy, including Rabbi Lev, who we saw was present for the birthing of the red calf. The center displays a bible open to the Old Testament's Numbers 19, the verse about the red heifer prophecy. We also learn that Emma was having some of the calf's blood secretly tested and seemed to recognize what it meant.

As the shenanigans between Connelly and Cohen play out, we learn a couple of personal details about Connelly. His daughter, Vicky, had committed suicide a year and a half earlier, and Connelly had at one point studied to become a priest, dropping out three days before he was due to get his collar.

Meanwhile, in the cultist compound in New Mexico, we have Pastor Billingham confronting Debbie about her role in letting the original Josh (I’ll call him Josh 1 and the second, Josh 2) outside. In the pilot, we had learned that Josh’s feet were never supposed to touch the ground before his 13th birthday or else he'd become unpure. Debbie, however, had let him outside on a rooftop, and this taste of freedom inspired him to try to escape the compound. His adventure ended badly, as he was hunted down in the desert and killed by Faye.

Billingham somewhat threateningly reminds Debbie that she had seen things she was never supposed to see (the Josh 2 clone), and wants her to reaffirm her commitment to the cause. Josh 2 (unlike the first Josh who had a soul), successfully survives to his 13th birthday, manipulates Debbie into staying at the compound by playing the innocent victim, and then pretty cold-bloodily kills a baby calf that is part of the customized Bar Mitzvah ceremony Billingham has set up for him.

Billingham later sends Debbie and Faye out with Josh 2 to do something fun for the boy – to get him used to the world. They take him to a diner with video games where Debbie plots an escape. We learn that Debbie has a drug-use history (which explains how she ended up at the cultish compound), and that she has some good fighting moves as she takes down Faye in the bathroom to escape with Josh with a police officer. Not too surprisingly, it is revealed to be a set up when Billingham arrives to pick them up. What’s more surprising is that we see that Josh was complicit in the test, telling Billingham that he had predicted Debbie would fail.

In another part of the world, a stone believed to the last missing piece of the breast plate is stolen by from a collector’s gorgeous estate by a man who is part of a conspiracy that also includes U.S. Ambassador Ruth Ridell, and Rabbi Lev. They discover that the stone is a fake, so the whereabouts of the final stone is still unknown.

Finally, we follow the journey of Hasadic Jew Avram, who is on a challenging mission to transport the red calf from Norway to its end destination, which is as of yet, unclear. This journey apparently is a dangerous one, as those working with him are murdered, leaving him to accomplish it on his own. It is unclear who is hunting them. We last see Avram on a boat, appropriately named Enigma, headed toward Croatia.

Final Thoughts

If you like puzzles, this is a well-done complex show with a lot of moving pieces. It might be a lot to take in at first, but the pieces are slowly starting to come together as the series progresses. The show has a strong cast, interesting locales, and is doing a good job of mixing end-of-world, biblical prophecy with modern characters, politics, and suspense. I’ll probably have more to comment as more of the story becomes apparent, but for now I’m enjoying watching the mystery gradually unfold.

Let me know what you think of it in the comments.

About the Author - Chris684

Chris is a New Englander with a background in print and digital media, who currently earns a living by making web and technology products easier to use. She has a weakness for TV characters who are 'dark and twisty' (to quote Meredith Grey) and reviews The Walking Dead, Legends, Halt and Catch Fire, and Dig for SpoilerTV.

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