Diksha Sundriyal
The second season of Apple TV+’s ‘Criminal Record’ ends with a tense episode that keeps June Lenker and Daniel Hegarty on their toes. Despite their polar differences in how they approach their jobs, they finally start to see eye to eye. June learns that justice doesn’t always come in the form she would like it, and some sacrifices, even if entirely unlikable, have to be made to save people’s lives. This lesson hits harder because of a personal loss that shakes her to her core. SPOILERS AHEAD.
June and Hegarty Break Down Cosmo
This season of ‘Criminal Record’ was mainly focused on finding the seven detonators that had been stolen before the events of the show. It was the whole reason Hegarty broke Billy out of prison and sent him to infiltrate Cosmo’s gang. Unfortunately, one wrong move on Billy’s part blows his cover, and Cosmo uses it as an opportunity to show his followers that the cops are so desperate to get him that they are sending spies. He also knows that while the authorities are busy with him, his men can go around the city and execute the bombings just as they had been planned from the beginning.
It is one thing to plan the deaths of hundreds and thousands of people, and entirely another to actually go forward with it and live with the consequences. At first, Cosmo doesn’t give up anything because he thinks the cops are grasping at straws and they don’t actually have anything against him. But then, the van in which his men carried the bombs (two of which they left behind because Cosmo and Billy are out of the picture now) is found. This creates a direct link with the explosion in the woods, which means the cops finally have something against Cosmo.
Additionally, they have a recording in which Cosmo tells Billy about his big plans to blow things up. June and Hegarty build upon this, telling Cosmo exactly how things will go down for him. Because of the scale of damage, the government will want to make an example out of him, and it doesn’t matter how many followers he has. And then, it also depends on who the victims are. Because London is a melting pot where people from all nationalities live, the victims could belong to the countries that are their allies with extradition treaties.
Are the Bombs Found? Is the Attack Stopped?
June and Hegarty paint the true picture for Cosmo. If some Americans die, then the US will want to get Cosmo and punish him the way they see fit. It must also be kept in mind that some countries are less forgiving, and they won’t even bother gathering all the evidence against him. The recording itself is incriminating enough, and Cosmo could be sent to the gallows. All this talk of punishments gets to Cosmo, who somehow never stopped to think that the law would punish him for killing so many innocent people. The possibility of accountability, and a harsh one at that, makes him flip. With only about half an hour left before his men detonate the bombs, he asks for a deal.
If he gets complete immunity, he will tell them exactly where all the bombs are. June is not happy about letting Cosmo walk free, but the clock is ticking. Hegarty reminds her that the whole point is to stop the blasts from happening, and so, she eventually caves and agrees to the deal. As promised, Cosmo gives up the three locations. One bomb was supposed to go off at a busy street, but the cops already intercepted it, neutralizing the man carrying the bomb. Two bombs were supposed to go off at an immigration office. One of the men is neutralized as soon as he enters the building, but the other, Nigel, enters through the back door.
He hears the gunshots and tries to set the bomb off, injuring one officer in the process. In the end, however, he is shot before he can detonate the bomb. The third bomb was supposed to go off at a rundown hotel, which now serves as an apartment complex for refugees. Kieran arrives there with the bomb, but the cops arrive at the same time, leading him to abort. He takes the bomb to the school where he works, and thinks about blowing it off. But he grows a conscience in time and surrenders himself. With this, all seven detonators are accounted for, which means the mission is accomplished.
Is Leo Dead? Who Killed Him?
When all the bombs are found, the cops can finally let their guards down. June calls home to tell Leo that the crisis has been averted and she will be returning home later that evening. He reveals that he heard about it on the news and is glad that she is safe. However, there is no familiar sense of love and care in his voice anymore. In the previous episode, he found out that June had an affair with JP, which became the final straw in their already broken marriage. Now, they are nothing more than roommates. So, he treats her as such and tells her he will be returning the keys to her car, which he has borrowed.
As he sits in the car, he also tells June that it’s time she finds another place for herself to live. She is caught off guard but agrees that this is what must be done. They bid each other goodbye, but Leo forgets to cut the call. In anger, he screams about how it’s his house, and of course, he told June to leave. He also calls her a slag, which she hears. She speaks out, letting him know that she heard it. Leo is embarrassed and apologises, but it also leads him to start talking about the life he wished for with her. He reveals that he always dreamed about having a child with her. When June asks why he never said so, he says that she was so busy with her work that he never thought about broaching the subject. Now, since she says all he had to do was ask, he decides to ask her.
Before he can do it, the car explodes, and Leo dies. This is truly shocking because not only was this attack not anticipated, but it was also deeply personal. Someone wanted to kill June. It was Leo’s bad luck that he took the car that day. Since Cosmo’s focus was on the seven detonators and he wasn’t particularly targeting June, it seems obvious that he wasn’t the one who did it. Later, when Hegarty asks him about it, he jokes that one of his fans did it, though he cannot claim responsibility because he didn’t actually ask anyone to do it. While it might not be clear now, this is clearly Kieran’s doing. He’d zeroed in on June when he suspected Billy of being the mole. He’d reached out to his contacts on the dark web, who even found her address, and had decided to teach her a lesson. The explosion is likely the lesson they were going for, and they clearly didn’t care who’d get hurt.
What Happens to Cosmo and Billy?
The second season of ‘Criminal Record’ begins with a deal between Hegarty and Billy. The cop offers him freedom in exchange for joining Cosmo’s gang and finding the seven detonators that could wreak havoc on London. After all the ups and downs, where his cover is blown twice, Billy eventually does hold up his end of the deal. The seven detonators are found, the blasts are prevented from happening, and thousands, if not millions, of lives are saved. In exchange, it is only fair that he must get his freedom. Of course, he cannot get it in the conventional sense of the term. He is a convicted murderer, which means he cannot walk the streets again. He cannot be exonerated of the crime.
Moreover, now that everyone knows he snitched on Cosmo, his followers would want revenge on him. So, Billy is sent to a safe house. This is a temporary arrangement until something more permanent is found for him. The season comes full circle when Hegarty strikes another deal with a criminal. This time, it’s Cosmo, and he asks for immunity in exchange for giving up the locations of the bombs. Since all bombs are found in time and the crisis is averted, Cosmo should get what he wished for. However, things are not so simple. He did mastermind the attack after all, and he cannot be allowed to walk away scot free. So, Hegarty agrees to get him immunity, but this means that he must act as his informant. Cosmo is not the only person riling up far-right people.
He is also not the only one planning domestic attacks. But now that he is ready to cut a deal with the cops, he might as well work for them. Six months later, we find Cosmo on the stage. His audience has grown tenfold over the past few months, and it seems he is getting a deal with the Americans to do shows across the pond. He has also made connections in Germany. This progress is great because it means that he can pass on all the information to Hegarty. Because Cosmo has not been in contact for a bit, Hegarty meets him after the show. When he asks about the car explosion, Cosmo jokes about it a bit and then says that he still doesn’t have any confirmation.
When Hegarty mentions America, Cosmo refuses to give up stuff about them, pointing out that he is already helping them with the groups in the UK and Germany. Hegarty doesn’t respond to this, though one can assume that he will somehow get the information out of him. Before he leaves, Cosmo asks him how Billy is and if Billy ever asks about him. Hegarty doesn’t reply to this and walks away. He meets June at a pub, where he tells her about the meeting with Cosmo, suggesting that this time, she is entirely looped in. He is also sympathetic about what happened with Leo and tells her they can end it now if she wishes. However, she states that there is no option but to power through.
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