Another week, another recap of the next episode of the Netflix thriller series, Pieces of Her. This time, we’re on to episode 4, bringing us halfway through the season. Let’s dive in.
Where we Left Off
At the end of episode 3, Andy was enacting an elaborate plan to disguise herself as an attorney for Paula Kunde, giving her the ability to visit her in prison. Laura had been stopped on the way to the airport to catch Andy in TX and was now in the custody of the US Marshalls.
More Flashbacks
We’re getting more flashbacks to help fill in the blanks on what Laura may be hiding from in witness protection. This one centers on that economic conference in Oslo, where Martin Queller was murdered. This time, we see that the cultish Army of the Changing World may have actually simply intended to humiliate Queller during the conference.
However, to enact their plan they kidnapped Professor Alex Maplecroft and replaced her with a woman named Grace Juno, whose husband was prescribed a QuellerCorp pharmaceutical drug called Haldol. He suffered severe psychological side effects and murdered his three children.
Grace has been waging a public vendetta against Martin Queller after the incident. The plan for Grace to impersonate the professor and humiliate Queller goes sideways when she shoots him instead.
Andy Goes Undercover
Back in the present, we catch up with Andy now getting access to the TX state prison and meeting with Paula Kunde. But, Andy has no real plan for the conversation. She doesn’t really have any good questions and isn’t sure what she expects to get out of it. She asks Paula about her mother, Laura, and shows her some of Laura’s fake IDs. Paula doesn’t recognize Laura at all.
However, she does recognize the polaroid of a much younger Laura with a huge gash on her shoulder. Upon seeing this photo, Paula goes a bit crazy. She calls the girl in the picture Jane and promising that when she gets out of prison, Jane is dead. However, amidst the exchange, Andy puts some pieces together and realizes that Laura is actually Jane Queller.
Meet Jane Queller
Andy heads to a bookstore and buys the latest book by Jasper Queller, which includes a lot of biographical information on the Queller family, including his sister Jane, who vanished over 30 years prior. She sees pictures of Jane in the book that match the old picture of her mother. Leaving the bookstore, she confronts Jack, who has followed her to TX.
Jack admits that he is actually a US Marshal named Michael Vargas, who had been assigned to monitor Andy and Laura while they were both in the witness protection program. While we knew this already, it’s the first Andy has really learned that she has been in the program her entire life, without her knowledge. Andy convinces Vargas to help her meet her uncle Jasper by helping her get into a fundraiser he is holding in TX that day.
At the fundraiser, Jasper recognizes Andy, seeing she is the image of her mother. While Andy meets with Jasper, Vargus is distracted when he sees the man who attacked him and Andy earlier in the series. During the distraction, Vargus misses when Andy leaves with Jasper, heading off to who knows where.
Witness Protection
Meanwhile, Laura has been meeting with Charlie at the witness protection safehouse and has asked to be released from the program. At the end of the episode, Laura is no more and Jane has once again become a person.
Open Questions
Seriously, is Andy the clueless 30-year old we’ve known from the first few episodes or the person who hatched a plan to impersonate a lawyer, steel her ID, and get into a prison? Since she has no questions at all about why her mother would have stayed away from Jasper and her family and then goes off with Jasper willingly, I’m still thinking she’s the clueless person we first met. She is just a clinic in bad decision-making in a crisis.
When someone checks out of witness protection after 30 years, how the heck do they go about getting new IDs? They won’t have had a driver's license in decades. Just a random question.
So, if the man who attacked Andy and Vargus was at the fundraiser, seemingly intent on distracting Vargus - does he work for Jasper? If so, that means Jasper know Andy was coming and planned the distraction to get her away from Marshall Vargus. Hmmmm. Do we trust Jasper? No. No we don’t.
