If you were overwhelmed with information from the three-part premiere of Harlan Coben's Shelter, it's good to know that the show is now releasing a single episode per week, letting things slow down a little.
After the first three episodes of this Prime Video young adult mystery series introduced lots of mysteries, episode four, Phantom Threads, tells us that we may have been asking the wrong questions all along.
Mickey Bolitar has now made lots of progress investigating the disappearance of Ashley Kent and of his father four months prior, but has he found some red herrings?
Here's how to watch Harlan Coben's Shelter, so you're caught up on the show as we follow this Shelter episode 4 recap, as obviously spoilers for it ensue. Just note, we've changed the order of events, so we can present storylines together.
Phantom of the school halls
Mickey tells Arthur (Adrian Greensmith) and Ema (Abby Corrigan) about his theories on The Butcher, but they point out that this Nazi would be incredibly old, and it doesn't make sense. They also show him the video of Rachel going through Ashley's locker after her disappearance.
Mickey confronts Rachel (Sage Linder) and they agree to meet later to discuss. He also talks to his history teacher about The Butcher, and using a textbook she points out that the picture he has of this Nazi isn't correct — it's been faked by the Bat House Lady.
Arthur is meant to audition for the school musical but his duet partner doesn't show up, and Ema has to fill in for him. They're so good that they're cast, for the roles of Raoul and the Phantom respectively, but so is Arthur's bully Buck who's a fantastic singer. The girl who originally bullied Ema, Whitney, congratulates her, clearly learning to respect her.
Later Ema visits Mickey to apologize for not believing his thesis on The Butcher (even though she was totally correct), and says that she's been trying to investigate the paramedics who might have attend Mickey's dad's crash. He remembers that the uniform worn by The Butcher had a different logo, and upon investigating, they find that the organization that has that logo didn't attend the crash — because their ambulance had been stolen the night before.
Arthur also hears in a police dispatch that an abandoned car has been found belonging to Mrs Kent from the last few episodes, so she might be missing. Ema and he break into Doctor Kent's office, and find a file on Dylan Shakes — the man was Dylan's doctor. They even had an appointment the day Dylan disappeared, but nothing is written in the notes section.
When Mickey has his meeting with Rachel, she confesses. That day she'd been with Ashley at the cheer tryouts, when the newbie was bullied for her "risque" dance moves and had run off. Afterward Rachel had chased her to check if she was okay, only to witness an attempted kidnapping.
Rachel saved Ashley, though the latter didn't give the former many answers about why she was being chased, or let her go to the police. However Rachel decided to let Ashley stay in her pool house — where the girl is still hiding! However before Mickey can go to her, Rachel gets an alert on her phone, as someone has broken into the home. It's Octopus Face Man, and he's going straight for Ashley.
Bat Lady bites
Chief Taylor (Lee Aaron Rosen) goes to Bat Lady's (Tova Feldshuh) house, to check in on a tip he'd received that a body was buried in the yard. An obvious recently-dug grave doesn't help this impression. He uncovers the plot but it's just a dead deer, as Bat Lady had told Taylor was buried there.
While this happen, Sunglasses Man (Hunter Emery) watches from a distance with a gun, ready if anything goes awry.
Sunglasses Man and Bat Lady visit Mickey's history teacher, who presumably gave the police the tip and is also informing Mickey. It's clear the two women used to be friends, and that stops the Bat Lady doing something nasty to the teacher, though she warns her old friend from doing any more.
From their discussion we learn a few key points:
- The Butcher's name is actually Luther, and the Bat Lady photoshopped the Nazi picture she gave Mickey.
- Mr Vollmer, the drama teacher who was killed, was trafficking in children. In fact, it's him who attempted to kidnap Ashley.
Ice cream dates between ball players
Mickey's aunt Shira (Constance Zimmer) gets some more romance this week, after hooking up with her childhood best friend Hannah (Missi Pyle) at the end of the last episode. She's initially acting suspicious, which Mickey notices, but things get worse later...
At the pancake and basketball mixer, Missi isn't acting as weirdly as Shira, and she invites the latter to make a speech. Turns out, the two were on the basketball team together as kids. Shira gives an embarrassingly poor speech but starts to reminisce about past memories.
We get a flashback to the two's high school prom, where they almost kiss, and decide to leave together, implying more happened. Shira's then-boyfriend, who is now Hannah's husband, is there too.
Hannah asks Shira out for ice cream, and eventually the latter shows up, and Hannah asks her why she left all those years ago. We don't get a solid answer.
