Frankie Drake Mysteries returns to CBC tonight with its second season premiere and a passel of guest stars, including Slasher‘s Steve Byers, X Company‘s Lara Jean Chorostecki, who was also on Killjoys earlier this month, and Dark Matter‘s Anthony Lemke.
[Warning: General spoilers ahead.]
The season opener begins with two mysteries. In the first, Flo (Sharron Matthews) and Mary (Rebecca Liddiard) work together to identify a John Doe. In the second, Frankie (Lauren Lee Smith) tries to suppress her suspicions about Marian Hartley (Chrostecki), a self-professed archaeologist whom Nora (Wendy Crewson) is underwriting in her attempt to go straight as the newest board member of the Royal Ontario Museum.
Frankie and Marian have history, which piques Nora’s curiosity. It also makes her wary about what she’s gotten herself into. When the cases intersect, Frankie does her due diligence about the artifact before Nora writes a very large cheque. That takes her to see Hiram Bingham (Byers). Trudy (Chantel Riley) moves things along for the tandem investigations with just the right resource at just the right time.
Lemke, who co-starred with series star Smith on The Listener, plays Detective Grayson, whom Mary tries to sidestep with her extracurricular activities. Mary Kills People‘s Grace Lynn Kung is also back as Wendy Quon.
It’s a fun, fast episode, with a couple of winks at the audience. This includes a much friendlier reunion for Slasher co-stars Byers and Crewson. Smith and Byers, who co-starred in Mutant X and The Wedding Dress, are terrific together, too, so I hope we see Bingham again at some point.
Matthews and Liddiard have a couple of really good scenes together. As their mystery clicks into place, they happily acknowledge they’re so fired if they get busted for what they’re doing.
Frankie Drake Mysteries airs Mondays at 9 pm ET on CBC, and on the CBC App starting the day after air. Here are a couple of sneak peeks of “The Old Switcheroo.”
Photos and Videos Courtesy of CBC.
