Found Episode 7 Missing While Indigenous Review And Recap- Undercooked Taken Of The Week Struggles To Let Its Stars Shine

Found Episode 7 gives us more of the same. I enjoy the flavor of the week styling, but for this series to have legs, it must grow beyond the superficial premise. Either the missing need to become more interesting to find, their mysteries less obvious, or Mark-Paul Gosselaar’s Sir needs to see a lot more screen time. Shanola Hampton has assembled a cast of characters that are likable, quirky, and sympathetic. We need to spend more time with them and their collective trauma and less with the Easy Bake Oven type of cases we are presented each week. Somehow, they take a little too long, and they are undercooked at the same time.

The episode opens with promise as Detective Trent, now on suspension, struggles with his identity. He has been a cop probably before he was even on the force. It is who he is, and without the precinct and the badge, he doesn’t know what his future looks like. This is another relationship that would be worth exploring. The secret Gabi is keeping from him, and his trust in her could make for explosive television. The dynamic it sets up with Sir, who is very jealous, is also exciting. Instead, we got backstory as filler and very little present-day time with Sir.

He is a petulant child masquerading as an intellectual savior. He is a narcissist who needs to convince everyone, including himself, that he is a hero and always the better choice. Sir is a complex character that viewers are repulsed and mesmerized by. Partly, it’s the smart casting of Gosselaar, whose boyish charm from Saved By The Bell morphed into a dangerous sexiness, and partly, it’s the writing that allows him to present as the bad boy we shouldn’t want but can’t help ourselves from thinking about. He’s a walking red flag of insecurities, neurosis, and psychosis. He’s also strangely sympathetic. This complicated, unexpected, and unusual villain is one an entire show could be built around. It’s why anyone first watched. It is what has kept us coming back, but if he isn’t used more, it is the frustration that will make viewers tune out.

Strangely, the character that should be the most believable is the least authentic. Gabi is our crusader. She is the hero who doesn’t think boundaries exist and has zero quit in her. She is brash and opinionated, hardened, determined, and utterly devoid of anything other than cookie-cutter heroism. Even her breakdown feels scripted to fit the circumstance. Watching young Gabi and present-day Gabi mirror each other as we watch her yet again breathe fire back at the dragon is exhausting. Being brave should not be your only defining character trait. Why was she able to be so brave? I need to feel she earned that courage somehow to buy in. Otherwise, it just feels manipulative and shallow.

In Found Episode 7 we got only one brief pouty moment with Sire. He sulked through a conversation about Trent, who he called “Heavy Boots.” His obvious jealousy prevents him from doing more than demanding answers and name-calling. Separate flashbacks act as little more than plot devices for Gabi to figure out where her missing indigenous woman is. The one bright spot in between the signposting and displays of bravery is tears.

Those tears just before he drugs young Gabi and chains her in his basement just as Gabi now has chained Sir are fascinating. It allows Sir to be both more and less than a brilliant criminal. He is a sicko that loves Gabi. He felt betrayed more than anything and disappointed he would have to chain her up. This house in Virginia is a funhouse of horrors, and I’m shocked it wasn’t torn down, but it could pay huge dividends down the road should we revisit it.

All of that is window dressing for the missing person case. An indigenous woman nine months pregnant was leaving her life in Washington DC to return to her reservation in Virginia. False flags come in the form of a bar-brawling boyfriend whom she was leaving and who seemed only too willing to get her out of his life and a reservation beef that turned out to be nothing more than a sister-in-law trying to protect her family, a hurt and scared brother reacting poorly, and the normal family drama that most people deal with.

Gabi found Danae but not her baby who she had just given birth to. With Danae conveniently unconscious, Margaret goes to her doctor and asks him to be with her when she wakes for reasons that make little sense other than plot progression and she sees evidence of a baby. The doctor lost his wife and baby decades ago when she went driving after he told her not to when she was pregnant. They both died in the car accident and evidently, he has been waiting all of this time for a mother he deemed unfit. The gender swap in Found Episode 7, is interesting as it is usually unhinged mothers who steal babies but the story is as overdone as it was obvious.

These cases need to become much more sophisticated or we need to spend more time with the team and Sir. Dahn and Zeke have great chemistry together and I genuinely want to know what happened to them. I’m invested in Margaret’s plight. Will she ever find her son? Will it somehow make things worse if she does? Could an imposter show up and break her heart? These are all things I want to see. The cases need to require Sir’s expertise otherwise his being confined to the basement is pointless. Is he a genius, a monster, or both? Maybe just let Gabi embrace that she is not doing the right thing?

I’m holding onto hope that with the news of a credible Sir sighting this plot beat is heating up. Found needs to lean into its strengths. More time with the characters and less time on finding people. Showrunner Hampton needs to decide if she is going to be the CSI or House of missing people or a character-study in trauma with mysteries attached. I know the one I’d rather watch. Find all our Found coverage here.