The Hunting Party Season 2, Episode 3 ‘Zack Lang’ loses a bit of the spark that ignited last week, but Bex finding out Lazarus’s true identity makes up for a somewhat boring case. We saw Lazarus being a former serial killer from a mile away, but seeing it confirmed was both eerie and validating. So, the surprise of it all was finding out her real name was Caitlin Taylor and how innocent it sounded attached to Lazarus.

Regarding the case of the hour, Lang wasn’t really interesting. Even if his modern-day evil personification of Robin Hood had us hooked at times. It’s just that we’ve watched enough procedural television about catching murderers. So, we’ll say his character didn’t give us anything new to awe about. Zack Lang was a man haunted by his father’s rejection of him when he began showing signs of mental illness as a child. We’ve seen this storyline of men having daddy issues before. However, we’ll never turn down the chance to see Bex take the bad guy down with her own hands.

Overall, The Hunting Party Season 2, Episode 3 ‘Zack Lang’ made us think about family, biological or not, and how they have the power to hurt you in a way you don’t deserve. Or love you the way you deserve. They come in all sizes and don’t have to be made up in blood. While showing us how isolated and hurt Lang felt by his father’s actions, we saw how much Bex and her team care about each other. And this episode served as a reminder that the family you make can be better than the family you were born into.

MORE: Miss our interview with Melissa Roxburgh and Patrick Sabongui? Read our interview where they talked about Season 2 HERE!

Caitlin Taylor

Bex was relentless in her deep dive into Lazarus’s past in ‘Zack Lang’ and we’re happy to see it pay off. She wasn’t going to stop until she searched through every high school record book to prove that Lazarus did track as a teenager. And when she got the answers she wanted, she had this triumphant look in her eyes that always means trouble. From that moment on, we knew that Bex was going to uncover every secret that Lazarus had kept hidden now that she had a starting point.

Arguably, we don’t know much about Caitlin Taylor yet, other than the fact that she did high school track and got arrested for the murders of three girls in her hometown. But we do know what this means. Especially for Shane. She’s a real person and human being choosing to be bad. Lazarus isn’t just an unknown woman in Shane’s therapy tapes from when he was a child. Or a strict, mysterious Colonel. The hard truth was that she wasn’t conditioned to be evil and that The Pit made her worse. So, it’s hard to see Caitlin/Lazarus as Shane’s biological mother because he’s not like her.

The only physical similarity between them is that they’ve both been in the military and know how some aspects of The Pit work. Other than that, Shane is thoughtful and kind, while his mother is the opposite. In this episode, he knew and bought Bex and Hassani’s coffee orders. Then, he made them laugh while playing with a fortune teller 8-ball after closing Lang’s case. When he heard Bex and Lang fighting, he was the one to kick down the door to be her backup.

The love and protectiveness he feels over the people he cares about has grown to be loud and unashamed. Which makes his storyline that much sadder. As the woman he’s been trying to find for almost his entire life has now been proven to always be immoral, quiet, and dark. Shane Florence isn’t like his mother, but we suspect that he’ll feel some type of way when he realizes just how bad a person she’s always been. Even if they never had a connection.

“You’re Supposed to Love Me. I’m Your Son.”

Truthfully, Zack Lang’s case wasn’t as exciting as last week’s focus on Erica Burke. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t heartbreaking to watch. Lang was someone who was killing innocent people for the sole reason that they were rich and had money. Yet he was targeting those who mimicked his father’s behavior. His father valued money and reputation over his own family. He’s an awful person who took lives in horrific ways. On the other hand, we understood that his actions were motivated by pain caused by his father. Parents should love you unconditionally, so it hurt to watch Lang’s father push and neglect his son when love was all he wanted.

The Hunting Party Season 2, Episode 3 ‘Zack Lang’ made one thing very clear. There may be similarities between the killers and the team, but they’ll never stoop to the same level of instability. Not when Hassani’s first thought as he walked into Bex’s new apartment was to check locks and windows to make sure it was safe for her. Or when Shane and Hassani always come running to save Bex whenever she’s in trouble.

This hour held Shane and Lang as opposites of the same coin, just as Season 2, Episode 2 ‘Adrian Gallo’ had done with Erica Burke and Bex. Where, once again, we’re able to see how special and unique the team’s dynamic is. Here we have a group of friends who care about whether each other is happy, safe, and valued. While these two men can say they have parents who are incapable of love, it’s different for Shane. He has friends capable of loving him, and more importantly, he’s capable of loving in return. He’s different from Lang and his mother because he doesn’t thrive in despair or try to re-create what he lost.

Shane has relationships that he knows are important to cherish, so he takes care of the people closest to him. He’s a strong, physical man who doesn’t try to fit or erase his quirks or softness into a mold to be loved or kept around. Not only because he’s confident in himself. He understands that he’s safe with them and knows they feel the same way with him. So, the team’s love for each other is special because not everyone has or wants that luxury in life. And this episode further solidified that Shane isn’t going to be turned away once the team finds out Lazarus, or Caitlin Taylor, is his mother. Not when Bex, Hassani, and Morales are by his side.

MORE: Miss what showrunner J.J Bailey said about Shane and Bex’s dynamic growing in Season 2? Read our interview HERE if you haven’t yet!

Other Thoughts

• Great. He hid in the trunk, and nobody heard a thing.
• This show does the feeling of eerie, creepy vibes well.
• This is totally giving rage room vibes.
• Shane knows everyone’s coffee orders. I love him.
• Hassani checking Bex’s locks and windows to make sure it’s safe. I LOVE HIM.
• Sometimes men deserve rights.
• “A real millennial Robin Hood”
• “Eat the rich. How original” Lol Hassani.
• “Rich people do love to gentrify.” GASP.
• Sometimes therapy is NOT the answer.
• “All of our killers have daddy issues.” Is everyone a comedian in this episode?
• The trio walking in guns blazing into the office got a laugh out of me.
• Fast Eddie is funny. Please don’t die.
• “Relax Bro, we’re saving your life.” I’m so weak over this.
• ‘Is Jacob Hassani too uptight?” Yes, and we love him like that.

What did you think about The Hunting Party Season 2, Episode 3 ‘Zack Lang’? If you have any thoughts about the show, leave your own review/rating in our The Hunting Party hub!

NBC‘s The Hunting Party airs Thursdays at 10 pm EST.