WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD (duh!)
Nancy Drew and the gang are back for season 2! While there are not too many Big Gay moments in this first episode, the season 2 premiere is jam packed with adventure! Buckle up.
The episode opens with a recap of season 1, where we learn that Nancy and her friends have been threatened by a sea spirit and shown the ways in which the spirit plans to kill them. Yikes.
We enter the crab shack where the gang works, and they are all sitting around discussing how the sea spirit is going to kill each of them. They debate if this is truly what’s going to happen, and how to destroy all the ways that they could be killed; a rusty hook, drowning in their trucks, etc. Thus, a plan is born to destroy all of the murder weapons, and they leave to get started.
A detective shows up at the restaurant and tells Nancy that a girl had been hit by two park rangers in their car. The girl said, “Nancy Drew” indicating that Nancy was there, and the detective is ready to take Nancy to the hospital to see the girl.
At the hospital, Nancy sees Carson coming in to help a client, and George goes to distract him from her so Nancy can go see the girl from the accident. Nancy doesn’t know the girl, but does notice she has a code written on the inside of her hand. In a stealthy move, Nancy holds the girl’s hand, pulling the code off of it. Nancy has a hunch that the code has something to do with the sea spirit, and how to get rid of it.
Back at the crab shack, the gang is working on how to solve the sea spirit case. It is evident that they blame Nancy for getting them involved in this, especially Ace. A pipe bursts in the crab shack; a bad omen. From there, Ace cracks the code that was on Jane Doe’s hand in the hospital. The code indicates that they want to sell Nancy a mirror that could help her with the sea spirit case.
Nancy wonders how anyone knew that they were working on that case and finds out something had been tweeted from the officially Nancy Drew twitter account. Turns out, resident lesbian Bess had sent the tweet. Since nothing can be done about that now, they return to the coded message. It turns out that the mirror does have to do with the sea spirit, also known as the Aglaeca.
The gang goes to the meeting place described in the coded message; it’s an old barn full of knickknacks and fishing gear. They find a cell phone that is encrypted; it uses the dark web to send video messages back and forth between two twins — Amanda and Gil. Amanda is Jane Doe! Nancy watches as Amanda is attacked by what the gang assumes to be the Wraith of the woods, who comes out during every full moon. In order to follow in Amanda and Gil’s footsteps, they decide to head to the Pinecrest Lodge.
At the lodge, however, Hudson almost immediately catches Nancy and escorts her and her friends to a back room. Fun fact: Hudson is Nancy’s real grandfather, though he doesn’t know it yet (which was revealed in the last season.) Nancy accuses Hudson of killing 12 people on a ship and putting a hit out on Carson while he was in jail. Ooo. This is when Ryan walks in and lets his father know that he invited Nancy, to thank her for her help on a previous case. We know this isn’t true, but Hudson buys this excuse for now.
Meanwhile, George and Ned are walking outside looking for clues about Gil’s whereabouts. It is hit on here that Ned and George are dating, and wondering how they will tell Nancy (who previously had flirtations with Ned.) They find where Gil had last been seen, realizing he went into the woods where the dangerous Wraith would be waiting.
Back to Ryan and Nancy; Ryan lets Hudson know that Nancy helped him gather info on Lucy Sable, and that he needed to give her a tip. Hudson lets Nancy go, but tells Ryan he needs to apologize to his friends who Nancy interrupted. Ryan is defensive, and accuses Hudson of using those “friends” to cover up his murders. All the while, Nancy is listening in, disgusted by her true family.
Nancy then thanks Ryan, but tries not to accept his money. As they walk away, Ace tells Nancy that she actually is a lot like Hudson. Why? Because she drags her friends into dangerous situations. Ouch! Suddenly, they see that Gil’s footsteps have stopped, and there are scarecrows everywhere. The scarecrows are meant to hold the Wraith back from attacking; however, the Wraith still manages to scream at George, causing the gang to run.
They run until they find a bus, and inside they locate Gil. It is revealed here that the Wraith feeds off of fear, and they stay in the bus to hide from it. Gil reveals that his father used to be a house caretaker for the Hudson’s, and that’s why he knew about the mirror.
As they are sitting in the bus, they share memories from the past Fourth of July with one another. This is where Nancy remembers meeting Ned, and how they were attracted to one another. Ned and George hold hands, and Nancy observes that but nothing is formally stated. Hmm. Suddenly, the Wraith attacks the bus! Nancy sacrifices herself and has her friends run out of the bus; at the same time, Nancy’s entire life story flashes before her eyes, and we see how confused she is about her true identity.
The Wraith breaks in, and Nancy lights the bus on fire which buys her time to run out of the vehicle. Gil helps Nancy out of the bus and stands with her while she recovers; flash to Gil and Nancy walking together and Nancy pays him for the mirror.
As Nancy and her friends look at the mirror, she lights it on fire (she really likes fire, huh) and cracks the glass. Inside, there’s a message about how to kill the Aglecea, by finding a sea shanty. At this moment, the cops show up to arrest Nancy and Gil for property theft over the mirror, and they head to the local precinct, after Gil gets to see his sister in the hospital, of course. Ugh!
However, Nancy gets bailed out by none other than Ryan himself. He told the cops that Nancy could not have stolen a family heirloom, because it was her family heirloom. Ryan knows that Nancy is his sister and he gives her the mirror as a kind gesture of truce. Ryan walks away and is met by Carson, who questions his relationship with Nancy. Ryan threatens to destroy Carson’s life by revealing everything Carson knows about Nancy.
Meanwhile, the gang heads back to the crab shack only to find that Ned’s truck had been returned. They had tried to get rid of it, as Ned’s death vision revealed him drowning in it. It seems the truck always finds its way back. Oh no!
Nancy talks to Ace about his resentment towards her, finally. Ace lets her know that it’s not about Nancy, rather that he’s simply just scared. Nancy now sees how she put all of her friends in danger; she looks at the hook in the storeroom, and sees a vision of a bloody towel falling off of it, which is Ace’s death. Then Nancy decides to go find the sea shanty herself, and the episode fades out.
What a wild ride! We wouldn’t expect anything less from miss Nancy Drew. However, we hope to see more scenes with our favorite lesbian BFF, Bess, in the future!
