The Widow season 1, episode 5 recap: Poteza

In episode 5 of Amazon prime’s The Widow, Georgia Wells takes on Pieter Bello and we learn dark secrets about Judith.

Previously in The Widow, Georgia Wells (Kate Beckinsale) finally came face to face with the mysterious Pieter Bello (Bart Fouche).  This episode unveils more about his operation, also giving time to General Azikiwe (Babs Olusanmokun). The General had placed a bomb in the laptop he had given to Gaëlle Kazadi (Luiana Bonfim), and now he is imagining her showing up at his doorstep after she perished aboard Flight Sankuru 19.

As Georgia holds Bello at gunpoint, she also mentions the recent bombing of Emmanuel Kazadi (Jacky Ido), in a car whose bomb was intended for Mrs. Wells. She then wounds Bello when he denies knowing her husband, Will (Matthew Le Nevez). Wounded, Bello starts spilling the beans. He tells her the Coltan mine he’s taken over is necessary for smartphone capacitors, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is right in the middle of it. He also says he can’t take her to her husband and she should go home before anyone else she knows gets killed. On that note…

There’s something about Judith

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The Widow hasn’t focused much on Judith Gray (Alex Kingston) so far, but this episode changes all that. We see that sometime before going back to the Congo, Judith met a woman named Shevaun (Siobhan Finneran). It turns out Shavaun was just using Judith and was hiding her actual identity, which is Sally Newell. In fact, for whatever reason, Sally started trash-talking Judith, saying Judith wasn’t there for her mother. With Sally out of the picture, a jaded Judith headed back to the DRC after all. It turns out to be a fateful decision, as she gets stabbed by Sidney (Yoli Fuller), an associate of General Azikiwe!

When Joshua (Matthew Gravelle) finds Judith and rushes her to the hospital, her life is in the balance. So why was she stabbed? It turns out it wasn’t just a thrill kill. In a flashback scene later, we learn that Judith met with General Azikiwe to negotiate their access to the mining land. Because she was sick of everyone making money but her, she risked paying the ultimate price.

Showdown

When soldiers outside spring to Bello’s aid, Georgia flees from the mine area into the woods. As night approaches she enters an abandoned building and runs upstairs. The insects trilling help the tension as Bello approaches in the floor below her, floorboards creaking and his gun at the ready. However, all that drama is dispensed with quickly as she shoots him in the throat, making Pieter Bello into an even more sad and pathetic creature. See, The Widow reminds us that violence begets violence, which is a simple enough moral lesson. On that note, General Azikiwe and Sidney talk about horrible things they’ve done, with Azikiwe mentioning the “ghost” woman showing up at his house.

Immediate aftermath

Meanwhile, as Georgia takes off in Bello’s truck, guards shoot at her. She happens to find the child soldier Adidja (Shalom Nyandiko) on the road and they escape together. This is while Ariel (Ólafur Darri Ólafsson) and Martin Benson (Charles Dance) arrive to the DRC. They discuss how Ariel has a criminal past, in addition to hiding his identity after the plane crash.

It seems Ariel committed fraud in Iceland and considers himself selfish and a coward. When Georgia and Adidja find a hotel to rest (and, to some degree, hide) in, she realizes that Pieter Bello had Judith Gray’s number in his phone! It’s a big revelation for The Widow, suggesting how the aid operation was perhaps vital to the violent mining operation.

In the phone conversation, Martin Benson tells Georgia about the bomb on Sankuru Flight 19, and also how Judith actually died from the stabbing. It’s established that Judith was in it too deep, though we don’t know exactly why she was stabbed. However, when General Azikiwe learns about Georgia (who he calls “The Widow”), he blames her for his loss of power to Bello. In other words, Georgia has a new person to deal with, and someone with even more experience in the game. Will his recent pangs of conscience prevent him from doing greater harm? Probably not!

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