Mystery Road: Origin - 2

This second season of the acclaimed Australian drama noir is nothing short of harrowing and puts indigenous detective Jay Swan at odds when it comes to balancing his duties as a detective with his personal beliefs.

At the end of Season 1, we saw Jay Swan (Mark Coles Smith) and his partner Mary Allen (Tuuli Narkle), together with their adopted little niece Anya (Eloise Hart) driving into the sunset in the hope for a more promising future. Bang on at the beginning of Season 2, with the trio settling down in the fading timber town of Loch Iris, hopes are soon shattered…
In a short prelude taking place thirty years prior, we see a boy go missing who was never found. In the present, Detective Swan drives along a country road when he almost hits an Aboriginal boy, Swayze (Aswan Reid) who suddenly runs out onto the street from a forest, panic written all over his face.

While recovering at the hospital, we are introduced to two characters who are about to play an important part in the unfolding jigsaw puzzle: Nun Sister Kelly (Helen Morse) and Dr. Garry Lloyd (Nicholas Bell). While the seemingly good doctor (who turns out to be not so good after all) and Sister Kelly clash over Swayze’s treatment, Mary, who works as a nurse at the hospital, has her own demons to battle when it emerges that the hospital (where she was born) used to be a children’s home and here comes the sinister bit: it was used as a children’s home for indigenous children taken away from their mothers without consent, so they could be put up for adoption and looked after by white Christian families. This deeply shameful fact is not only a stain in Australia’s colonial history but as series 2 (set in 2000) unfolds, we come to learn that it is still very much practiced to this day.

Just as Swan and the now pregnant Mary try to settle into their new surroundings, little Anya’s best friend Scarlett (Scarlett Yarran) goes missing. Her own mother, a former drug addict, is deemed unfit to look after her daughter and thus Scarlett has been looked after by someone else, who turns out just as ill-equipped. While the search for the missing girl takes on frantic proportions, everyone has their own suspects and theories - in the case of Swan, he reckons there is something rather dodgy about Joey (Luke Carroll), who works at the caravan park in which Swan and Mary reside. Swan’s suspicions (which turn out to be correct, albeit not in the way he had assumed) are squashed by local Sergeant Simmo (Robyn Malcolm), a chain-smoking, single lass with a bit of history who initially likes to disagree with Swan on most things.

Then, while the search for Scarlett continues, Sister Kelly is found dead, drowned in her bathtub. Simmo reckons she suffered a heart attack due to her old age but Swan is not so sure and when certain medications are found in the dead woman’s bloodstream, Dr. Lloyd refuses to disclose what the medications were for. On the domestic front, Mary isn’t happy that Jay Swan’s semi-alcoholic brother Sputty (Clarence Ryan) has temporarily moved in with them, never mind a dispute with her own father, whom she accuses of being responsible for her having been adopted as a young child.

Then, there’s the mysterious character referred to as ‘The Cowboy’ (Steve Le Marquand), what does he know and what’s his story? Meanwhile, Joey is devastated when he learns - with Mary’s help - what really happened to his mother many years ago. As the saga continues, the plot doesn’t seem to thicken but instead, gets more complex and occasionally feels convoluted as there’s so much going on and so many individual stories ultimately paint a bigger picture, with more social workers creeping up and another corpse found. Just when it looks like things can’t get more messy for Jay Swan, little Anya is taken away by social workers on grounds that living conditions in Swan’s caravan, combined with an apparently poor diet, does not provide an adequate domestic condition for a little girl. Mary, who is prepared to fight tooth and claw to get Anya back, is at loggerheads with Jay whom she accuses of putting his job before his private duties. Things are about to get worse before they get better but only in parts… While there’s a conclusion regarding the missing children and the murders, Anya’s destiny is left open, providing the perfect cliffhanger for a Season 3…

MYSTERY ROAD: ORIGIN - Season 2 is not an easy watch as far as detective dramas go but it makes for a thought-provoking watch and stellar performances from all the cast.
It’s available as a 2-Disc Blu-ray set and bonus features include a ‘Making of…’ featurette and trailer.