Tonight on NBC State of Affairs airs with an all new Monday December 8, season 1 episode 4 called, “Bang Bang,” and we have your weekly recap below. On tonight’s episode, after Charlie [Katherine Heigl] and Nick [Chris McKenna] get a threatening text, Nick embarks on an investigation to find the source.
On the last episode, Charlie (Katherine Heigl) had flashbacks of her arrival at Midnight City where she first met Nick (guest star Chris L. McKenna) and witnessed him brutally interrogate Fatah (guest star Farshad Farahat). When members of the militant Islamist movement Boko Haram kidnapped 21 Nigerian girls, President Payton (Alfre Woodard) tasked Charlie with the logistically impossible — to find and save the girls without Nigeria knowing the U.S. was ever involved. Meanwhile, President Payton hosted the Chinese president (Tzi Ma) at Camp David and realized that she could use their trade talks to get something she really wanted. Also starring Adam Kaufman, Sheila Vand, Cliff Chamberlain, Tommy Savas and David Harbour. Nestor Carbonell, Courtney B. Vance, James Remar, Christopher Michael Holley and Hakeem Kae-Kazim guest star. Did you watch the last episode? If you missed it, we have a full and detailed recap right here for you.
On tonight’s episode as per the NBC synopsis, “a threatening text is sent to Charlie and Nick. Meanwhile, Charlie has flashbacks of her first interactions with Fatah; Payton’s rival reveals information about a report on a senatorial convoy attack; the team tries to contain a smallpox contamination in Panama.”
This is definitely one series that you don’t want to miss. Don’t forget to stay tuned to Celeb Dirty Laundry where we will be live blogging every episode of State of Affairs first season. While you wait for the recap, check out a sneak peek of tonight’s episode below!
Tonight’s episode begins now – Refresh Page for Updates
In Panama, a guy hands out malaria medication at a makeshift hospital with other aid workers. Many of the people turn down the malaria preventative. The woman complains to the guy that they won’t take the pill. A guy bursts into the clinic and starts looking through their supplies and shoving people around. He asks for drugs and the guy says just for malaria. He demands their shoes. Suddenly, there’s an earthquake or something. The lights flicker, things fall over and then the lights go out. A bio-hazard storage fridge has fallen over and a vial with a disease in it has smashed.
Charlie is having a nightmare about Midnight City. She wakes and thinks back to finding Fatah and tells him she watched what Nick did to him. She quotes the King of Persia and says she knows his history and everything about him. She says she knows why he does it and she says she wants to kill people too. She says the desire to hurt, hunt and kill is very much alive in her too. Her phone buzzes and she’s back in the present. Someone texts her a photo of a gun and the words bang, bang.
She gets up out of bed and heads downtown. She pulls on a jacket, pops on a hat and tucks up her hair then heads over to Nick’s. She shows him the text and says it’s escalating and this is a threat. He tells her he got it too and says he has a lead. He won’t tell her and says he’ll play it out. She asks if they’re being blackmailed but says she can’t see an angle. He says once they clone the op, they’ll know the players because they know the targets – them.
Maureen comes out to ask the IT guy if he’s done. He’s listening to a French app while he works. Charlie comes in and tells him to turn it off or she’ll toss it down the burn chute. The others smile. She asks what’s new today. Dashiell tells her Sheik Hakam is making new friends including Abu Sayyaf and Charlie says they need a new leader for top of the book since it’s not actionable. Maureen tells her there’s bad stuff in Panama after the earthquake.
She says they found a smallpox outbreak. Charlie says it’s back of the book unless more crops up. She sends Lucas to check on Hakam. At a kids football game, Nick sits in his car watching. Looks like he’s watching a coach. POTUS gets an unscheduled meeting request from Senator Green. David tells her to let her in and she agrees. Senator Green says they are finishing up the report on the convoy attack and there is something in there that could hurt Payton.
She asks Green what this is about and the Senator says she should assume the worst about what’s coming from the report. POTUS says she won’t thank her for the visit and the Senator leaves. In Panama, the aid workers are treating the people injured in the earthquake. They are running low on supplies and they won’t have any more or at least 48 hours.
Charlie talks to POTUS about the book and then says a DOD sniffer plane found smallpox in central Panama. She says she thinks it’s an error but Payton says it’s not. Navarro comes in then and Payton greets him. Charlie says President Valera should be positive if they reach out. Navarro tells Charlie she’s not cleared for this but Payton lets her stay.
Navarro says there were active smallpox vials at the hospital – it was a former American research facility – and most if not all of the vials were broken. POTUS says they were researching bio weapons. Navarro says he wants to work up some plausible deniability and POTUS asks him to keep Charlie in the loop. They leave and Navarro says he understands she has a special relationship with the President but says the agency will be their long after the President is gone.
He tells her to be clear on who her loyalty is to and she says she’s very clear. Mo and the others talk about the CIA challenge coins and that Mo’s ex stole her Basra coin. Lucas says exes take and that’s why they’re exes. They’re eating a nice buffet courtesy of Charlie and they tell her it’s a bribe. She pulls them in and tells them about the smallpox. She says they have to recover the vials.
Dashiell asks shouldn’t the Panamians do it but they can’t let them because it’s US smallpox. Charlie says Jack Dawkins and his team are going on. She tells Mo to get some bio-weapons transportation transportation info. She tells Kurt to get 3D maps of the info to get to Jack en route. Marshall reminds Constance of when they used to eat on the cheap. She says they got where they are by hard work
David comes in and says he wants to talk about Senator Green. David says he can dig in and try to find out what’s in the report. David asks her again to look into it and says it won’t come back on her. This time she agrees. Charlie tells Jack where the vials are and asks him to leave a light or non-existent footprint. He tells her they’ll be models of discretion.
Nick follows the coach and his kid home. He lurks outside watching the guy do dishes and kiss his wife. Nick is in his house with a gun out and tells him to sit down or nobody else wakes up. He asks the guy if he remembers him. He tells him it’s been a while. The guy – Dale – says he was just a guard on the boat and didn’t know anyone’s name.
Nick asks why he’s taking photos of people he doesn’t know on a boat that doesn’t exist. He says he knows he paid cash for that house. He asks why he took the photos and the guy says he did it for the money to buy the house. Nick puts the gun up to him and asks who he sold the photos to and he says – the Krieg Group. He says they’re a lobbying group, right. Nick says no.
He holds a gun to his head. Dale sees his kid in the doorway and Nick does too. He goes over to the boy and tells Dale the kid just saved his ass. He walks out of the house. Senator Green gets a missive from the Oval Office – an invitation to a state dinner. She accepts. Charlie meets a woman who says Syd asked her to help her. She looks at the texts.
She says she added an infiltration program. She tells her to reply to the text and it will install a program that will let her listen in on the other phone. The woman walks off into the dark after Charlie thanks her. Nick finds Charlie in the CIA lobby and he says the guard on the boat took the photos and sold them to the Krieg Group. She says it’s a PMC.
He says it’s a massive place and that it’s really bad. She says she has a line on the texter and he tells her to point him and he’ll shoot. He says they need to move fast or consider exit strategies. He leaves. She thinks back to watching Nick torture Fatah. She makes notes on what torture is and isn’t effective anymore. Nick is worn out from torturing the guy.
She makes a note that Nick is losing faith in the op. We see him stand back up and go back over to Fatah and wrap a jacket on him. He asks him to tell him where the Sheikh is so he can go away and take all the fear and pain with him. Now, Charlie watches Nick walk out. Jack’s group is over the water headed into Panama.
Charlie comes in to watch the ops. They are at audio only and they sit and listen. They are one minute out from the hospital. They can’t land so they opt for a fast rope insertion. They put on their masks and helmets. They count down and then rappel down to the hospital and force their way inside quickly, guns drawn. They head down to the basement.
They find a lock still intact, cut it and kick the door open. That’s where the broken vials are. They pop open a bio-hazard case and begin inserting the vials. They confirm via radio that they’re clear. They head back out. The female aid workers walks up on them and panics thinking they’re foreign soldiers. They reassure her, then see past her down the hall that there are a load of people there in the basement.
They call back to Charlie that they have exposure on the ground. The group talks about how many may have been exposed and she asks what the window is on inoculation. She tells Jack to evac the package and he says to get him the vaccines and the WHO can administer them. She tells Jack to go but he breaks protocol and asks to help. She agrees.
Jack tells the aid worker they’re coming back with vaccines. Nick goes to meet Syd in the park and Syd says he’s been watching him watch him for the last 15 minutes. Syd asks what he wants and Nick says he knows Charlie read him in on their problem. He tells him who took the photo and who the guy sold it to. Nick says what Charlie doesn’t know yet is that Syd has worked for Krieg.
Syd says he’s not connected to the texts and asks what would benefit him from prodding Charlie. Nick says it’s pretty good leverage to hold over Charlie. Syd says he has no desire or need to leverage Charlie, tells him to go to hell and then says he knows Nick has also worked for Krieg. Nick asks how he’s covering Charlie’s ass and Syd says he can’t lay down cover for her on this because Krieg is like smoke.
He says they can get to anyone anytime and tells Nick his lead is a dead end. He walks away and leaves Nick there. Charlie replies to the text and the program starts running. She hears a woman speaking French and thinks about the tech from earlier. She goes downstairs and slams him against the wall. She asks why he’s texting her and reminds him she interrogates people for a living.
He tells her Dash threw his tablet down the burn chute. She goes down and finds the tablet and the searches for the phone. She finds it and pockets it. She checks the bag it was in and sees some of her docs in it. The maintenance guy confirms all the stuff in the bin was from seven. She goes back up and looks at her people. She’s dressed all hot for the State dinner.
She goes to walk out as Mo says they had a win today and that doesn’t happen often. Charlie murmurs – a win, yeah. At the State dinner, Charlie orders a soda and Marshall comes over to have a drink with her. Payton greets Senator Green and they smile for the camera. She thanks her for the warning but says she won’t let her son’s murder be used as political currency by anyone.
Charlie and Marshall watch her and he says she’s not the same woman she married and has gotten good. Lucas hands Mo a challenge medal. She asks where he got it and he says her ex has been flashing it in bars to brag about his time in Basra and pick up women. Her phone rings and she gets grim fast. Navarro gets a text at the dinner and he goes to Charlie and whispers to her.
She tells Marshall she has to go. She goes to David and says she has to talk to POTUS urgently. He pulls her away and she comes to Charlie. She says the mission is complete and they got the vials out but Jack was taken into custody as a spy by the Panamanians while he was delivering vaccines to exposed civilians. POTUS says they have to disavow him. Charlie says she understands.
We see Jack lying in a filthy prison cell. POTUS says Jack pulled her out of hell in Kabul and tells Charlie to find a way to get him back. She agrees. Charlie is at a stop light when Nick hops into her car. She tells him to stop stalking her and he says to lock her doors when she’s driving (what car is she driving that doesn’t auto lock?) He asks if she’s okay.
She tells him the mystery texter is one of her team and he says it’s not surprising that it’s someone close. He says it always is. He touches her hand and says she’s not alone. He tells her that Aaron is gone and she can move on. She tells him not to do that and he says he’s sorry. She pulls the car over. She thinks about waking up to Aaron and watching him sleep. He gets teary.
He tells her that it’s still there with them and doesn’t go away. She looks at Nick and he touches her hair. She closes her eyes and leans her face into his hand. He strokes her cheek. We see POTUS speaking at the State dinner. Nick leans in and kisses Charlie. David ends a call as she wraps her speech. Nick looks at Charlie and kisses her more deeply.
David tells POTUS the report leaked and there’s something very disturbing in it. Syd tries to call Charlie to warn her but she doesn’t take the call. He leaves her a message saying the bullet that killed Aaron came from a CIA registered weapon. Charlie’s window is busted out and Nick is dragged from the car. A black bag is put over his head and he’s dragged away by some guys in black.
They shoot out her tires so she can’t follow. Charlie sees her phone and the voice mail and she listens. The message from Syd says that he can confirm that the bullets that killed Aaron came from Nick’s gun. She’s in shock.
THE END!
