Missing You is a five-part Harlan Coben thriller on Netflix and following on from the success of previous adaptations such as Fool Me Once, Stay Close and Safe.
The story follows Kat Donovan whose fiancé Josh went missing eleven years ago, only for her to stumble upon him on a dating app. From that moment on her life is turned upside and the twists and turns get more intense and bizarre as Kat delves into what might have happened to Josh and if it could be linked to the tragic death of her father.
Here is everything that happened in Missing You episode 1...
The series opens with Kat on a date where she is about to take the guy, Daryl, home when she hears shouting coming from the restaurant kitchen. She intervenes in a fight between the kitchen staff where someone has been stabbed and is bleeding on the floor. The chef with the knife turns on her and tries to strangle her when he finds out she is a police detective, but she sets off the fire alarm and gets control of the situation.
The following day we see Kat arrive for work at the police station where she works as the head of the Missing Persons Unit. Before she has even taken her coat off her colleague, Nia, tells her about a missing man called Rishi Magari, while her boss tells her they have a new digital media analyst called Charlie Pitts.
Kat offers to make Charlie a cup of tea and as she brings it to him, she catches him googling her name at his desk, and he is reading a newspaper report on her father, Detective Sergent Clint Donovan who was killed in the line of duty. He then looks at another news report on Monte Leburne, the man jailed for life for Clint's murder, but while he is reading, Kat catches him.
Kat and her team get a lead on Rishi Magari's car and they find it in some woods, abandoned, Charlie uses his tech skills to get into the car and they search the boot, but it is empty. Meanwhile, we see Rishi staggering along in the wilderness, with flashbacks to a beautiful woman called Vanessa playing on his mind.
Later Kat is at a yoga class that her friend Aqua is teaching and afterwards she catches up with another friend, Stacey, a private investigator, who asks her if she has gone onto the dating app she set her up with, Melody Cupid, where they match you with someone based on your music tastes. Kat says she hasn't checked her matches yet and Stacey grabs her phone and looks for her. At home, Kat logs in and looks through her matches, but as she is swiping through them she sees someone she recognizes and soon we get a series of flashbacks of her with the same man, getting engaged, kissing and looking happy before she then is seen getting home and finds all Josh's things gone from their house, his clothes are gone, his phone is disconnected and he seems to have vanished without a trace.
Stacey comes to Kat's and Kat explains that she hasn't heard from Josh in 11 years and that one minute they were engaged and the next he walked out. She explains that the photo on the dating app is a new one, not one from 11 years ago and that his profile says he is a widower. Stacey tries to get Kat to ignore finding Josh saying nothing good comes from going back, reminding her that ever since they have known one another Kat has barely been able to talk about Josh because he hurt her so badly after he left her when she was grieving for her father.
Kat meets Aqua in a bar, and she shows her a photo of Josh on the dating app. It turns out Aqua knew Josh from when he was with Kat and she asks if Kat is going to message him when Kat's phone beeps and Stagger, her boss, asks her to come back to the office.
Once there Kat is horrified to hear that Monte Leburne, the man who is in prison for her father's murder, has terminal cancer and he might die before she gets a chance to hear him explain exactly what happened that day. Stagger reminds Kat that he killed her dad becasue someone called Calligan paid him, but she is convinced there is more to it. She wants to visit Monte Leburne but Stagger says he can't get her in.
Kat goes to her mum's house to tell her the news, but she has friends round for a games night, and they all grill her on her dating life. Later, when everyone has gone, Kat tells her mum about Monte Leburne and that she wants to go and see him, but her mum is adamant that she shouldn't go. She also tells her mum that Josh is back and she tells Kat that she should talk to him if it will help, but to be careful. Kat matches with Josh on the app, and now she has to wait to see if he wants to message her.
Charlie calls to say he has been doing some digging on missing Rishi and found he booked a holiday cottage a few miles from where they found his car. Charlie has called the owner and asked for more details about his booking, meanwhile, Kat asks Stacey to come over so she can tell her about her dad's murder.
Kat tells Stacey all about Monte Leburne and her dad's death and Stacey says she can try and get her into the prison to see Leburne through a friend who works at the jail. The following morning she gets a match with Josh on Melody Cupid and she sends him a song along with a flirty message. The song is John Waite's Missing You, which we see them singing together on karaoke in a flashback.
Charlie says he has heard back from the cottage owner and she has confirmed that Rishi made a booking for last Friday, so Kat tells him she will meet Nia there. At the same time, we see Rishi still staggering around in the countryside when he is approached by a man in a tractor who appears to be looking for him. Rishi tries to run away, but he is hurt and exhausted and the man tasers him.
Inside the holiday cottage Kat and Nia find Rishi's overnight bag, which has lingerie in a gift box and there is champagne in the fridge. They work out someone was meeting him there but before they can get any further, Kat gets a message from Stacey saying she can get her into the jail to see Leburne.
Kat meets Stacey at a hotel where she is working as a honey trap for a client who thinks her husband is cheating on her. Within 20 minutes Stacey has trapped her prey and they are on the way to the prison to see her friend Tamsin, who works there as a prison officer and is a former client of Stacey's.
At the prison, they get through security and head to the hospital wing. The nurse working there brings her to Leburne, who is very sick but still won't talk. After Leburne toys with Kat, the nurse tells her that a combination of morphine and scopolamine will get him talking and injects him with a double dose of the concoction. She tells Kat he won't stay awake long, but this should do the trick, and before long Leburne mistakes Kat for his sister, Angie, and starts to open up. He tells her that he didn't kill Clint and that he was paid to take the fall for the murder and as he was already being convicted for two other murders he thought he might as well take the blame. But this doesn't help Kat becasue before she can ask Leburne who did kill her dad if it wasn't him, the drugs take hold and he passes out.
Later, Stacey calls her and says she asked Tamsin to give her everything she knows about Leburne and she reveals that the visiting list shows Josh went to visit Leburne in prison the day before he vanished, which leaves Kat stunned.
As the episode comes to a close, we see Rishi has been tied up in a farm, clearly being held against his will, while Kat gets a message from Josh on Melody Cupid where he tells her it isn't a good idea for them to talk and mutes their conversation on the app.
Why was Josh visiting Leburne before he vanished and why is he ghosting her?
All five episodes of Missing You are available on Netflix now.
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