NOTE: this post contains spoilers for Three Pines.
Prime Video subscribers are on the case with Chief Inspector Gamache (Alfred Molina) in the mystery series Three Pines. The series, based on Louise Penny's Inspector Gamache novels, finds the Canadian detective continuously brought back to investigations in the seemingly idyllic Quebec village of Three Pines to investigate perplexing cases that reveal deep secrets within the town.
However, while Gamache and his team dig into these specific cases, there is another one that eats away at him throughout the series — where is Blue Two-Rivers (Anna Lambe), an 18-year-old indigenous girl who has gone missing.
The case of Blue Two-Rivers is actually the first one Inspector Gamache takes on in the series, as her family and many others protest the disappearance of Blue and other indigenous women and the lack of cooperation from Canadian authorities. Gamache promises to help the Two-Rivers family, with Blue's disappearance always in the back of his mind, even as he is busy solving the individual cases in Three Pines.
Let's take a look at the evidence of what happened and where Blue Two-Rivers might be.
Where is Blue Two-Rivers?
When Gamache takes the Two-Rivers home at the beginning of the first episode, they are convinced Blue is not a runaway because she would never abandon her young daughter. It has already been a year since Blue's disappearance, but Gamache promises he will help them find Blue.
Gamache talks with his colleague in the police department, Pierre Arnot (Frank Schorpion), who had been investigating Blue's case. He tells Gamache that Blue and her boyfriend Tommy were last seen getting into a truck believed to be heading toward the US/Canada border. Gamache asks him to run the plates and see what he can find out. As it turns out, the truck was last spotted in New York City and in searching social media they found a recent post that features Blue and Tommy.
Even with this evidence, the Two-Rivers are not convinced Blue ran away to New York. One of the reasons is Blue is wearing a denim jacket in the photo, but Blue's sister Kara (Isabel Deroy-Olson) pulls out a denim jacket from Blue's closet, saying they are the same. Gamache discusses with Sergeant Lacoste (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers) that it's impossible to tell from the picture if they are the same jacket, but she makes the argument you don't wear a denim jacket in the middle of winter.
Gamache finds what he believes is the key piece of evidence to prove to the Two-Rivers that Blue is in New York — a witness statement saying she and Tommy were spotted just two days prior in the city, buying meth. While distressing to learn that Blue is struggling with addiction, Gamache believes knowing she is alive can be some comfort to the family. However, the Two-Rivers, particularly Blue's mother Missy (Crystle Lightning), are steadfast in their belief that if Blue was alive she would have gotten in touch somehow, so she must be dead. While their belief does have an impact on Gamache, he acknowledges the lack of evidence contradicting Blue being alive and having run away, meaning, the case is set to be closed.
This leads to a tragic incident. Upset over Gamache believing Blue is a runaway and the overall lack of support from the police, Missy takes her own life, jumping off the police building despite attempts by Gamache to stop her.
Three Pines episode 3 picks up months later. Blue's case is officially closed, buy Gamache is still trying to figure out how they can give some kind of closure to the Two-Rivers (and dealing with nightmares involving her). He asks that Isabelle take a look at it again and see if she can pick on something they missed.
She does. Isabelle notices that the picture of Blue and Tommy at a party in New York was Photoshopped, as Blue and Tommy's eyes don't reflect a camera flash like the rest of the people in it.
However, there is still little evidence explaining what may have happened to Blue. Isabelle looks at Tommy and Kevin's apartment, which remains unchanged since their disappearance and has the look that they just vanished.
In episode 4, Isabelle can't shake the feeling that she has missed something, so she goes back to Kevin's apartment and after turning the whole thing over, she notices something up with a rug. Pulling it up, she notices that the floor has been bleached. Forensics reveal that they found traces of Blue's blood, which makes Kevin, who previously crossed the border into the US, their new prime suspect.
Despite the work Gamache and Isabelle have done, they are told by Pierre to back off so as not to be seen interfering in the case. However, Isabelle is directly reached out to by Kevin (Colton Cause), saying he wants to talk to her and only her. She meets up with him, where he explains that the night Blue went missing they were pulled over by the cops. He ran away because of previous arrests, but he heard gun shots, which make him believe that Blue and Tommy were killed by the police.
Isabelle does some digging and finds video evidence that a cop car was following Kevin that night. When Kevin calls back, she tells them that she and Gamache believe him and he agrees to meet with them both, letting them know where he is.
After Gamache and company solve the mystery at the center of episodes 5 and 6, he and Isabelle go to meet him, but she sees that he has tried to call a couple of times. However, when they get there, he is gone. Kevin is at the bus station about to get on a bus to New York when he cops swarm in and arrest him. Gamache and Isabelle go to see him in holding, but he is unconscious, mouth foaming. Isabelle tries to revive him when the episode ends.
Kevin unfortunately died, leaving Gamache and his team in a tough spot. Now, they're only hope is to find the bodies of Blue and Tommy with the help of the Two-Rivers family and others.
While investigating another murder, Gamache notices that a pine needle on the victim is different than others, learning that it comes from a white pine tree, which are rare in the area. Remembering that pine needles were found at Kevin's apartment, they get them analyzed, revealing that they are white pine, which limits the supposed area the bodies could be.
Gamache goes to inspect one of the areas and finds Blue and Tommy's bodies, as well as bullets that can be analyzed to find out who shot them. The first is a Daniel Chowski, a low-level cop they already suspected, but another is Pierre Arnot, Gamache's friend and a high-ranking police official.
Looking to ensure justice for the Two-Rivers family over Blue's death, Gamache tracks down Arnot, who has been laying misdirection after Gamache raised his findings to their superior, pointing at Chowski and Gamache as the potential perpetrators. Gamache ensures him that he made backup files that disprove these theories and tries to convince him that the only way forward is to come clean. But Arnot shoots Gamache and goes on the run.
What does the blue jay mean in Three Pines?
When they first meet Gamache, the Two-Rivers tell him they called her Blue because as a child she reminded them of a blue jay, playing tricks and hiding from them. They give Gamache a blue jay feather.
Throughout the first two episodes, Gamache sees a blue jay in his dreams or appear in real life. This is a metaphor that Blue is always in Gamache's head. It even goes a step further, as a number of times when he sees the blue jay in dreams it's followed by a vision of Blue. In one of these instances, she asks why he isn't looking for her anymore, and also gives him a clue to find the murderer of CC de Poitiers — "The truth lies in the things we can't see, listen to the silence, that's where you find the monster."
While the vision of Blue says this bit of advice is to find CC's killer, it wouldn't be surprising if it comes back to be a key idea in finding out more about her disappearance.
There's one other connection with the blue jay. In addition to the blue jay feather Gamache is given by the Two-Rivers, in episode 2 we see him pull out another blue jay feather in a plastic cover with a sticker labeled 1963 on it. A quick flashback shows a young Gamache was given the feather.
We get another flashback in episode 3 when Gamache sees an imprint of a bird on the window of the St. Anthony building, which reminds him of when a blue jay ran into a window when he was a child and died. More of that flashback is revealed in episode 4, including the young Gamache finding the birds' nest with baby skeletons in it and his mother giving him the feather of the dead bird.
In the present, another mother blue jay, watching over her young, helps Gamache unlock the mystery around Marc Fortier's murder.
Blue jays appear to be some sort of symbol with death for Gamache, related to the loss of his parents when he was a child.
All episodes of Three Pines are now playing on Prime Video.
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