Marshals: Lost Girls

In Yellowstone country, jurisdiction is serious business. For a Dutton, not so much. Kayce Dutton’s family has gone rogue before, so he is willing to go rogue again. However, when Thomas Rainwater, the Chairman of the Broken Rock Reservation makes an official request for assistance finding trafficked girls, the Marshals are relieved to finally help real victims and pursue real scumbags in “Lost Girls,” tonight’s episode, “Lost Girls.”

Running a fruitless errand to Wyoming, Dutton’s son Tate happens to meet a former classmate, Hayley Charlo, in a truck stop, but she doesn’t seem to be herself. Quick follow-up reveals Charlo is one of many missing Reservation girls, who have been dismissed as runaways. Babysitting a piece of trash Federal witness leaves a rather bad taste with most of the Marshals, so they start quietly investigating until they get official permission.

Frankly, Dutton and Miles Kittles aren’t so quiet about it. While he was still with the Reservation Police, Kittles diligently worked the case of Charlo’s missing friend Ava. This week, he might be the loose cannon their boss, Pete Calvin should be worrying about.

This episode definitely taps into the human trafficking outrage of The Sound of Freedom, while capturing the Marshals’ frustrations with conflicting and overlapping jurisdictions. There is also a bit of “Frontier Justice,” but it doesn’t come from Kayce. However, it is deserved and cathartic.

“Lost Girls” also provides the most memorable appearances in the spinoff series for Gil Birmingham and Mo Brings Plenty, still reprising their Yellowstone roles, as Rainwater and Mo. In fact, the latter has a stone-cold scene that would be worthy of the mother-ship series.

Marshals remains a largely conventional procedural, but “Lost Girls” adopts an edgier attitude. The series should continue in this direction—and it will for at least an episode, because this story-arc continues next week. Recommended for the solid action and its cowboy-inclinations, “Lost Girls” airs tonight (3/29) on CBS.