The Hunting Party Season 2 Episode 1 Review: Ron Simms

The Hunting Party Season 2 Episode 1 returns for Season 2 with “Ron Simms.” It sends the team right back into the action as they track down the infamous “Boogeyman.”

Season 1 of The Hunting Party Season 1 ended with Oliver Odell’s death, and the Season 2 premiere wastes no time getting the team back to work, even after disbanding.

Killing off one of the main characters in its first season is a bold decision; however, Oliver’s absence hasn’t slowed down the team. Bex blackmails the Attorney General, Elizabeth Mallory, providing a quick and solid justification for why the team can continue business as usual.

For the most part, this episode focuses on reintroducing the “killer of the week” formula. Besides the looming presence of Colonel Lazarus, it doesn’t dwell on the events of the previous season outside of a pretty large exposition dump. This is good for new viewers, but perhaps a bit irritating for old ones.

This episode follows the team as they attempt to track down and recapture Ron Simms, a serial killer with a total of twelve victims. Ron is known for breaking into women’s homes, drugging them with a paralytic, and spending days with them as they slowly die.

Every scene with him will make your skin crawl. He’s incredibly creepy thanks to Eric McCormack’s performance.

They explain that Ron becomes a serial killer because he suffers from severe anxiety and sees no other way to escape his isolation. The way this is explained is a bit simplistic, but it works for advancing the plot.

Ron is depicted as someone who doesn’t kill for the sake of it, but also doesn’t seem to understand how truly bad his actions are. There’s an interesting sequence that shows how Bex deduces what kind of person he has become, while also showing the patterns of behavior that did not change. 

Nearing the midpoint of the episode, it’s revealed that Ron has been holding his therapist prisoner in a barn while forcing him to wear a rabbit suit. This reveal, while beautifully creepy, also marks a turning point in the episode.

Soon after that, Bex is kidnapped by Ron and taken to the same barn where Dr. Charles is. While this isn’t out of place, it feels notably different from how he’d been depicted previously.

He went from being someone creepy to someone who is more outwardly aggressive. This is fine, but there was a missed opportunity to really lean into his creepiness.

The rabbit barn is an incredible set piece that, unfortunately, lost a bit of its atmosphere with Ron’s shift towards a more conventional killer.

During the final showdown, we see Bex nearly strangle Ron to death before being stopped by Ryan and Shane. This is an interesting moment for her as we see a very angry side of the character come out.

This moment might have some interesting implications for Bex for the rest of the season, as she clearly is not handling Oliver’s death well.

This is even more pertinent given the reveal of Colonel Lazarus taking over the program at the end of the episode.

Overall, while flawed, this is a solid reintroduction to The Hunting Party and an interesting setup for the new season.     

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The Hunting Party airs Thursdays at 10/9c on NBC.

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