Getting Sid Baker away from her kidnappers should be the hard part. In Slow Horses Season 6 Episode 5, “Sayonara,” surviving an encounter with Russian assassins only gets her delivered into another dangerous arrangement. The people carrying MI5 credentials have instructions, and bringing her home safely is nowhere near the top of the list.
Jack Lowden and Olivia Cooke carry the episode’s desperate escapes as River Cartwright and Sid, while Gary Oldman and Kristin Scott Thomas give its political reckoning a sharper edge. Jackson Lamb has worked out enough of Diana Taverner’s scheme to know who is paying for it. Unfortunately, knowing the truth does not automatically give him the power to stop her.
Following the devastating events of “Lost and Found”, the penultimate installment makes the connection between Slough House’s predicament and Taverner’s decisions much clearer. It also puts River in the position of choosing whose orders deserve to be obeyed.
Sid Fights Back, and Jim Doesn’t Survive
Jim and Jane begin the episode with Sid in their car and every intention of killing her. Sid disrupts that plan by attacking Jane while she is driving. The vehicle overturns, giving Sid an opening to escape into the woods, but Jim follows her.
His pursuit ends at the water, where he tries to drown her. River arrives in time to intervene, and the struggle becomes a joint effort to survive. Sid hits Jim with a rock, and she and River hold him underwater until he is dead.
It is an important distinction that Sid helps save herself twice in this sequence. She causes the crash, then contributes decisively to stopping Jim. River’s arrival matters enormously, but the episode keeps her involved in her own survival rather than leaving her unconscious while he finishes the job.
Jim’s death also follows his killing of Coe, making the confrontation especially charged. Yet there is little room to absorb what has happened. Jane’s apparent death in the wreck does not hold: she disappears from the scene, leaving another capable killer unaccounted for.
The Dogs’ arrival initially looks like a way out. Instead, River and Sid are taken to an airfield. The Service has plans for Sid that make surviving Jim only the first ordeal of the day.
Lamb Explains How Taverner Exposed Slough House
The confrontation between Lamb and Taverner gives “Sayonara” its strongest scene. He understands that the danger facing his agents grew out of her attempt to hide the Kazan operation.
Sid Baker’s identity was used for the assassination. Taverner then tried to conceal the connection by scrubbing records that contained Sid’s name. That cleanup created a pattern Russian intelligence could follow, bringing attention to Slough House and the people associated with her.
Lamb’s argument is devastating because it takes apart the supposed cleverness of the cover-up. Removing information is itself an action that can leave evidence. The agents at Slough House have become targets because of a decision made far above them, without their knowledge or consent.
Oldman and Scott Thomas have ideal material here: two experienced operators who can dispense with polite explanations because each knows exactly what the other is capable of. Lamb’s anger is rooted in what has happened to his people. Taverner is still working out how much damage she can contain.
Her appearance before the oversight committee shows the public version of that calculation. She pushes back against scrutiny and invokes the difficulty of protecting the country with insufficient resources. It is a persuasive defense of the job’s demands. The private conversation with Lamb exposes the people omitted from that defense.
Vassily Turns the Funding Against Taverner
Taverner’s arrangement becomes even uglier when Vassily threatens to reveal that Cantor’s money financed the Kazan killing. The financing that allowed her to act outside the usual channels now gives Russian intelligence a means of pressuring her.
He wants Sid handed over. Refusal risks exposing Taverner’s operation and the money behind it. Whatever arguments she makes about national security, the immediate bargain asks another person to bear the consequences of her choices.
Sid and River recognize the danger of her identity having been selected in the first place. Sid’s supposedly closed history makes her useful to an operation that requires distance and deniability. Now that she is physically available, she can be surrendered as well.
Taverner offers the prospect of Sid coming home after a period in Russian custody. The flight plan makes that reassurance difficult to take seriously: the destination is Sofia, Bulgaria. The episode treats the location as a warning that this will be an unofficial detention, with no meaningful protection for Sid.
Even after that concern is raised, Taverner lets the handover proceed. That decision is the episode’s clearest statement about her priorities. She has enough information to understand the likely consequences, and she authorizes the transfer anyway.
Cantor’s Calendar Leads Lamb to Natasha
While Taverner tries to manage the immediate crisis, Lamb pursues the money’s other connections. Ho finds an unusual recurring entry in Cantor’s calendar: a children’s ballet class, despite Cantor having no children.
Lamb follows the lead and finds Natasha. Her ability to shake his surveillance makes her more than a casual business acquaintance. Someone who can lose Jackson Lamb knows how to operate.
Natasha is also encouraging Cantor with the promise of a major Russian media deal. His appetite for a larger platform makes him receptive to the people offering one, even as the surrounding espionage threatens to overwhelm whatever business arrangement he thinks he is making.
The ballet-class investigation is an effective change of pace. A mundane calendar entry produces a useful lead, and Lamb gets a result even when his surveillance fails. Natasha’s escape tells him something about her that a conversation might never have revealed.
River Refuses to Let Sid Board the Plane
At the airfield, River and Sid have time to talk about what they mean to each other. His memory of his grandfather leaving a light on gives their conversation a tenderness that the more overt flirting does not always match.
The emotional point is clear: River has already believed Sid dead, and losing her again is unbearable. Some of the banter stretches that point longer than necessary, particularly with a handover approaching. In a six-episode season, the pause is noticeable.
The escape restores the urgency. River attacks his guard and takes an airport pickup, while Sid fights her escorts and reaches the truck. She then sends fuel tumbling into the path of their pursuers, producing an explosion that buys them time.
It does not buy enough time for a clean getaway. River stops, kisses Sid, and sends her running across open ground. He keeps the vehicle and draws the pursuit toward himself.
By the ending, the Dogs have caught up with River while Sid has escaped their immediate reach. He has prevented the handover, but the institution he defied is now in a position to demand answers. His decision leaves Taverner with a disrupted bargain and no easy substitute for the woman she promised to deliver.
The Others Prepare for Trouble at the Holiday House
The remaining Slow Horses have their own preparations underway at Taverner’s holiday house. Shirley’s petrol bombs and exchanges with Louisa provide welcome flashes of the show’s abrasive humor, without making the threat outside disappear.
Harkness and his men are closing in, with Reece providing a route toward the group. The refuge is becoming another potential confrontation, just as Lamb is occupied untangling the larger conspiracy.
That leaves several urgent problems for the finale. Jane remains loose. Sid has nowhere clearly secure to go. River is in the Dogs’ hands. Lamb’s discoveries about Natasha and Cantor need to produce something more useful than an explanation of how everyone ended up in danger.
Final Verdict
“Sayonara” is strongest when it connects the season’s violence to specific decisions. Taverner’s funding, the erased records and the proposed handover form an increasingly grim account of how an operation can consume the people around it. Lamb’s confrontation with her gives those consequences the weight they deserve.
The romantic pauses are less consistently effective, and some of the holiday-house material remains preparation for next week. Still, the two escapes work well together: Sid survives an assassin, then has to escape an institution prepared to surrender her. River’s final choice delivers a satisfying act of defiance while leaving the consequences unresolved.
River Defies a Deadly Bargain
Lamb exposes the cost of Taverner’s decisions while River and Sid turn a ruthless handover into a desperate escape.
Lamb explains how Taverner’s erased records exposed his agents.
Gary Oldman and Kristin Scott Thomas make the confrontation count.
Sid’s active role in both escapes and the increasingly clear political stakes.
The airfield flirtation lingers while the handover and finale approach.
“Sayonara” Ending Explained
River prevents Sid’s transfer to the GRU, then separates from her to draw the Dogs away. Sid is free of the immediate handover; River is caught. Her longer-term safety remains unresolved, especially with Jane still at large.
Taverner’s problem has also changed. She promised Vassily a person she no longer has, and he possesses information that could expose her financing of the Kazan operation. Meanwhile, Lamb has identified Natasha as a trained operative connected to Cantor. None of those discoveries has yet removed the danger gathering around the other Slow Horses.
Slow Horses Episode 5 FAQ
Does Jim die in “Sayonara”?
Yes. Sid strikes him with a rock during the struggle at the lake, and she and River drown him.
Does Jane die in the car crash?
No. She disappears from the wreck and remains an unresolved threat.
Why does Taverner hand Sid over?
Vassily demands Sid and threatens to expose the Cantor-funded Kazan operation. Taverner proceeds despite the danger the transfer poses to Sid.
Do River and Sid escape together?
They escape the airfield together, but then separate. Sid runs while River draws the pursuing Dogs toward himself and is caught.
The Slow Horses Season 6 finale arrives Wednesday, October 21, on Apple TV. Catch up on Slow Horses on Apple TV, and revisit our “Sayonara” episode photos.
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Thomas Miller is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Seat42F, covering television, movies and streaming entertainment. He launched Seat42F in 2007 and has spent nearly two decades covering the entertainment industry.
