After coming across a severed head left at their doorstep by the biker gang in the previous episode, Ray realized they had no choice but to hide. In Dope Thief episode 4, we find out that Ray had temporarily taken shelter at a motel with Theresa and Manny. His best friend was in a terrible state after he was compelled to abandon his fiancée. Manny was not coping well with the situation, and the drugs in his system made it worse. Ray didn’t have the option of giving up, and he was determined to protect his loved ones till his last breath. Will Ray manage to keep Theresa and Manny safe? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
What was ‘the Alliance’?
In the fourth episode of Dope Thief, the show delves into Mina’s past. She and Jack had gotten physically intimate on more than one occasion. Jack was married, but he liked Mina, though she preferred to keep her emotions at bay. As undercover agents, Jack believed it was crucial that they let go of their ideas of right and wrong, because at times it was more just a matter of playing a role. The line separating the good and evil often got blurry, and one had to do what they had to to survive. Jack had discussed the story of Randy Baum with Mina. Twenty years ago he was a cook at a bikers’ club and he eventually testified against his gang, but surprisingly, all of a sudden he had become active again and was working around the clock. Jack believed liquid meth was the answer to the supply problem faced by the drug cartels as a result of COVID, and he was sure that Randy was contacted because there was a labor shortage. COVID had resulted in the tightening of border security, thereby hindering the smuggling route. According to Jack, before the chaos was unleashed, a big shipment came over but unfortunately everything was shut down and their networks had fallen apart. There was a lack of cooks and contractors because mobility had become an issue, and that was when the cartel started hiring third-party contractors to convert and move the East Coast stash. They had biker gangs working on it, and it seems these third-party contractors together formed ‘the Alliance.’
Jack had requested Mina to meet Randy and become familiar with the business. That’s how they too started cooking, hoping that they would manage to pull off one of the biggest seizures in history. When Mina was interrogated by the feds after the shootout, she admitted that Jack often took risks, and they often had to skirt the law to get things done. Mina believed that neither she nor Jack was pure, but that was what it took to be in the game. She was ready to face the consequences of their decisions and for not playing by the rulebook. But Mina was still hopeful about continuing to investigate the case. She believed that to find out who’d ratted on their operations, it was crucial to track down Ray.
Why was Son arrested by the police?
Son’s connection with Ray was neither a secret from the biker gang nor the police. The gang killed his dog to warn him that his family would face the same repercussions if he failed to tell them of Ray’s whereabouts. Son was constantly under surveillance, and he felt the urgency to get rid of the biker gang. Meanwhile, Ray had surveillance cameras installed everywhere he thought the bikers would search for him. He noticed a man in a car waiting for him outside his house. Ray drove to the spot and placed a tracking device on the car.
Ray couldn’t sleep, imagining the worst, and he constantly had his eyes on the surveillance footage and the location of the tracking device. He noticed that the car had been parked at a quarry, and upon visiting the spot, he figured out it was the bikers’ headquarters. Ray contacted Son and updated him on the progress. Son informed Ray that he would have his man, Cyrus, contact them and figure out a way to handle the gangsters. After dropping his children at school, Son saw policemen storming in his direction. He got rid of anything that could be used against him within seconds and surrendered himself to the cops. He was interrogated by a DEA agent who accused him of being involved in moving the new meth (the liquid meth Ray had temporarily stored at his place). We learn that Son was once an informant for the federal agency, and he’d helped the DEA take down the Thang Organization. The agent was hopeful that the possibility of not facing any repercussions would encourage Son to give away some information. But the drug dealer remained tight-lipped and simply asked for a lawyer.
What was the deal with Cyrus and his gang?
Ray and Manny found it a little difficult to believe that Son had recommended Cyrus to get rid of the biker gangs. Even though Ray was not a fan of the philosophical killer, he decided to show Cyrus the headquarters only because Son had vouched for him. Manny had a bad feeling about Cyrus from the very beginning, and his hunch about the guy turned out to be quite right. Ray assumed Cyrus would only check out the spot to come up with a plan and take down the gangs. But to his surprise, Cyrus was far from an organized killer. He was driven by adrenaline, and his nihilistic ideals prepared him for war at any given second. Soon after arriving at the quarry, Cyrus’s men turned up at the spot. They had painted their faces and were pumped up to execute the ambush. This was not what Ray had in mind, and he did not wish to get caught up in a shootout again. Also, they’d barely scouted the place, and planning an attack without having complete knowledge about what they were dealing with was nothing short of a suicide, according to Ray. Cyrus manically laughed as he flung a Molotov cocktail at the pit where the bikers had gathered. His men did the same, and soon a gang war began. Unfortunately for Cyrus and his gang, the biker gangs were not as foolish as they would have preferred. Just when Cyrus and the gang started shooting the bikers in the pit, members of the biker gang hiding behind the trees attacked the intruders. Cyrus and gang were targeted by the bikers in the pit as well as those hiding in the hilly terrain. There was no way to escape, but Cyrus did not seem to mind the chaos. While he tried to bravely face the gangsters, Cyrus was eventually shot dead. Ray somehow managed to grab the van keys, and he drove out of the spot with Manny by his side.
Why did Manny want to kill himself?
Manny was suffering from withdrawal symptoms, and he was all the more devastated when found out that Sherry wanted to keep her distance from him. With the cops, the gangsters after them, and the love of his life leaving him hanging at the altar, Manny started to question all the life-changing decisions he’d made so far. He wanted a normal life, and Sherry was his last hope, but all of a sudden every good thing in his life was gone. When, towards the end of Dope Thief episode 4, he noticed a grenade in the van, he decided to end his life. As soon as they reached the motel, Manny begged Ray to step out of the van, but Ray refused to do so. He soon figured that Manny was clutching a grenade, and he was determined to kill himself. Manny believed he had no other choice left; he was too deep into the mess, and there was no way he could ever get out of it. He thought his life was not worth living without Sherry in it, and somehow dying seemed to be an easier option for him than surviving and putting on a brave face. Ray refused to let go of Manny. He believed Sherry deserved to know what she was dealing with, and he did not regret telling her the truth. Ray admitted that his risky hustle ideas had landed them in trouble, but at present they had to face the consequences of their actions because dying would not help their cause. Even if Manny died, the gangsters would end up at Sherry’s doorstep. They had to live to protect the ones they loved. Ray managed to calm Manny down, and he got rid of the grenade.
At the very end of Dope Thief episode 4, when Ray went to meet Michelle at the spot they’d agreed upon to discuss his past, he realized there were federal agents waiting at the bar to apprehend him. Michelle, too, slyly gestured for him to leave, and Ray walked away. Clearly, there are no safe spots left for Ray, and the sooner he finds a solution, the better it will be for him and his loved ones. Though finding a way out of this mess almost seems impossible.
