Justin Davis
Episode 3 of Spinning Out opens with Kat berating Justin’s lateness in the morning and after Leah gives her some words of encouragement, Dasha arrives and the training begins. Serious trust issues clearly come between them and with both competitors carrying baggage, Justin arrogantly skates off the ice and rests, waiting for Kat to get her mental state in order. It turns out Leah has a new partner, a man named Gabe, and with Bruce as their coach things look set for a showdown between the two pairs of skaters in the future. Before we get there though, Kat messes up her lift again and this time she falls awkwardly onto Justin. Believing she could have killed her partner, Dasha reassures her but it’s enough for Kat’s mental problems to come back and haunt her again in a big way. In the locker room, she bites her arm for relief, drawing blood and spitting a thick, red glob into the sink. Serena arrives and expresses her concerns, probing whether her sister is taking her lithium (she is as it turns out) while the women gossip about Kat’s fall earlier in the day. Kat encourages Jenn to look out for Serena while she heads back to the bar and works with Marcus, where he suggests they forget the incident between them last time. Back home, Dasha encourages Kat not to get too worked up as Justin won’t be dropping her anytime soon and as a last resort, she drives Kat and Justin up to the middle of nowhere and suggests they work out their trust issues, driving off and leaving them standard. Justin’s quick thinking allows them to drive up and eat at a diner nearby though where things go reasonably well, connecting over the meatloaf he hungrily gulps down. When they head back to the lodge together, the beginning of a love triangle looms on the horizon as Marcus immediately takes offence to Justin and invites himself along to the party going on that night. Before she can go however, Jenn arrives at Dasha’s and convinces her to break into Mitch’s caravan, convinced that there’s some truth to her suspicions that he could be having an affair with his students. As they head off, Justin feels anxious when Kat fails to show up at the party, experiencing flashes to the past during his time on the podium. Drowning his sorrows in alcohol, Marcus arrives and immediately messages Kat asking where she is. She, as it happens, finds divorce papers in Mitch’s caravan and after snapping photos, notices Mitch arrive and scrambles out the door and into the night. Back home, Carol tells Kat the truth about Mitch’s previous student. It turns out there was nothing suspicious going on and actually, Mitch’s wife left him. Carol tells her daughter to leave, especially after her previous mess-up on the ice. Unfortunately Serena hears everything and heads into Mitch’s caravan, questioning the “trial period” her Mum mentioned previously during the argument It’s a big hammer blow for her. The next day Kat arrives for training but when Justin fails to show up, she purposefully walks up to his hotel room and drums on the door. He berates her for not showing up at the party and offers him an ultimatum. There’s a lot of baggage here between them and as we skip back in time, we see that Justin’s Mum had an accident and he’s been carrying this around the whole time, bringing some clarity and meaning to his destructive behaviour. The flashbacks to Justin’s past are a really nice touch here and more so in this episode than the previous one, the soap opera elements actually compliment the mental health commentary really well. Seeing the issues Justin has had in his past is a nice touch and understanding just what’s driving his behaviour is a much-welcome sight too. It’s not the most memorable or stylish drama we’re likely to see this year but Spinning Out is a pretty light, breezy watch and there’s enough character drama to keep you sticking around to see how this one plays out.
