What You Need to Remember About CBS’ ‘Tracker’ Before Season 3

Tracker is set to return for its third season on October 19, 2025, and the anticipation has been heating up since Season 2 concluded in May 2025. That’s largely because of a massive revelation in the season finale that saw Colter Shaw (Justin Hartley) learn devastating news about his father’s murder. It will shake the character to his core and will likely encapsulate a big part of at least the first half of the new season. But there are more shake-ups coming with the supporting cast, including ones needing to deal with trauma and some departing the show altogether.

What Colter Learns About His Father’s Death Devastates Him

CBS

While Tracker is largely a case-of-the-week procedural action drama, there has been one main overarching story since the beginning. Colter’s father, Ashton (Lee Tergesen), was a brilliant scientist who abruptly moved his family off the grid. He taught Colter and his siblings everything they know about surviving in the wild, which is what largely led to the career path Colter decided to follow as an adult as a nomad who takes on missing persons cases for reward money.

Prior to his death, Ashton was getting increasingly paranoid. One day, he took off without explanation, noting that someone was after him. When he didn’t return for hours, Colter went to check on him and found his father dead at the bottom of a cliff. For years, he believed his older brother Russell (Jensen Ackles) killed their father since he saw him peering over the top of the cliff. But by the end of Season 1, Colter learned Russell had nothing to do with it. The air of mystery surrounding his father’s death permeated throughout every episode.

At the end of Season 2, a case takes Colter down a winding path that gets personal when he finds a man named Otto (Alex Fernandez) who knew his father. He learns that Otto helped Ashton set up wind turbines for the family’s remote home. Otto eventually reveals that he’s the person who pushed Ashton off the cliff, but advises Colter that he did it because “she” asked for his help. The person he’s referring to is Mary (Wendy Crewson), Colter’s mother, a piece of news that cuts deep, Colter having trouble reconciling how this could be possible.

It’s unclear if Mary specifically asked Otto to kill Ashton or whether there’s more to the story. Executive producer Elwood Reid clarifies to CBR that Mary might not have specifically asked Otto to kill her husband. The “help” she needed is up for interpretation, and this will likely unravel once Colter finally confronts her in Season 3.

The Secret Note About a Mystery Scientist

Colter eating pancakes while talking to his mother in her kitchen in Tracker.

Another major revelation in Season 1 relating to Ashton that wasn’t addressed until towards the end of Season 2 was that Colter learned from his childhood friend Lizzy (Jennifer Morrison) that his father and her mother were having an affair. She also revealed that Ashton left a box of belongings with her mother right before he died. Unsure of what to do with it once clearing out her mother’s things after her death, Lizzy gave the box to Colter’s sister Dory (Melissa Roxburgh). Colter eventually meets with Dory in Season 2, and they go through the random items, trinkets, and papers. There are notes on scientific research but nothing that especially stands out.

Later, while examining items from the box in his trailer, Colter finds a piece of paper hidden within a keepsake. It contains a number once belonging to a man named David Pearson, who he learns with Randy’s (Chris Lee) help was a scientist with a shady past and a history of having worked for the government. Most shocking, however, is that Pearson reportedly died by suicide the same year Ashton was murdered.

Now, it will be up to Colter to figure out who Pearson is, what his relationship was to his father, and what they might have been involved in that possibly got them both killed. How his mother plays into the story is crucial too, as well as his other family members. There have been hints since Season 1 that his father might have learned something, or made a scientific discovery himself, that the government wanted him to keep quiet about. In a Season 1 episode, a man Colter and Russell come across at a secret government site tells Russell that his father “asked too many questions,” which further teased this theory.

There’s also the odd relationship between Mary and her other kids. Russell went off to the military and Dory went off to live with her aunt and uncle following Ashton’s death, and it seems she has cut ties with both of them since. In fact, Mary went so far to, on many occasions, encourage Colter not to speak to his older brother, implying that nothing good would come of it. This suggests that Russell might know more about their life than he’s letting on. What’s further puzzling is why Mary would let Colter believe all these years that Russell killed their father. Answers to all those questions loomed through Season 2 and will hopefully be finally addressed in Season 3.

The Crew Gets Smaller, and Some Are on Edge

Colter on a computer with Reenie and Scharf on phones in the background in Tracker.

Sadly, it’s worth noting that Season 2 marks the end of two major characters. Velma (Abby McEnany) has been one of Colter’s handlers since the beginning. Robin Weigert left the series after Season 1, and her character Teddi, Velma’s wife and partner, was written out with little explanation. It was implied they separated, but Velma was seemingly getting a new storyline. She moved into a shared office space with Reenie (Fiona Rene) and the two were growing closer as friends.

Bobby (Eric Graise) was the biggest question mark through Season 2 as his character oddly disappeared from numerous episodes, replaced by Randy, his older cousin. The vague references suggested he left to take care of personal family business. He popped up a few times in later episodes, typically alongside Randy. But it has been confirmed that Graise will not be returning, and Lee has been promoted to a bigger role.

Reenie will return as a main character, and the big question for her lies in what happens in the aftermath of the incident involving her shady billionaire client Leonard Sharf (Pej Vahdat). Reenie was kidnapped by someone Leonard wronged, her life threatened if Leonard, who had also been cornered in a separate location, didn’t give up his own life for hers. It’s unclear what answer he gave because they were both saved in the nick of time. Will Reenie continue to work with him, and was Leonard willing to sacrifice himself for Reenie, who has put her career and seemingly life on the line for him through dangerous legal dealings? That remains to be seen along with the future of her new business, especially if she ends up losing a massive client like him.

We do have confirmation that Ackles, Crewson, and Roxburgh will return for Season 3. Reid told TV Insider that while Ackles is very busy with other projects, including The Boys and its prequel spin-off Vought Rising, he is contacting him for any time he can spare to shoot scenes. The hope is that Russell will have a bigger storyline in Season 3. Roxburgh, meanwhile, is game to “come up and play,” adds Reid, noting that Dory is the “biggest blank canvas we have as far as a character goes. We feel like she knows something, but we don’t know what it is.”

Notable for Season 3 is that Reid hints that an Easter egg from Season 2 could come back and potentially have something to do with Ashton. This could be the mysterious Deputy Director Bartholomew, introduced in Episode 13 “Neptune” when Colter handled a case that led him to a secret government operation, and his involvement clearly made some people, or someone, unhappy. Whatever happens, all we know is that the breadcrumbs laid out in Season 2 will come together in Season 3 in a big way. Even if it doesn’t lead to everything Colter wants to know, he’ll get closer to solving the biggest mystery in his life, and hopefully some emotional closure, too. Stream Tracker on Paramount+.