Harlan Coben’s Run Away Recap ‘Seeing is Believing’: A father desperately searches for his daughter

Run Away Episode 1

When Simon Greene (James Nesbitt) went to the park one lovely morning, it was only so he could find his daughter Paige (Ellie de Lange), whom he has not seen in the past six months. A sweet girl from a wealthy home, she succumbed to addiction, and was often in the company of her boyfriend Aaron Corval. Simon did find Paige, playing her guitar and singing, but she refused to come home with him. When she tried to get away from him, Simon followed her, only to be accosted and mocked by Aaron. The two of them got into a fight, with Simon venting out months of fury and worry on his daughter’s junkie boyfriend. A Youtuber who happened to be at the park doing yoga saw a rich man beating up whom she took to be a homeless man, took a video, and uploaded it online, along with some inflammatory comments that turned Simon into the Internet’s villain of the day. His lawyer Jessica got him out of jail without a charge. He returned home to his wife (a pediatrician, Ingrid, Minnie Driver) and his other daughter Anya (his son Sam was away at university). His life would have returned to normal had Aaron not been found murdered, and Simon, the rich jerk who beat him up on camera, became the prime suspect. 

Welcome to the latest in a string of Netflix productions of Harlan Coben’s mysteries. Since we’re not new to this, we already know what to expect — twisty mysteries, seemingly unconnected characters whose presence will make sense as the series goes on. The one consistent thing about my experience with Harlan Coben’s mysteries is that I’d never been able to correctly guess whodunit. I’m not even going to try and guess now. Instead, let’s start 2026 immersed in the utter grief of a normal family who already had to deal with the heartbreaking disappearance of their daughter and her spiralling addiction, and now had to be on the defensive against a policeman intent on exposing the father’s secrets and a public that judged him. 

Let’s start with DS Fagbenle (Alfred Enoch), who seemed to dislike Simon on sight. And why wouldn’t he? How many times has he seen suspects walk away because their fancy lawyer got them off? Not too many, perhaps, since he didn’t look old enough to have that kind of cynicism etched on his soul. Perhaps he disliked Simon the same way the Internet did, because he was a rich man beat up a poor guy on video? Perhaps. Or, he was a young man trying to establish his authority as he investigated a horrific murder. Aaron’s three fingers were cut off. Someone hurt him before he was killed. 

Could it be the two assassins we saw but don’t know much about yet? Their names were Ash and Dee Dee, and their victim on this episode was a man with a wife and child, whom Ash shot inside his garage. He sent a sorry text to the man’s wife and tried to make the scene look like a suicide. Why? It has not yet been revealed.

Could it be Simon’s wife Dr. Ingrid? No, she was working a shift at the hospital when Aaron was killed. It was strange, though, that she worked the night shift, when the Greene couple looked obviously wealthy. Unless she was a night owl, night shifts were brutal on the body. Once she learned of Aaron’s murder, she, whom her husband did not even inform of his plan to go to the park to see Paige since she would have stopped him, had a renewed sense of urgency in finding their daughter. She suggested that she and Simon head over to Aaron’s flat, which Simon helpfully pointed out was a crime scene, and try to locate Paige. 

I need to constantly remind myself that characters in mystery shows may not have grown up watching CSI to not feel frustrated at the foolishness (or entitlement of the wealthy?) of crossing a police tape and trying to break down the door of a flat where a brutal murder has occurred. How do you know the police was done processing the scene? Simon was the prime suspect, being there meant he and his wife could accidentally leave hair or fingerprints which could be used against them? Could they not be charged for breaking down Aaron’s door? In any case, they didn’t need to. Aaron’s neighbour and Paige’s friend Cornelius Faber (Lucian Msamati) found them outside the flat and let them in using his own key. 

Cornelius told the Greene couple that a couple of days previously, he saw Paige hurrying down to her supplier with blood on her face; he then knew that Aaron had beaten her up. He pointed the couple to where Rocco, the dealer, lived. 

Face to face with his daughter’s dealer in his dingy hideout, Simon offered him ten thousand pounds for information on Paige. He seemed interested, but when another associate, Luther, walked in, Luther started freaking out, and he pulled a gun out. He shot Ingrid on the shoulder. Another shot rang out.

Run Away began with a simple concept, a father desperate to find his daughter. Now we move on to the twists we have come to expect from Harlan Coben mysteries, and I am here for it. 

Rating: B+

Strays

🪷The opening shot was of Paige in a Lanford jacket who walked into what appears to be her dorm room, and found a masked man there. Then there were interspersed shots of someone beating someone up bloody. This was a year prior to the events of the series

🪷Paige was singing and playing a guitar with a flower sticker when Simon found her in the park. We later saw what appears to be this same guitar in Sam’s room.

🪷There was a private detective named Elena Ravenscroft (Ruth Jones) who stole a dog in the park so she could return it to the owner and her daughter. The dog owner, Maria Finchley, owned Finch & Leaf, a vegan cafe, and for reasons not yet revealed, Elena seemed to be keeping an eye on her. 

🪷Elena’s new client, Mr. Thorpe, was looking for his (adopted) son Henry, who has been missing for six days. Henry’s phone could not be located, which meant it has been destroyed somehow.  

🪷Elena’s tech person Lou found the person who messaged Henry on Instagram, Paige Greene, Simon’s missing daughter.

🪷Simon was business partners with his wife’s sister Yvonne.

Episode Title: Seeing is Believing

Episode Writer: Danny Brocklehurst

Episode Director: Nimer Rashed

Original Release Date: January 1, 2026

You can view Recap Lab’s full coverage of Harlan Coben’s Run Away via this link.