Did 'Tracker' Kill Justin Hartley's Colter? Season 3 Fall Finale Explained

The season 3 midseason finale of Tracker ended with Justin Hartley‘s Colter Shaw in a horrible car crash - but could he actually be dead?

During the Sunday, December 14, episode of the hit CBS series, Colter traveled to help Keaton (Brent Sexton) on a case that ultimately turned deadly. Keaton's cop friend was the first victim of the investigation and then Keaton himself got severely injured. Colter was driving Keaton to get medical aid when their car went off the road and flipped over multiple times.

"It's pretty bad," executive producer Elwood Reid exclusively told Us Weekly. "The situation we pick directly up in [episode] 10 is pretty dire. Part of the puzzle is [whether] Keaton [is] dead or is he alive? How does Colter save himself or try to resuscitate Keaton?"

Since Colter is the main character, it is likely that he survives.

"It's Tracker so I am sure Justin will be there for the rest of the episodes. But it's just fun to mess him up physically. There's some real benefit to that because he's human. One of the things that the network said early on is they don't want to be a superhero," he noted. "I think that's what's fun about it. That was the way we entered this. What's the closest we could come and what is the worst situation we could put him in and see if he can get out of it - if he can."

Based on Jeffery Deaver‘s novel The Never Game, Trackercenters around a survivalist named Colter who travels the country helping find missing people and solving cases others wouldn't. Hartley has previously warned that the fan-favorite cast isn't immoral.

Darko Sikman/CBS

Reid, however, hinted that the chances of Colter being killed off are slim, telling Us, "First of all, I think Justin would kill me so you'd probably have no showrunner. Also this show really just lives and dies with Justin's character - even when he's not kicking down doors or rescuing kidnapped kids. We're on this ride with this guy who's emotionally given his word that he's going to help these people."

While there is room for Colter to be out of commission for several episodes - there would be challenges.

"I don't have any way of doing it outside of bringing in [his brother] Russell or something. I don't know how you would ever do it - nor would I want to do it," he noted. "The show works best when the audience is right over Colter's shoulder. It's almost claustrophobic in some ways, but there's something about the way that Justin portrays this character. He's able to - without a lot of words - bring gravity to every scene."

Reid promised that the best is yet to come this season. "We have some really fun cases," he teased. "We have a couple of really twisty emotional things that push Colter to an edge that causes him to go back to Echo Ridge to actually have a conversation with his mother. Then this mystery that we've been teasing about Echo Ridge - that may or may not bring Russell back into the fold - is going to accelerate as we move forward."

The screenwriter continued: "He's going to learn more things about the past and about his father. The thing that he struggles with a lot is, ‘Was my father a good guy or a bad guy?' Maybe it's both. Same thing with his mom like, ‘Is my mom a good person or a bad person? Or is she both?' He's on the long play program for that to parcel that and that discovery out."

Tracker returns to CBS Sunday, March 1, at 9 p.m. ET.

US Weekly

This story was originally published December 14, 2025 at 6:29 PM.