Opening eye candy! And why not, it’s not like they hired
the actor for his amazing thespian talents. Alas, it’s a very brief montage of
Vincent working out which is interrupted by Cat who brings the relationship
drama - does Vincent want there to be an “us”. A kiss follows…
And Vincent wakes up (kisses from Cat are apparently like
being pinched). At least it’s just a dream and Cat has some class and isn’t
rekindling her romance with Vincent while Tori isn’t even cold and Gabe is in
hiding. That would be tacky.
To ~Cat and Tess! Who are talking about men – how shocked
are we with this discovery? Anyway it seems Cat called Gabe “Vincent” over
dinner while on a romantic holiday in Mexico and he was so gracious over it
while Tess would have totally eaten Cat’s liver. Cat has decided to avoid
Vincent for a while so we can really ramp up the angst
To Gabe’s fake funeral! Tess isn’t exactly reverent since
Gabe isn’t actually dead and they make a note not to tell Gabe how poorly attended
his funeral was. Vincent and JT arrive and there’s more whispered small talk
while the priest drones on in a rather melodramatic fashion. Tess and Cat make
nice with the evil Sam (since
Dana is also faking her own death) and Vincent and JT talk about getting
Cat back, which includes Vincent convincing her that he won’t choose Beast over
her again (ugh,
are we really going to say Cat was right about all that?)
Cat goes to see Gabe and tries to sugar-coat his poorly
attended funeral (personally I think they booked too large a venue for a man
with no living family and a very small social circle) and discuss what they
know about the mysterious and menacing Barnes – mainly that he liquidated his
fortune and is now playing hidden paymaster to secret evil plotz. As you do,
everyone needs a hobby
Tess is stalking Sam and has followed him to a hospital
where he’s visiting someone in quarantine. Doesn’t that defeat the point of
quarantine? Gabe says “quarantine what does that mean?” and I don’t know
whether to despair or call in the cast of Helix
to explain it in agonisingly painful detail. Which would serve him right.
Cat wants to check it out but Gave is horrified that she’s
going to go alone. To a hospital. A public hospital. That Tess has already been
to. Of course, this ridiculous turn of
events is just an excuse to make Cat take Vincent with her.
In the hospital, someone dumps a kid on a gurney and
Vincent flies into doctor mode, not approving of the neglectful treatment and
deciding his several-years-out-date-medical-skills and completely
unsterile-street-clothes are exactly what is needed. Cat, of course, loves
seeing the “old you”.
He did, apparently, save a kid from a ruptured spleen
while Cat, alas, couldn’t get into quarantine. Because it’s quarantine. If you
could get in, it wouldn’t be quarantine. The CDC has taken over and the patient
has memory loss, fever and psychotic rage and for some reason she mooted the
possibility of a designer drug (which the CDC decided to… quarantine?) and
apparently he’s the second victim of the same ailment – the last one is dead.
Interestingly, they both were the same age and had the same name – Jacob Sutter.
They also have a brief meeting with Vincent’s old mentor who wants Vincent to
become a doctor again.
Gabe recognises the name as someone who was in the
orphanage with him – the same orphanage that Muirfield used for human guinea
pigs; they suspect that Barnes is running through the Jacob Sutters until he
finds the one Gabe was a child with – injecting them with the serum that JT
made in the hope of making a Beast. Cat’s curious as to what made these kids in
this orphanage so special.
Tess follows Sam to where he speaks to another Jacob
Sutter while Vincent disguises himself as a doctor to question the grieving
mother and give her some hope
Cat goes to see daddy dearest who, in between ranting
about murdering all the beasts (especially Vincent) and Cat slapping him down
for being a murderer, tells her that her mother selected the test subjects; a
small percentage of the population have a gene that makes them susceptible to beastliness.
Without the gene the serum is just deadly.
Cat joins Tess, watched secretly by Sam. This Jacob
Sutter looks like he was the right one – he’s been turned into a Beast. After
fleeing Cat and Tess (knocking Cat over) he is tranqed by Sam and presumably
captured.
To Gabe and some more “I must keep you safe, oh delicate
lady person” before Cat points out that Gabe has the gene and is, therefore,
susceptible to rebeasting.
Vincent takes some of the quarantined man’s blood to JT who
is not amused by the theft of sick people’s blood (and what if it has nothing
to do with beasts? Quarantine? Hello?) Vincent thinks more about becoming a
doctor (despite, y’know blood stealing and quarantine breaking) and JT confirms
that the sick Jacob was injected. Cat arrives to fill in the gaps and enlist
Vincent’s tracking skills. Vincent is upset because he wanted to do the doctor
thing and cure the patient while Cat wants his beastliness. JT says “it’s hard
to be Dr. Jekyll while everyone wants Mr. Hyde”.
Sam has beasty Jacob in a cage so has changed his plans –
he now wants to see Jacob fight Vincent and see if the new super serum will
give him the upper hand. Vincent arrives, following the trail and tries to talk
Jacob down – allowing Jacob to ambush him and half throttle him with a chain.
Beast fight
Out of which only Jacob emerges. He follows Sam at Sam’s
command.
Vincent returns to JT complaining about how strong the
serum made Jacob – he should still have won, but Vincent’s attempt to talk him
down (act human) allowed the surprise attack. Again, Vincent’s human side is
getting in the way of him being effective. JT thinks he’ll win next time but
Vincent doesn’t want to – he doesn’t want to keep giving in to his beast and he
doesn’t want to kill Jacob since he’s human as well (JT, bemusingly, says this
is more like Cat talking. Which is ridiculous – Cat never gave a damn when
Beasts were murdered, only humans). He’d rather use the cure and save the ill
Jacob than kill the other.
Of course, at the hospital his mentor, Dr. Marcus is not
happy to see not-practicing Vincent inject a mystery substance into a
quarantined patient. Vincent speaks fast, begs Dr. Marcus to give him a chance –
and he agrees
And JT tells Cat about Vincent going human to try and win
her back. Which she calls ridiculous and he points out that that is precisely
the reason they broke up. Which is when Gabe calls with a new theory – maybe there
is no Barnes. Maybe Sam killed Barnes and took his identity. The dates fit and,
it being Beauty and the Beast
everyone jumps on this potential theory as the one truth. Gabe wants to go help
– since Vincent won’t fight Beast!Jacob he can talk him down since they were in
the same orphanage – despite Cat’s protests
Cat, hearing everyone making plans without her, decides
to blow everything up in an act she calls “hail mary” but I call petulance. She
calls Sam and not only reveals they know he’s the bad guy but also reveals they
know about Barnes AND that his fake dead wife isn’t dead. Yes she made the call
on all of these decisions. Yes, Dana at least has the full right to kick her
arse to California and back. Sam is apparently doing all this for revenge for his
son (which is convoluted but hey) and finds Gabe messing with Jacob’s chains –
and tranqs him
If that tranq is set to beast strength, Gabe’s dead. Just saying
At the hospital the cure is a success and Dr. Marcus is
both praiseworthy and willing to do some cover up. When Cat arrives to tell
Vincent she knows he’s trying to redeem himself and de-beastify but she needs
the beast right now for Gabe, so come along.
They arrive in the nick of time to save Gabe from the
needle and Vincent and Jacob have a beast fight while Sam runs. When Jacob is
about to inject Gabe, Cat shoots him
Killing beasts? Never a problem for Cat.
For some reason Vincent’s beastisenses don’t let him
track Sam – story based power loss! Gabe tries to comfort Cat about her having
no choice about killing Jacob but that isn’t bothering her (of course not) –
she didn’t hesitate. She didn’t even think of him as human. Uh-huh, and this is
a shock?
Sam goes to visit Xavier Wright – another person from the
orphanage.
And back home Gabe is finally tired of Cat being so upset about Vincent, says he’s a beast not a man and generally says for their relationship to work, Vincent has to go. Uh-huh, twice in this episode he was happy – nay, eager – for Cat to whistle up Vincent as support.
She goes to Vincent and tells him they should never see each other again. Vincent says "hell no" he loves her they're destined to be together - he grabs her and she pushes him away. When he holds on she pushes much harder, knocking him back where he hits his head on the table and falls to the floor. Dead.
Another dream.
JT’s line “it’s hard to be Dr. Jekyll while everyone
wants Mr. Hyde” is the best this show has ever produced. It shows so much about
the hypocrisy of the other characters – especially Cat. She wants Vincent to be
human, she hates his Beast, even shot his Beast – but when Beasti-woo-woo is
needed he’s called in to let it lose. It also has an interesting question of
duty – when you have unique skills and abilities how obliged are you to use
them even when you don’t want to?
It looks like it's going to be developed as well!
And Cat? I don’t even have words for her deciding to
shred all their plans, all that effort and Dana’s effort to keep away from an
evil husband on her own unilateral decision.
Can we also not even try to play the whole “I’m becoming a
monster, I don’t feel guilty for killing beasts” game because we’ve gone a
whole season with beast bodies hitting the ground and Cat not even blinking
until an actual human whose crimes far outstripped theirs was in the firing
line.
