The prison transport carrying Nolan and Irisa has
crashed/exploded/had badness happen. Berlin comes across the wreckage, strewn
with bodies. She finds one survivor: Irisa.
Nolan is missing but alive (as Irisa knows because of the
alien tech in her head) though he has been taken by someone. Why is Berlin
around? Well she was heading back to Defiance when the VC attack was over and
now wanted to help Amanda in the aftermath of Nolan shooting people. She’s also
not impressed with the “not in his right mind” excuse since Irisa used the same
reasoning for killing Tommy. Irisa tells her about the attack but it’s a pretty
sparse description
Looking at the bodies, Irisa realises some of them have
been killed by an Omec (or the same “animal” attacks that they had in Defiance.
T’evgin himself has been captured by Kindzi who is now
draining his blood to stop him escaping because he’s so super powerful. She
also maintains that whole sexual/family sexual thing that makes them so very very
creepy.
Kindzi is also the one behind Nolan’s kidnapping – she’s
brought him to her lair and is having Yewl check him over. Despite being
controlled Yewl is still snarky. Kindzi has taken Nolan as abet because he’s oh
so special. I’m with Yewl “why him”. When Kindzi talks about his beauty, Yewl
points out she’s a lesbian. She also makes a very unsnarky but still quite
brutal summation of how sickening Kindzi is (though unfortunately linking it to
mental illness, because otherwise that would be an epic take down). Kindzi gets
rid of her and decides to remove the arc tech from Nolan’s head herself.
Which Irisa also feels on the road. She feels pain and then
Nolan disappear.
When Nolan wakes up Kindzi is there to lie about why he
rescued Nolan – claiming that Irisa is in on the plan and is currently giving
them a cover story in Defiance. And now it’s sexy time.
Afterwards she praises him for brutal random murders but
he says he was actually being possessed at the time and hallucinating. The Omec
know all about it – they have a “warrior echo” that keeps telling them to kill
people even when common sense says no. Nolan plays nice and tries to act like
everything is normal but Kindzi clearly sees through his plan to escape and
tases him.
When he’s all chained up she explains how he no longer
gets to be her special valued pet and now gets to be snack food. This is
interrupted by Irisa and Berlin arriving looking for Nolan. Kindzi tells them
that Nolan and T’evgin are on the run because T’evgin loves the “lesser races”
and hates the Votanis Collective so liked Nolan killing the Castithan
vice-chancellor. As cover stories go, it has a few holes in it, it has to be
said. She invites them to search. And find nothing
Nolan gets himself free though and finds T’evgin all
imprisoned and blood donating – as well as a Yewl growing vat. I think a world
filled with hundreds of Yewls will be both awesome and terrifying. T’evgin tells
him their history as Nolan frees him – how he and Kindzi had followed the Votan
arcs since they knew it would lead them to a liveable planet; on a personal
note he tells how he was completely obsessed with hatred and vengeance and how
he taught Kindzi that – infected her with it. He considers himself a bad father
but Nolan, tellingly, can see the point, how anger kept Kindzi going (with some
nice, subtle clearly he’s thinking of himself and how he raised Irisa subtext)
Kindzi interrupts before T’evgin is free and again plans
to chow down on Nolan – but now Irisa arrives. This lady just can’t eat in peace,
no wonder she’s in such a bad mood. Irisa can’t take down Kindzi but an axe she
throws goes past T’evgin – and he catches it. Kindzi quick turns to bargaining
with T’evgin.
It doesn’t work and Nolan and Irisa leave them to fight. T’evgin has lost a lot of blood but still wins – and returns her to the sleep pod and to swear to obey. When she swears he lets her go – and she stabs him in the neck. Nolan and Irisa leaves as she grieves over her dad.
We have a flashback – to 1978 in the Omec arc a long way
from Earth with T’evgin looking for the world the Votans have fled to while
Kindzi disappears – until they find human radio signals and celebrate.
At home, Stahma and Datak are playing cards and snarking
at each other about T’evgin and Kindzi – Stahma rightly points out that Datak’s
nastiness is because of his jealousy over T’evgin. Stahma both points out how T’evgin
helped and protected her and is due respect and affection – but also that she
only loves Datak.
They’re supposed to be waiting for T’evgin to come and
tell them it’s safe –or Kindzi to come and kill them. Datak gets his troops
together – but here we can clearly see how the Tar reputation has fallen. They’ll
fight for his money but they’re not loyal to him any more – and it’s not only
the whole arch-blowing up thing. Datak killing his old crew because they sided
with Stahma also hasn’t gone down well. Further evidence of how low they’ve
fallen is how much back talk Datak puts up with.
Stahma certainly isn’t thrilled to be left alone with
them and Andina – but Datak is leery that Yewl has disappeared. In addition to
his friendship with Yewl he also thinks she’s the only one who may know how to
actually kill an Omec since they’re damn tough. In response to Stahma’s worry
Andina asks to be armed so she can fight for Stahma.
Later Stahma shows Andina how to weave while they talk
about baby Luke and Alak. Andina is sad though – she loves how close she’s come
to the Tarrs but once they are past the crisis she, a handmaiden, will be
relegated to being a servant again. Stahma suggests elevating herself through
marriage to the Shanje Liro – and pokes
her towards Alak. And Andina will, of course, totally get Alak to forgive
Stahma and let her see the baby. Stahma is impressed.
Datak finds Yewl (“I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”
“I haven’t been everywhere.” Oh Yewl) clearing up lots of blood, blaming it on
a horrible new plague. She claims she has a vaccine for it which she gives to
Datak – allowing her to knock him unconscious. Another part of the Omec – well
Kindzi’s plan
Berlin goes to town to tell Amanda about the “raid” that
kidnapped Nolan only Amanda is very much NOT Berlin’s biggest fan at the
moment. Amanda springs into action when she hears what happened to Nolan – but her
first instinct isn’t rescue but about Defiance. If Kindzi’s attack didn’t fool
Berlin and Irisa then it’s not going to fool the VC who are still waiting for
Nolan to arrive for some vengeance killing and may show up asking why Amanda is
faking Nolan’s disappearance and protecting the “Butcher of Yosemite.”
She takes some of Nolan’s personal effects to the raid
site and burns the bodies so they can properly fake his death. Only then does
she soften a little towards Berlin with Berlin promising to hang around as long
as Amanda needs.
Back to Kinzi - and T’evgin’s… funeral I guess. Which involves
cutting him open and painting blood about and eating his heart. Kindzi then
goes to her arc and wakes her fellow Omec (amusingly announcing that she speaks
in English and announces it as the language of their new world – but how they
understand her remains a mystery). She speaks of conquest and the Dread
harvest. Datak is already in a cage on the ship.
I do like Datak and Yewl because they seem to have
genuinely built a… mutual understanding if not friendship. They work well
together, even if it is generally very one side. He’s such an excellent target
for Yewl’s snark. I also like Yewl’s clear remark about being a lesbian – it’s
a small thing, but Season 2 had a lot of the characters be shown as bisexual (as
well as some heavy hinting with others) – but this season has pretty much buried
any LGBT presentation; those characters established as bisexual or lesbian have
kept quiet and outside of relationships (or in relationships with the opposite
sex) and the only indication of any same-sex desire we’ve had is the much more
dubious Omec declaration of the slaves they have “loved” and eaten.
Andina – definitely cheering this. It’s so easy to
relegate serving staff to background set decoration but that misses so much of
Andina’s history, especially how she was desperate and first came to serve the
Tars. It’s excellent to see she does have ambition and hopes and is willing to
use a little craftiness to get ahead - oh she’s not as adapt as Stahma (but who
is?) but it’s like seeing a baby Stahma in training. Her methods are severely
limited by the classist and misogynist culture they live in, but within those
limits it’s nice to see her working to achieve more than just being a loyal
servant. And Stahma is clearly willing to apprentice her.
I do like the way this show handles world building of all
these aliens – little things like T’evgin telling Kindzi to fight with honour
not in her “second skin” gives a little insight to their shapeshifting. Or how
they’ve talked about the Indogene and made it clear the Omec created them
without ever sitting down and saying so – lots of information is delivered in a
very natural way without any character clumsily info dumping to us.
Amanda continues to be an excellent character even if she only appears briefly here – her dedication to Defiance first and foremost is all. It’s not to say she isn’t emotional and doesn’t care about people but, ultimately, Defiance matters first and is her first thought and concern.
