Alex and Noma are all ready to face off against 8 Balls when Michael arrives scaring them off. After a brief check to see if Noma is dying (she isn’t) he lays out the situation – Gabriel is alive (which he presents as a good thing) and Julian is about to invade Vega for spare bodies.
They walk off and return to the place where the random
guy last episode nuked a lot of 8 balls to save Noma and Alex – Michael
remembers it as being a similar affect to what the town of Mallory did to
approaching 8 Balls.
Michael does talk to Noma about her epic sacrifice, but
it’s only a brief reference towards further helping Alex. She also tells him
about the man who could burn 8 Balls who told her to bring Alex east.
Devious David and devious Arika communicate by radio –
Arika isn’t happy; though they both want the war to keep going she wanted the
negotiations to go ahead without the sniper messing things up. David is happy
for the war to keep flaring and they end on a decidedly uncooperative note.
Except seems to catch David talking – and Gates is
listening in on the conversation as well.
Zoe confronts David, but David has already taken steps –
she killed Curzon who arranged the sniper (at David’s request) and now David
has now recruited Curzon’s men. Nor are they alone – as David points out, he
has been running organisations for a long time, he’s good at this. Despite her
hope for peace dashed, she’s pretty much forced to agree a truce with David and
plan his death later.
Arika makes nice to Claire until Gates asks her to leave
so they can have a word in private. Gates is pushing for all out war with Zoe
While Arika talks to Daria about being ready to get out
at a moment’s notice since she knows something is up.
Back to command, Arika, Gates and Claire, planning their
attack on Zoe and her warlords. But Arika changes the plan –suggesting they go
for the armoury instead (possibly disarming Vega in the process by Gate’s
concerns). Claire agrees.
Arika passes this to David and he and Zoe
antagonistically arrange an ambush at the armoury.
Except a spy is very useful when you know they’re a spy –
Gates and Claire gave Arika wrong information and they’re actually attacking
the agri-towers (with soldiers who are taking no prisoners).
David angrily snarls at Arika who realises Gates knows
and it’s all a trap – she runs for her prepared escape – while David’s whole
position is destroyed by bombs. Zoe and David both live (damn plot armour).
David satnds and Zoe begs for help – but with troops coming David abandons her.
Arika doesn’t escape either – she and Daria are captured
and imprisoned. Zoe is captured, the armoury destroyed, David on the run, the
agri-tower taken. Gates reports this to Claire who collapses in tears
Claire confronts Zoe and snarls at her for forcing a war
without mercy, for killing her baby – she shoots Zoe in the head.
But Arika may have the last laugh – she’s poisoned Gates.
At Vega, William Wheele (David’s dead son who is
apparently alive and not a hallucination) appears at the doors demanding to be
let in. he gets let in but then has trouble convincing anyone he is who he says
he is. David decides to brutally beat one of his doubters in an alley – it
looks like he beats the man to death with his bare hands in order to rob him.
Able to buy a drink, he tells the bar man of how terrible it was trying to
survive in the Wasteland.
His story turns into preaching to an entire rapt bar –
telling them that god is still there and he knows it. He tells them how god
came to him and now he knows he has been chosen – and he has his own markings
(well, so he calls his many scars from his experiences in the wasteland).
General Riesen is in New Delphi with Julian trying to
tempt him with the angel who possessed Clementine his wife. She’s now in a new
body and trying to convince him to join them and hand over the Amphora of death
and possession. David resists originally because he denies who she is – and
then because he’s not impressed with his own legend.
In the present, Julian tells General Reisen that the city
is in civil war (avoiding mentioning Zoe) and that Claire has been shot. Julian
puts this down to Claire being so young and inexperienced.
Through this we have flashbacks of Riesen before the war
– when he was a civilian auditing the military and had just exposed someone
right before the first 8 Ball possessions happened and David has to fight for
his life surrounded by people who are possessed one by one and then become
violent killing 8 Balls. He steals a soldier’s uniform – and finds his wife and
daughter. He was never a general.
As his health deteriorates, both Clementine and Julian
beg him to reveal the amphora and become a diad. Riesen accepts.
Also in New Delphi, Julian continues to torment Gabriel,
especially about how lonely and lacking friends he is before drugging him. When
he wakes up, he staggers but is apparently able to free himself (I call drug
induced hallucination). This seems more likely when he apparently runs into
Claire Riesen, Noma and Arika who argue about helping him. He wants them to
unpin his wings and then have time to heal though the women tell him he’s
totally helpless and useless and instead he should stay and have an orgy with
his hallucinations.
He chooses orgy. When the drugs wear off the three women are holding him prisoner again. This is all proof, apparently, to Julian that Gabriel’s mind is subject to manipulation. Gabriel decides to up the ante – remember how Gabriel can possess angels – but Julian has taught them how to resist. Nice try Gabriel.
I still don’t follow the path of Claire and the
rebellion. Last episode Claire et al were sure sure sure that Zoe was not
behind the sniping. They were shoe Zoe legitimately wanted peace. They were
sure that they could actually reach an accord and not only achieve peace
without bloodshed but also that they
could address the injustices of the V-system which Claire has always hated
So this episode they go for all out merciless war? Why
not approach Claire and point out David is their common enemy (as has become
clear?) This seems like the very opposite of what Claire wanted – and she
screams at Zoe for forcing it even though it’s her walking right into David’s
and Arika’s plans to keep the war going
I could understand her doing this because she is so consumed by rage. But she saw through it. Last week she very clearly saw through the singing and plot against her (coupled with their rumbling of Arika should have REALLY made it clear what was happening) but it’s like they saw the trap and happily walked into it anyway.
I have no idea why we have the Gabriel orgy. Nor what
Gabriel even adds any more. This show is suffering from more than a little plot
line bloat.
