The cast of The Mist continues to be large and very much separated. Kevin, Adrian, Mia and Brian make a break from the church. Kevin trips over the body of a young boy on the way. The foursome pile into a car and Mia attempts to hotwire it but the car doesn't turn over. This enrages Kevin, and he accuses Mia of not knowing what she is doing but Mia asserts that something is absolutely wrong. After a little discussion, they decide to make another break for it run on foot through the mist to a garage.
The Garage
A quick search of the garage reveals no other usable vehicles. A light at the end of the tunnel appears when a car actually pulls up. Clay hops out of the car wearing a gas mask and immediately points his gun at the foursome, who quickly raise their hands. Clay makes his way inside and apologises for pulling out his gun. Clay is a bit frantic and he pulls out a picture of his son who is missing to find out if the foursome has seen him. Of course, the kid turns out be the body that Kevin tripped over in their escape from the church. Kevin looks at the picture and lies and says that he hasn't seen him. Following his lead, the others lie as well, as they make weird eye contact displaying confusion over their communal untruth. Clay is absolutely determined to find his son and explains he's been out looking for him for quite some time.
When Clay heads into another room, Mia immediately confronts Kevin about encouraging everyone to lie. Kevin explains that he was just trying to save Clay the pain of learning about his dead son. Mia quickly moves on to point out to Kevin that they are going to need Clay's car, or for Clay to give them a lift, if they are going to get to the mall. An irritated Kevin promises to handle it.
When Kevin does approach Clay, he learns that Clay is driving a bug out vehicle - one made to function in disasters. Kevin asks for a lift to the mall, saying that this is where his family is. At this point, Clay only has a little bit of gas left and he wants to reserve it for his search for his son. Clay expresses his regret but makes it clear that his top priority is searching for his son. Kevin asks him to think about it over night.
The next morning, Clay is looking at a map trying to figure out where to search next when Kevin approaches. Once again, Clay turns Kevin down to prioritise his search for his son. Unable to take it anymore, Mia reveals that Clay's son is dead, causing Clay to go into complete denial. Clay reasonably suggests that he is only being told this because they want his car and that if his child were really dead, they would have told him the day before. A nervous Clay grabs his gun again as the foursome cautiously approach. It's Brian who ends up on the attack and the two men struggle for the gun. Kevin pulls out his own gun and Mia and Adrian call out for him to shoot. Brian does manage to get the gun away from Clay but not before being shot in the thigh. The foursome move immediately to offer Brian whatever medical care they can, tying off the wound and applying pressure. Mia says that if they don't get Brian to a hospital that he is going to die and this is enough for Clay to decide to hand over his car. The foursome load up and instead of going with them, Clay chooses to stay behind and take his chances in the mist to keep searching for his son.
The Church
Father Romanov is not doing well trapped in the church with his parishioners. It's clear he feels that this might be the end of days, despite the fact that this is not how Revelations describes it. His fear that this is the end causes Father Romanov to start praying for Nathalie's soul. Following through on her statement that the God she saw didn't belong to Father Romanov, Nathalie reads the diary of an old priest looking for a record of an event like this happening before. When Nathalie starts to talk about nature killing 6 people May 12, 1860, it's clear that Father Romanov is upset. Father Romanov offers to talk about church history and insists that if Nathalie really wants answers that she'll turn to the bible.
Father Romanov gathers everyone in the church and starts to talk to them about his concern for their immortal soul. Everyone gathers to listen except Nathalie, who is to busy looking for a sign. When Nathalie finds a spider, she squeals happily. Before anyone can kill the spider, Nathalie slips it into a jar, referring to it as God and thanking it for making it's presence known.
Father Romanov turns to Police chief Connor Heisel about the agitation he feels regarding Nathalie's actions. Instead of doing the expected thing and getting all tough guy, Connor talks about cutting Nathalie some slack because everyone is tense and she's grieving.
When Father Romanov again tries to instruct his flock and people begin to question Nathalie about her beliefs, the priest finally loses it. The priest screams at Nathalie to kill the spider repeatedly. When Nathalie refuses to comply, Father Romanov grabs the bottle containing the the spider, wrenches the lid off, so that he can free the spider and kill it.
Later the jar now containing the remnants of the spider has some glowing creatures in it. Nathalie calls out for the others to come and see it but the only one who obliges is Connor. It seems that he experienced something when he was running from the jail to the church and that has made him amenable to listening to what Nathalie has to say.
The Mall
The claustrophobia has begun to set in at the mall, causing some people to wig the hell out. In order to distract people, Gus pulls out some cards and a few board games for people to play with while they wait out the mist. Gus then hands Jay a football and points to a group of teens asserting that they won't be able to resist the quarterback of the football team. Gus proves to be wrong in this because Jay is quickly rejected with a comment about date rape. In a rage, Jay throws the ball and it lands right at Alex's feet. Okay, what is Alex doing there in the first place? Wasn't the plan to gather supplies so that she could get some space between her and Jay? With a weird little smile, Alex picks up the football and tosses it back.
The stoners dudes haven't finished causing trouble. They decide that they want to be heroes and to accomplish this, the big plan is to drag the bodies of the dead soldiers that they placed outside. Vic has gotten his hands on a harpoon from from the sporting goods store. Gee, what could go wrong with this.
On the other side of the mall everyone is settled in. They've had a bite to eat and are getting to know each other a little bit. Alex decides to take a little girl to the book store to read a story that her father used to read her all of the time. The two settle into a little reading nook, unaware that things are about to go terribly wrong.
Vic and Link harpoon one of the dead bodies in a cart and manage to drag it in. Buoyed by their success, they decide to attempt to gather the other body. When they try to reel in the second body, the line gets stuck. Once gain, proving that when they handed out the brains that Vic and Link were both missing, Link decides to head outside and bring in the cart containing the body himself. Naturally, this backfires spectacularly, with Link's body being thrown through a window, thus letting in the mist and Vic running away manically trying to get help.
The mist quickly fills the bookstore where Alex and the little girl are reading. The little girl decides to hide as Alex makes her way to the door calling for her. The people from the mall gather around the door to the bookstore but when Jay tries to open the door, a monster appears in the mist. They are forced to watch in horror as the monster turns its attention to the little girl and sucks out her soul, desiccating her body in the process. Yes, it's terrible but awesome. Alex is next to have her own run in with the monster but it decides to let her pass and she calmly walks out of the bookstore to embrace her mother.
Vic is in a world of shit for letting the mist enter the mall. Jay tries to argue that it was an accident and that Vic isn't bright. Unfortunately for Vic, the residents of the mall already believe that if you endanger the safety of the mall, you should be exiled. After a very quick vote, Vic is voted off the island. Gus orders Vic be given three days worth of supplies and a weapon with which to defend himself. Vic tries to plead but the minds of the mall's residents are made up and so he is forced to head into what is certain death.
Once alone with her mother, Alex admits that she lied about fighting off the creature.
It's a big move for the residents of the mall to decide to banish Vic even though they know that they are sending him to certain death. It's a huge leap to go from afraid and panicked to hay, let's murder because of an accident. What did the residents of the mall think was gonna happen when they left Link and Vic without supervision, given that these two have already proven to be not so bright? Two stoners made a stoner mistake. There was no maliciousness in their actions to require immediate eviction this way and in Link and Vic's defense, it's only been a couple of days and everyone is still figuring out the rules of the Mist.
Speaking of the rules of the Mist, what makes Alex so special that she didn't become monster food? Her interactions with her mother suggest that she knows why she was spared, even if she doesn't exactly share the reason.
Things are going to get more unstable at the church. It's clear that Nathalie just might be onto something and she seems to have Collin on her side. Father Romanov is going to push a confrontation for the simple fact that holding onto his belief system is probably what is allowing him to maintain his sanity. If pushed too far, I highly suspect that Father Romanov will crack. In the meantime, him ordering Nathalie to kill the spider was easily the funniest moment of the episode.
To a certain degree, to watch a show like The Mist, one must suspend reality; however, there are times when that's too much of an ask. With dead bodies all over the ground, Kevin just happened to slip and trip over the body of Clay's son? Really? That's some damn lazy writing. I also think it's worth pointing out that as a leader, Kevin already sucks. I cannot wait for Mia to overthrow him if Adrian doesn't get to that job first. If Kevin had just admitted to seeing Clay's son, then Brian wouldn't have been shot. Kevin knows best is clearly not a thing on The Mist.
