Marcy is the penultimate episode of the first season and what a set up it is. I found myself at the edge of my seat as the episode unfolded. Earlier in the season, we were informed that not all Travelers are happy following the orders of the Director and that some even feel abandoned by him/her. Essentially, one can only trust the people inside one's cell and that may not necessarily be true because as we saw in the last episode, orders are sometimes given privately to an individual rather than a team.
It all begins with David and Marcy in bed together. It's about damn time actually. Because nothing can ever go right for these two, Marcy's nose starts to bleed and she has a seizure. A worried David takes her to the hospital. This of course is going to be a problem because Marcy's MRI are going to show abnormalities that simply don't make sense. Marcy gets a hold of MacLaren, aware that if she stays in the hospital, the doctors will be running tests on her until the day she dies. Apparently, the technology that allowed Marcy to take over the host's body damaged the brain and the treatment Marcy was using no longer works.
The call comes for MacLaren at a good time because despite the fact that he tried to make it up to Kat by making her a coffee, Kat's still fuming. MacLaren leaves to see about helping Marcy and perhaps to take his mind off of the confusing feelings he now has for Kat.
We get the arrival of a new Traveler when a farmer's legs get caught in his equipment. The Traveler enters his host's body and frees himself quickly. Like all of the other Travelers before him, he marvels at the air and environment of the past.
Grace pops into her car only to find Trevor hiding in the back seat. Trevor quickly injects Grace with something that renders her unconscious. It turns out that the name Trevor recognised on the list of deaths was Grace. When Grace awakens, she finds that her wrists and her legs have been bound and that Trevor has driven her into the woods. I've always found Trevor to be fascinating but even I was absolutely creeped out when he explained to Grace that he kidnapped her to save her life. Trevor chose to take Grace to the woods so that she couldn't be traced by the Director. As Trevor talks to Grace about how she was supposed to die and the fact that he's from the future and following orders of the mysterious Director, it's clear that Grace is trying desperately not to panic.
Carly is having the same bad luck as the rest of her team. Carly left her baby with Jeff in order to deal with the plane crash and that is enough for the social worker to decide that Carly isn't actually in need of help. Carly is told that she effectively abandoned her son and now the social worker is team Jeff. Carly decides to confront Jeff directly and heads to the police station. Jeff grabs Carly's arm and pulls her into an ally. When Carly notices the CCTV camera, she attempts to goad Jeff into hitting her by calling him a horrible father and saying that he didn't fulfill her sexually. Carly's plan almost works because Jeff punches a wall in frustration but before he totally loses his cool, Jeff notices the camera and backs off, and orders Carly not to show up at the station again.
MacLaren gets a message that he's to greet a new arrival - Traveler 014. This is the lowest Traveler number we've seen to date. Unfortunately, MacLaren is not given an exact location, so he and Philip decide to scope out possibilities that will will occur that morning. This new Traveler is deemed important because of the low number and MacLaren hopes they are arriving to help Marcy. Now we know that the lower the number, the more important the Traveler. This is interesting given that Trevors number is a good deal lower that the rest of his team.
Trevor is still in the woods with Grace and he tells her that he wants her to survive because he knows that she's a good person. As far as Trevor is concerned, the Director can just choose someone else. In an effort to keep Trevor talking, Grace questions why they cannot just go back in time and kill Hitler if they want to save people. It seems that for the tech to work, Travelers need the exact date and time of a death and that information was only available with the advent of the computer. Trevor even reveals that because of time shifts, the Travelers only have one chance to change the past.
The expected Traveler didn't arrive and that's enough for Philip to realise that Grace was probably the intended target and that Trevor intervened.
With Carly in a bad way, Philip gets to work erasing her medical information and MacLaren decides to pay a visit to Boyd. MacLaren requests a meeting with Boyd's teamleader and when she says no, MacLaren reveals that Carly is sick and that they need a doctor. It turns out that Boyd is the Doctor for her cell and that after the death of her team leader, she assumed the role. Boyd is still reluctant to help but she finally agrees to see Marcy. MacLaren talks David into helping Marcy sneak out of the hospital. When Marcy finally meets with Boyd, all Boyd can offer is a neurotransmitter stimulator that she’d developed for another mission, but it won't work for long.
Now that Grace's death time has passed, it's time for her to return to civilisation. When Trevor goes to drug her for a second time she pulls away. Grace argues that it would be easier for them both if she were allowed to walk out and that she can tell Trevor is dealing with an injury. Trevor naively cuts Grace loose and she pretends to trip before picking up a rock and smashing him with it. Grace makes it to the car and starts to drive off, while calling for help. It's this call that allows the Director to find her and Grace is replaced by a Traveler. This new Traveler is not at all impressed that Trevor tried to change history on his own. Trevor is clearly grieving the loss of Grace. The new Grace is all about business and she has Trevor contact his team via phone, so that she can hear both sides of the conversation and demands that they look into any other Traveler arrivals that day. This is when they realise that the farmer we saw earlier arrived. They agree to meet at the farm and Grace reveals that she's there to help Marcy.
Grace and Trevor arrive at the farm and 014 is hesitant to trust him. It's not until Grace rattles on about how 014 would be writing shitty scripts in a leaky dome that 0014 recognises Grace as Traveler 027. Grave is quick to dismiss Trevor as being a no one. 014 questions if Grace is there to hide as well and when she say yes, 014 reveals that he has his defenses up already. It turns out that Grace and Ellis(read:014) are both programmers. Ellis has created a special code and has been sent back to the 21st to keep it away from the Traveler faction which is trying to bring down the Director. When the team arrives, even though they were originally sent to greet Ellis, he has no mission for them, nor does he reveal that he's in hiding.
Marcy pulls Grace aside and has her sit at a computer with Ellis's code on the screen. It quickly becomes clear that Marcy is unable to look away from the computer. When the screen goes blank, Grace leads Marcy into the kitchen to share a meal with the rest of the Travelers. At the dinner, Grace explains that she intends to repackage the original upload of Marcy's consciousness but this means that Marcy will lose all her memory's of the 21st century. Marcy wants to consider her options but Grace is adamant that Marcy has no choice about doing this. Marcy asks for time to to say goodbye to David before the procedure.
MacLaren is in complete support of Marcy and argues that she should be given a choice and this stuns Carly. Carly talks about how the mission is always supposed to come first and that they've all had to make personal sacrifices. Carly doesn't believe that Marcy should be given any choice in this matter.
MacLaren is in complete support of Marcy and argues that she should be given a choice and this stuns Carly. Carly talks about how the mission is always supposed to come first and that they've all had to make personal sacrifices. Carly doesn't believe that Marcy should be given any choice in this matter.
The team heads back to David's place and everyone is concerned about the loss of Marcy. Trevor reveals that when he was younger that his consciousness was transferred out of his body and back again and that he felt like himself. Philip admits that he's biased because he doesn't want to lose Marcy. Suddenly a countdown clock appears and the team is forced to watch as Marcy is rebooted in front of them. Marcy goes into fight mode and expecting to have to battle thugs at a library and the team is forced to calm her down. David arrives home surprised to see Marcy looking just fine.
Back on the farm, Grace and Ellis talk over security and the fact that someone is coming for them.
Okay I'm confused. MacLaren is Traveler number 3468 which is a much higher number that Trevor, who is Traveler number 0115 and yet in the last episode, the Director was willing to take extraordinary measures for MacLaren. Grace is Traveler 027 and she dismissed Trevor as a nobody. With low numbers, it seems that both Grace and Ellis would be higher on the totem pole than Trevor but shouldn't Trevor's low number actually mean that he has some kind of power?
What I am most interested in is Trevor's sudden decision to help Grace when he realised that she was going to die. Traveler 027 calls Trevor out on his hypocrisy in this case and Grant felt that it was out of character for Trevor to break protocol this way. It makes me wonder if Trevor is actually working with a faction rather than being dedicated to following the Director's orders. Trevor may have had an attraction to Grace and noted that she's a nice person but it doesn't seem like he has known her long enough to leap off mission like that.
Marcy's predicament bothers me. First, we have the fact that she was adamant about making a choice regarding her medical treatment, only to have Grace simply strip it away from her. Then we had Carly arguing to take away Marcy's choice regarding her medical treatment. If that were not enough Marcy's request for time to consider her options is clearly framed as emotional, as though losing your memory of the person you love isn't reason enough to be upset. Basically this comes down to what we are made up of and I think it's fair to say that our experiences shape us. Yes, Marcy would have the chance to fall in love with David again but she cannot relieve the events which caused her to fall in love with David.
At this point, I'm pretty much convinced that Carly is being played. The social worker arrived to investigate because Jeff called. When the social worker arrived again, Carly was vulnerable because of a bad appearance in court. To suddenly believe that Carly was lying because she left the baby with Jeff feels like a manipulation and a set up. A social worker should know that these situations are complicated and battered women have difficulty cutting ties, particularly when there are children involved. This all feels like another set up by Jeff, which is plausible because being a cop, he would have all sort of connections.
What is going on with the Travelers? I am really starting to get suspicious of the Director. At this point, I'm not longer certain that the Director is a person and could potentially be some kind of computer human hybrid or simply all computer. There's no reason why programmers in particular should be referred to as particularly close to the Director, if this were not the case. I am particularly suspicious of Grace and Ellis because they seem to be working an agenda and we have no idea what their orders are.
I want to know who this faction is made up of and why they want to take down the Director? The only potential motivation that we've been given so far is that at least some Travelers feel abandoned by the Director. There's also the issue that MacLaren's team seems to be making things worse in the future rather than better. All of a sudden there seems to be a lot of moving pieces which would have been better established I think earlier in the season.
