Tension, tension, recap, recap while everyone gathers
around Roger’s inert form and he finally wakes up just as Stephen and Marla are
considering he may not wake up. But not only did he wake up but can pull of all
the wires and sit up as well. Marla’s an awesome nurse. There’s a happy reunion
followed by John’s “oops sorry I killed you” but that’s totally ok because he
and Jedikiah manipulated him into it as part of their master plan. Jed has
randomly left as well – for some reason (and some how, does he even know how to
get in and out of the base without teleportation).
Roger instantly wants fitting on all of the Founder’s
plans when Marla speaks up, reminding him that Luca exists (the show often
forgets) and before diving into the mission maybe, just maybe, he could spare a
couple of minutes for his family.
And Stephen decides to report all the good news to spy
Hillary. The Founder is worried because Roger is so uber powerful and even
Stephen (a synergist – someone with two paranormal parents) hasn’t matched him.
He orders Hillary to bring him in.
Roger gets dressed and prepares to go home but Cara wants
her people’s saviour to stay underground with them. But he refuses to give up
his family again nor does he appreciate being lectured by someone young enough to
be his daughter. Then she orders him to stay and won’t let him leave unless he
fights her… seriously. And John steps up – he will fight Roger to keep him
prisoner.
And is there any point? Can’t Roger just stop time and win? Anyway they fight and it’s clear John is carrying a lot of guilt, he’s fighting so Roger can hurt him because of the whole shooting thing (speaking of, this is probably really bad for Roger’s bullet wound). Roger wins the right to actually go see his family rather than be Cara’s prisoner. Which causes John to roar and ask “who are we?” uhhh… not his family? John and Cara complain about being abandoned
Because the man wants to see his family, his son, after
years of not seeing them? Damn, that’s some epic neediness there.
Roger goes home and acknowledges to Marla that he can’t
just step into the lives they’ve built after so long away. She asks him to just
“be here”. And Luca arrives – that’s the Luca who has only just learned that
super powers exist, that he may have them and that his mother likes to keep
massive secrets for no discernible reason but no-one has a minute to explain
all this. Probably understandably he runs upstairs.
Stephen tries to talk to him about everything and not
going out that night and avoiding everything. Luca thinks this will be far too
awkward (since he’s a near stranger to his dad) and the first night of reunion
needs some kind of buffer – Astrid is on call! And then Hillary invites herself
because that’s totally not awkward.
Awkward dinner derails when Luca finally cracks and finally wants to talk about everything. Roger responds with a speech about how much he loves his family and proposes a toast, lifting all the glasses with telekinesis – y’know just in case Luca wasn’t freaked out enough about the super power thing.
After some convoluted twists people split off into
twosomes. Astrid lays an awesome verbal smack down on Hillary about how she
better be on the level and how much Stephen needs to trust people at the
moment. Outside with Stephen, Roger confirms he can’t stay with them because
the Founder will find him – Hillary watches and so does an “extractor team”.
But Hillary tells them to hold off (I’m guessing she’s conflicted).
Rogers tracks down Jedikiah to offer forgiveness while
Jed is all guilty for not bringing Roger back sooner, Jed admits that he liked
being the powerful brother for once. Roger thanks him for looking after his
family (Are. You. Serious?!) and Jed warns Roger about going underground
because the Founder has already tapped Stephen for the machine. To check up on
that they go to Jed’s flat (Roger taunting him all the time, as brother’s do)
and use remote access to Ultra’s supercomputer A.I, A.L.I.C.E (an upgrade over
TIM with extra flirting). They transfer the files and get out just before
agents arrive.
And at Tomorrow People HQ people are getting antsy about
Roger not being there. Charlotte drops in on John to tearfully point out the
only reason everyone put Roger on a saviour pedestal was because John did and
basically that he and Cara need to step up.
Jed and Roger arrive and put the data in TIM, after
seeing it they call Stephen. They see the full effects of the machine – when Stephen
first used it and stopped time in it, a room was connected. In this room were
two men, one human, one paranormal. The human freezes when time is stopped –
and the paranormal kills him. The usually prohibition against killing doesn’t
kick in when outside of time because the human isn’t technically alive. Now put
Roger – or Stephen - in the machine at full power and it gets much worse.
Hillary tries to make up a reason why she didn’t go for
Roger – reporting that Roger said goodbye and is leaving town. But this clues
the Founder in that Roger intends to attack to destroy the machine
Which is what Roger is preparing to do at the HQ. But
first they have to explain all this to dissenter Natalie and the rest of the
Tomorrow People who are still waiting for their ticket to an ill-defined refuge.
John points out there is no refuge – but the machine will kill every man, woman
and child on the planet. Natalie… isn’t that fussed because it’ll only kill
humans. So Natalie leads a rebellion of loads of people who are going to make
their own peace with ultra and are totally ok with mass genocide.
Really?
So Russell is dispatched to follow the pro-genocide Ultra
sympathisers while Stephen and John realise they need to hurry up their machine
breaking plans.
Stephen goes to Ultra and Hillary tells him the machine
is being moved. She tells him where it’s being moved to – I smell a trap.
Roger gets ready to head out and he and Marla have a
goodbye. She’s not happy he’s leaving but also thinks that maybe she shouldn’t
have tried to pursue normality so hard when they were never normal.
Roger and Stephen launch their attack. Stephen taking
down the d-chips. Roger goes down – and runs into John. John points a gun at
Roger and demands he be the leader he promised them he’d be – and tranqs Roger.
He goes, with Roger’s DNA, to blow up the machine… Stephen moves to intervene when
Hillary drops in to reveal (shock) that it’s a trap!
Jon is captured, but Stephen gets away with his dad. The
Founder gives John a “yay genocide!” recruitment speech which John doesn’t buy.
They inject him with, what I assume is the power stripping drug, but they give
him multiple doses and it causes his telekinesis to wreck the room dramatically
and make the lights flicker and even throw people around – which it never did
before. Hillary watches from outside and realises that the Founder may actually
be a bad guy
Well, Hills, take a minute. This is shocking and entirely unpredictable information.
Natalie and her group of “genocide yay!” paranormals arrive at Ultra with Russell, ready to remind us that the paranormals are the most naïve people on the entire planet. Now everyone form a queue to be injected with this mystery substance (don’t worry, it’s just a tracer. Oh I marvel at people who actually think being injected with a tracking chip is actually a good thing!) Russell points out they are actually in a room lined with D-chips and volunteering for mystery substance injection doesn’t seem… sensible.
Russell volunteers to go first so if it goes wrong,
Natalie and the others can escape. Noble Russell, but if it goes wrong, Natalie
and the others are already in the category “too foolish to live” and you’re the
only one there worth saving. But don’t worry, the injection is only a tracker
Only. Seriously. Oh hey it’s an organisation that has
repeatedly try to wipe you all out – it just wants to track your every movement
– how awesome is that?! Line up!
Hillary goes to meet… Astrid. To basically say “damn you
were totally right not to trust me!” But she loves Stephen, honest and
betraying him and his father to the evil genocidal megalomaniac will one day be
something they look back on and laugh about. She wants to make it right and,
while crying, she writes down a phone number and asks Astrid to call in 1 hour.
She calls it the only way to help him
The Founder collects John and says he wants him to deliver a message. And Marla and Luca arrive at Tomorrow People HQ where they go into hiding. Errr…. Natalie just lead a lot of traitors who know the location of that HQ right to Ultra. How is this a safe zone?
Astrid prepares to make the phone call and Hillary
telepaths her apology to Stephen – and says goodbye. Hillary goes to see the
Founder, talking about how she sold our Stephen and their entire species – he tries
to dismiss this and how slaughtering humans doesn’t concern him. Which doesn’t
really work for Hillary who wanted to be a hero and she’s found a way to do so
She’s wearing a bomb – and when Astrid (a human, who can kill) makes the phone call, she explodes (Stephen who arrived to try and stop her, is knocked back by the blast).
Founder dead? I rather think he had time to teleport away
since Hillary insisted on showing him the bomb first
So we’re going full Jedikiah redemption.
Despite the paranormals he killed for funsies, despite the drugs he forced
on people, he’s now one of the good guys?
I would say bullshit but, after Marla’s “oh I’m a paranormal and didn’t tell you now take your anti-psychotic meds” revelation it feels redundant to complain about any dubious characterisation on this show. Why complain about stepping in bullshit when the elephant herd has already unloaded 3 times your own bodyweight in turds upon your head?
And Cara decides to hold Roger prisoner? Enough, her leadership has been such a hot mess of ridiculous decisions, get rid of this useless excuse as a leader now.
And no, I don’t buy all these people deciding Ultra is doubleplusgood when there’s no refuge and they plan to slaughter the entire planet.
Why, every time I watch this episode, do I feel like screaming over the ridiculous decisions or praying for patience (I have a bottle of fun booze marked “patience” now) to help get me to the end?
Hillary had an awesome redemption moment though. I’ll
give the show that – THAT was well done, crafty and emotional.
