Tuesday, October 2, 2018

Killjoys, Season 4, Episode 10: Sporemaggedon





So Aneela is back - and everyone’s not super ok about that as D’avin and Johnny hurry her onto Lucy to answer questions and make it clear that they’re super not happy with her given the number of people she’s stabbed and all.

There she reminds them that body swapping is totally something you can do - Khlyen and D’avin did it last season. She also tells us what the Green is - well she mentions lots of woo woo but ultimately the green is a big repository of memory: a big transdimensional space where nothing is forgotten and everything exists. So kind of like a giant Wayback machine

No this doesn’t explain the super healy Hullen - but that’s nothing to do with the Green, that’s just The Lady’s shenanigans. She has a plan, she and D’avin go in, they grab Dutch and D’avin uses his strange Anti-hullen woo granted by the military experiments on him and when she’s stunned they leave.

Johnny insists he wants to come as well and Aneela warns him that since the Green is a big sea of memory, The Lady can use your worst moments, your memories against you and the more you care the more it’ll hurt. Since Johnny is a big ol’ carebear, this isn’t ideal. It’s also why Aneela wants to know nothing about her son Jaq - if you care about someone it can be used against you.

Of course Johnny insists so it’s off to the RAC and the pool of green. Which is a problem because Turin knows who Aneela is and has HUGE issues with all the people she’s killed, people he cares about and is prepared to shoot her in the face. And after the death of Pip Zeph doesn’t want to see anyone with Dutch’s face

But Aneela talks woo-woo and science with Zeph, intriguing her and eventually D’avin gives Turin the Green killing spore to reassure him he has options - but first they need to rescue Dutch,

To the Green!

In the Green Dutch and Aneela meet up to talk about a box Khlyen left for Dutch to give Aneela and I’m not even sure what is going on here because the layers are just confusing.

Everyone quickly enters their own hellscape as the Lady throws all their worst memories against them. Dutch and D’avin manage to meet up and they have to pull Johnny away from a heartbreaking scene with Pawter where Johnny tragically asks them to stop him turning round to look at the fake Pawter. Ouch

However when the Lady throws fake goons at them so she can talk to Aneela, D’avin points out since this is all their memory they can easily access memories of the various armouries they’ve been in - and fight back with big guns. Until D’avin pulls out his super power which is very very effective.


The Lady is trying to convert Aneela - which she, probably rightly, puts down to the Lady knowing she’s under threat. The Lady explains she was the last of her ancient species (a species driven to conquer and control the universe) and she just wants to keep on living. A reasonable suggestion except as Aneela points out - all things live, all things die. It’s how it works. The Lady tries to point out Aneela’s own 300 year life span but that has no traction - Aneela never chose this unnatural longevity

The Lady also is intrigued about this special connection humans have with their emotions, their connections with each other rather than just instinct. She talks round it but I think we’re having a full Power of Love thing going on here.

Using that the Lady has another offer - Aneela can have her family. Her and Jaq and Delle Sayah… and this gets traction. She agrees much to the horror of Dutch & co when they arrive. But Aneela leaves a clue - the location where Dutch has been before, where Dutch meet Yelena, Aneela’s mother. And where Dutch found the Green killing spore

And, as we’ve established, the Green is a place of memory where everything exists, she uses that memory to extract the spore and use it. The Lady was not expecting that at all and seems to have some consternation as Aneela turns on her and starts to fight her.

It looks like she’s winning - but when Dutch & co arrive so they can all run to the exit again, the Lady has pulled a fast one. Aneela is left with a ghostly Khlyen while everyone else tries to escape with the Lady.


While this is going on there’s a plague in Westerley - people are getting sick, including Pree and anyone who had contact with the rescued kids. Zeph swings into action doing everything she can to try and heal people, with Pree there helping as guinea pig and having some beautiful advice and wisdom for her on how to deal with Pip’s death. It’s awesome, but then it’s Pree.

The plague is unnatural, progresses at a ridiculous rate and is super infectious. So Turin appeals to the Nine for supplies and they turn up from their holes to remind everyone that they are Completely The Utter Worst and plan to nuke Westerley and kill everyone on it. The Worst.

Of course Zeph saves the day and finds a cure - but it comes with a side order of Amnesia. With parents not remembering their children - and Pree not remembering Garod

Which would be more of a problem, I think, if, as soon as the Lady Escapes the Green, everyone loses their memory. They’re all living in an alternate world where Johnny and Dutch are married (aaargh, this is like watching two siblings together!) D’avin is a killjoy looking for Jaq and everything is just wrong

As the Lady voice overs in a creepy little girl voice: memory isn’t just where you’ve been it’s what you are. And she controls that



Which is an ominous lead into the next season. Obviously I do want a lot from the next season in so many ways - but I do hope they will touch on what destroying the Green means not just the Lady. I mean if it’s the repository of all the memories in the world, that has to have consequences when destroyed.

I liked this season a lot but, perhaps, not as much as previous seasons. I think it just got a little too… serious? The fun swashbuckling joy is not there in quite as much degree. It’s all a little more heavy - which makes for a good (albeit often confusing) story but it’s just a little less fun

We do have a cast of excellent characters who bounce off each other well, but not only do we have great witty raport, some awesome snark but we handle a lot of other things well - like redemption. Or not. There are terrible characters they have to work with - like Aneela and Delle Saya - and though we’re working with them no-one pretends they’re not awful. We have characters exploring trauma like Zeph and Dutch and even D’avin and Johnny with their father - but it’s explored through the story and their characters not from over the top melodrama that consumes the storyline.

We also have a richly diverse cast - Dutch is a Black woman as, of course, is Aneela who is also bisexual and with Delle Sayah, another bisexual woman of colour. We have Pree and Garod given much more prominent roles: Pree a man of colour and both of them bisexual (given their time with a female sex worker). I wouldn’t say either are MAJOR characters but their relationship and sexuality is open unlike previous seasons AND they’re definitely more than the ascended extras of previous seasons (alas, Fancy and Weej remained as that). This really is one of the most diverse shows we have. And I’m also glad that Dutch found a level with Aneela, even some respect with Delle Saya and with Zeph since if I had any criticism on representation it was how Dutch moved in such a male world.