If you picked this week to get on board with “Orphan Black“, you picked a good one. In what is easily the best episode of the third season, we get huge stakes, big character shifts, dream sequences, answers to a few mysteries, and an explosion to top it all off.
Helena (Tatiana Maslany) gets the least to do in the episode but the decision she comes to is an important one. After abandoning Sarah at the Castor camp last week to ensure her own escape, she makes the only choice she really could and comes back for Sarah. Luckily for Sarah, it’s not a moment too soon. Sarah is run through the emotional ringer in this episode and experiences two separate, very intense, dream sequences, each offering dramatic insight into what continues to drive her emotionally.
We’ve started to accept it as a given that Sarah is tenacious and will stop at nothing to protect those she considers family. The first dream seems to reinforce this notion as she chases her daughter Kira (Skyler Wexler) through a variety of environments ranging from the Castor camp to the blanket fort. The dream ends, of course, with Sarah in danger and undergoing horrific scientific experiments but Kira is luckily nowhere to be found.
The first big revelation we get this week is that the male and female clones both share a similar defect, though it effects them differently. The men’s brains are affected while the defect impacts the women’s reproductive systems. This isn’t the most subtle metaphor the show has used, but adding the layer that the men are able to sexually transmit their defect keeps this line of logic intriguing. In essence, the defect takes away the female ability to produce life while the way in which it impacts the men is to basically weaponize them. This is a big idea and I’m excited to see the show continue to explore it.
The second dream sees the return of a long dead clone, Beth Childs. She is the clone that threw herself in front of a train within the first 3 minutes of the pilot episode and kicked off the entire series. The second big revelation comes when Sarah admits to feeling like a failure. She took over Beth’s life as a means to better her and Kira’s life but was quickly dragged into the conspiracy.
Sarah has been acting as the de facto leader with Beth gone but nothing has really changed for any of the clones despite all the work she’s done. She’s let down and betrayed Helena so many times, Cosima is still sick, and they are no closer to answers. Deep down, Sarah knows she can’t give up and Beth gives Sarah a reason to keep going. She needs to change her perspective – she needs to stop asking “Why?” and start asking “Who?” This question should propel the show for the rest of the season and well into season four.
Elsewhere, Alison is clearly enjoying her new life in the drug business with her husband Donnie (Kristian Bruun) as evidenced by an emphatic dance party replete with flying money and glitter. This week, Alison’s former boyfriend and current employer, Jason (Justin Chatwin), instructs Alison and Donnie that they need a way to launder the money they make. Sound advice, but of course to Alison this means buying her mother’s soap store. Why not? It is still hard to see how, or if, this story will tie into the main action with Castor, but it is so off the wall insane I can’t help but enjoy the ride.
Felix (Jordan Gavaris) is tired of sitting on his hands and not looking for Sarah who has been gone far too long for his liking. In an effort to track down the Castor base, he pays a visit to the villainous clone, Rachel. In response to Cosima’s lab partner, Scott (Josh Vokey), not wanting to take him to see Rachel, Felix gets the line of episode, “Nut up and take me to the cyclops.” The juxtaposition of lines like this with the exploration of scientific ethics is the show’s blessing and curse. I really enjoy the little punches of humor sprinkled throughout all the big ideas, but some people find it goofy and uneven. I can see their point.
One thing everyone who’s watched the show can agree on is that we’ve never been able to get a good read on Paul (Dylan Bruce). He’s been a monitor, possible love interest, traitor, and hero — sometimes all in the same episode. He gets a hero’s send off this week by making the ultimate sacrifice not just to save Sarah, but to try to put an end to the experiments putting all of the clones, male and female, in danger.
This is the first time the show has made the stakes this high. Because the clones are all played by the same actor or actress, there is a feeling they are all expendable. When a character has been put in significant danger, the possibility of their death is very strong but wouldn’t alter the show in a major way because the actor would still be around. The final scene with Paul signals a new directive from the writers — start worrying about everyone.
Have you gotten into the show yet? If you’re caught up, did you enjoy this episode as much as I did? Will Alison’s plot ever come into play with Castor? Let me know below!
