Oneoveralpha's Ramblings

Thursday, July 13, 2017

Orphan Black Season 5 recap – “Ease for Idle Millionaires”

“Ease for Idle Millionaires”

(Spoilers)

Cosima tests the tooth that Charlotte found. While it’s running, she dreams about the end of the first season when she and Delphine deciphered the synthetic genes and discovered that the clones were patented. We see more of the scene and see that Delphine promises to always protect Cosima if Cosima will defy them.

Meanwhile, some guy in Revival sneaks off to have a cigarette and is attacked by the guy in the woods, we later learn is named Yanis. The raised alarm wakes up Cosima. One of the hunters tells everyone that the guy will be fine. But everyone is getting upset about this “bear.” So the hunters send everyone home, and they’ll go out and get the “bear.” They have orders from Westmoreland to bring him in alive.

Cosima goes to see Aisha, and asks to examine her, even though the Messenger said not to. But Aisha’s tumor is shrinking, and she shows Cosima her little book on her progress, which Cosima borrows.

Sarah and Mrs. S. are talking quietly about everything, which is upsetting Kira, being left out of the adult stuff. So Sarah talks to her about Helena, and how they didn’t want Kira to deal with all the things that they’ve had to deal with. They also talk about Kira’s connection to all the clones.

Cosima sees Mud and asks what’s going on. Mud admits that Yanis had a room in the house, but then recently they started new experiments on him in the lab. That’s why Mud let him out. Before she goes back in, Cosima sees Delphine going into Westmoreland’s house.

Westmoreland and Rachel are celebrating all of her hard work. They’ve selected 1,300 surrogates for the next wave. He gives her Cosima’s cure. She asks about Yanis, and wonders why he wants him captured, instead of just killed. Westmoreland blows up about him being important and how no life is perfect.

Delphine is waiting outside, having returned from a Sardinian gene bank Westmoreland had purchased. She wants to go on to Geneva, but they have some questions for her about Cosima, and how she’s crossed some lines.

Rachel visits Susan – Ira saying he hid all the knives – and they talk about Kira and the new program. Rachel grabs Susan’s wound to remind her that Westmoreland put her in charge.

Delphine stops in to see Cosima, saying she was collecting samples from centenarians. Cosima tells Delphine all she’s figured out about Aisha and how they are manipulating tumors with gene therapy. The kind of cancer Aisha has is caused by a gene that deals with organ development that usually shuts down. Delphine points out that Leekie was studying the same gene in mice, like the one Rachel gave Kira.

Scott and Hell Wizard are still putting together the timeline of Neolution and how Westmoreland, Susan, Virginia, etc., all fit in.

Delphine shows Cosima Aisha’s genome, and Cosima compares it to Yanis’, saying only it came from another of Westmoreland’s subjects. Delphine tells Cosima that she’s pushing too hard, risking what Delphine is doing on the outside. But she can’t tell Cosima what she’s doing on the outside. The Messenger shows up to take Delphine to dinner, and Cosima says she’s coming too. The Messenger says she’s not invited, but then she talks about the specific gene they’re working on.

The Messenger takes them to the house, but they need to dress up for dinner. Westmoreland takes Delphine aside for a moment, and there is a tense bit with Cosima, Susan, and Ira. Westmoreland comes in and tells Susan that they’ve discovered the gene.

Over dinner they talk of Darwin, and Cosima seems to be getting a little tipsy. Westmoreland asks about her parents, and Cosima admits she hasn’t spoken to them in a while and they don’t know she was sick, or anything like that. Then Rachel shows up.

Sarah and Kira are working up codenames for all the clones, as part of a con on Rachel.

Back at dinner, Cosima figures out that they’ve identified a mutation of the gene in Kira, which allowed her to heal. Westmoreland says that Delphine told him about her trip to the basement, which upsets Cosima a bit. But Rachel is leaving, and Delphine needs to get to Geneva.

Cosima goes with Delphine to change, and Delphine tells her that she had to give Westmoreland something to let her get to Geneva. Cosima asks what’s in Geneva, and Delphine tells her Felix and Adele, and that they’re working on the endgame, but she can’t tell Cosima anymore. Cosima says their relationship is messed up, but she’s okay with it.

One of the hunters takes Mud, in case she can calm Yanis down. They find him by the wood pile, and the guy shoots him and Yanis kills him with a hatchet. Mud is shaken, but Yanis runs off to Westmoreland’s house.

Westmoreland tells Cosima about Yanis, how he showed remarkable healing abilities. Susan says she wasn’t the one who worked on Yanis, but she did synthesize the gene and put it in the Leda clones to see if it worked. It didn’t, but showed up in Kira.

The Messenger comes in and tells Westmoreland that Yanis is in the village. Cosima and Susan go back to her room, where Ira is waiting, and they hear breaking glass. Cosima asks what they’re planning for Kira, and Susan answers they need to know if Kira’s trait is heritable. The plan is to take Kira’s eggs and make 1,300 kids. Cosima thinks that’s a terrible idea and leaves to stop Westmoreland herself. As she leaves, Ira starts to glitch. She runs into Mud who tells her that Westmoreland isn’t well, which is why things have started up again.

Westmoreland knows where Yanis is going, and reluctantly takes the gun offered by the main hunter. Yanis has gone back to his cage, and even locks himself back into his shackles. Westmoreland gives Cosima the gun and tells her to end Yanis’s suffering. But she won’t because he can’t take her humanity. She tosses the gun aside and goes to treat Yanis, but Westmoreland picks up the gun and shoots Yanis. He then locks her in.

Kira and Sarah are sleeping, and Mrs. S. hears something and goes downstairs. It’s Delphine, on her way to Geneva. She gives Mrs. S. all the information they have. She then asks if her source – the one that led them to Virginia – can still be useful, because things will happen soon.

I had assumed that Mrs. S’s source was Delphine. But I guess not. So who is it? The first option is Ferdinand, which I think him turning sides is a bit quick. But it would explain Mrs. S’s reluctance to use them. I still think he needs to die because of MK. But who else is there? I wondered if it could be Marion. Perhaps she pulled a Duncan disappearing act? I guess we’ll see.

So I guess the bloody lab wasn’t from twenty years ago, but more like a month or so. That still begs the question why it hasn’t been cleaned up.

What is this endgame Delphine spoke of, and who all is involved in it?

A question Mrs. S. had for Scott and Hell Wizard is if the Westmoreland who disappeared in 1893, I think, is the Westmoreland of today. On one hand it would be easy to just have the current Westmoreland be a conman using a stolen identity, but that seems too bland for the show. I expect him to really be 170.

So we have five episodes left. I’m going to predict that if we see any of the forgotten characters – Angie, Vic, Cal, Gracie, Mark, Shay, Jason, Dizzy, and whoever else I’ve forgotten – in the series it will just be in brief, ten second cameos in the last five minutes of the last episode. A bigger prediction is that Kira’s connection to the clones, won’t be explained. We’ll just have to see.

***

Friday, July 7, 2017

Orphan Black Season 5 recap – “Let the Children & the Childbearers Toil”

My introductory post

“Let the Children & the Childbearers Toil”

(Spoilers)

Susan wakes up in a hospital bed. Westmoreland is there saying they treated her with some of their stuff that will heal her right up. She asks why she isn’t dead, since he turned Rachel against her. Westmoreland answers that he needs her.

Charlotte and Aisha go looking for a missing pig. They find it injured in the woods, along with some table scraps. Charlotte also finds a tooth. Mud shows up and tells them they shouldn’t be there and takes them back to the village. As they go, they hear odd noises behind them.

Sarah is trying to talk with Kira, but Kira keeps sidestepping things. Then Sarah finds a cut on Kira’s upper arm. At first she thinks Rachel did it, but Kira finally admits that she cut herself to see how fast she healed. Mrs. S. tells Felix to take her to school, and to pick her up and take her to his place for a sleepover. She also says that someone will come visit. Mrs. S. then takes Sarah to the comic shop.

Westmoreland talks to Susan about her greenhouse – where he let everything die – and she mentions that he never gets his hands dirty, just his mind. She also says that she can never forgive him. Mud then brings in Ira.

Scott and Hell Wizard have been searching for Westmoreland, and they come across some of his old books. He was one of the original eugenicists. He apparently disappeared in Borneo in 1894. Hell Wizard also tells Mrs. S. that he broke into someone’s email, and they have to move today.

Mrs. S. takes Sarah to a hotel bar. Sarah asks who their mark is, and sees a woman on a laptop. Mrs. S. tells her that’s Dr. Elizabeth Perkins, who has issues with her daughter, and that they need her ID. Sarah starts an argument with Mrs. S., but that’s a distraction. She splashes Mrs. S. with her drink, and while Elizabeth is helping her, Sarah grabs her wallet. Mrs. S. goes to go after her, but Elizabeth stops her to talk to her about her daughter.

Charlotte shows Cosima the tooth. Mud told them – and everyone – that there’s a bear in the woods. But Cosima says it looks human. She goes to talk to Mud about the “bear,” but Mud who keeps insisting that it’s a bear. Cosima wonders if there’s some Dr. Moreau thing going on. Mud breaks enough to say it’s not his fault, but then goes back to her bear story.

Elizabeth is a psychologist, and she and Mrs. S. talk about mothers and daughters, and how she’s in town to do a case study for her book on trauma. Sarah returns and slips the wallet back on the table, and she and Mrs. S. leave. The real Elizabeth is expected at a psychiatric facility tomorrow, but Mrs. S. will play her tonight when her “assistant” Sarah screwed up the appointment. They’re to meet a patient “Alex Ripley” a high-level neolution defector. Sarah wonders how Mrs. S. got this info.

Along the way, they stop at the convent Helena is at. There was a nun who was kind to Helena in Ukraine, so they cut her tongue out. She’s helping Helena now. Helena tells Sarah she’s writing her memories. They talk about Kira and the Sestra connection.

Adele shows back up at Felix’s. Apparently, Mrs. S. told her the whole clone thing, which Adele is okay with. Turns out, she was disbarred for embezzlement. She’s good at finding money, not so good at taking it. Mrs. S. wants them to go to Switzerland, to see if they can track Westmoreland’s finances.

Susan tells Ira that years ago, Westmoreland took another path. He chose a scientist who would do the things Susan wouldn’t.

Cosima follows Mud, who is going for a walk. She overhears the hunter who chased Sarah asking Mud, “Where he hides.” Mud slips out of the camp, and Cosima follows. Cosima follows Mud to Westmoreland’s house, where Mud is helping him with dialysis, or something like that. She goes downstairs and finds a “dungeon” lab with shackles and blood on the walls.

Mrs. S. and Sarah shows up at the facility and talk their way in. They’re given badges, but not allowed to talk to any of the patients. They find “Alex,” who turns out to be Virginia, the former head of Castor.

Virginia wants out of the facility, and then she’ll talk. Mrs. S. and Sarah say talk first. She says that Susan was the one who put her there, to keep her from Westmoreland. She tells them that before they found Kendell, they found their first human subject, a boy with a unique genome. They did horrifying tests on him, and he grew tumors, had brain damage, and became deformed. Susan wanted to stop, but Virginia was made of sterner stuff.

Mud finds Cosima and tells her she can’t be there, and rushes her out of the house. Later, Cosima follows Mud as she takes some coats to the disfigured man in the woods.

The facility’s head doctor shows up, and Virginia attacks Sarah and grabs her badge before she’s restrained.

Susan has apparently told Ira the same story, and about Virginia. She then talks with Westmoreland and his breakthrough with Kira’s anomaly. She demands access to all the data, and he gives it to her, with the understanding that Rachel is still in control.

So this kid was experiment on like twenty years ago? Why is there still blood on the walls and photographs of his wounds? Doesn’t anyone clean up?

How did Mud find the guy in the woods, and convince him that she was nice?

I’ve wondered what is it about Sarah and Helena that makes them different from the other clones, in that they can have kids and are apparently immune. What role does any of that play in the Kira anomaly?

The next episode will be halfway through the final season, and there are a lot of still unresolved questions. I wonder if all will be answered, or if there will be a few left unanswered to be answered in books, comic books, or perhaps even a miniseries or movie. We’ll just have to wait and see.

***