The Event Convolution Alert: Aliens Hack Our Websites, Spike Our Coffee
Last week on The Event, Vicki set the precedent for characters making completely baffling and rash decisions when confronted with Jason Ritter's empty threats. But this week, her Terminator-style romp through the police station may have been trumped. (Looking at you, Simon!) What crazy punches did our alien conspirators pull in the Great Sophia/Antidote Swap of 2010? What does Luke Danes know about our alien conspirators? Where does this leave the Convolution Threat Level?! Click through for the breakdown.
1. With Vicki's single surviving partner in tow, Sean, Leila and Ms. FBI head to Leila's parents' house, where they hope to find clues as to where Leila's sister is. (There's an inadvertently hilarious line or two when Sean suggests Leila stay behind: "I don't need to be protected...You can't just put me in some place!" Gotta love the canned feminist outrage.) While they're there, they're yelled at by a disenfranchised journalist up in arms about The Truth, whose website has been "hacked out of existence" by the government!
Convolution level: SEVERE. After the hostage tells Leila "Dad's no angel," the journalist reveals that Leila's father, the pilot, stumbled on information about the Alaskan prison holding the aliens. So importance has now shifted from Sean, whom everyone was previously setting traps for, to the all-knowing Michael Buchanan, who is laid up somewhere with an alien virus. Mmhmm.
2. Sophia is released, but her food was laced with a radioactive isotope that Sterling and Co. will use to track her to Thomas. Simon, the unaccounted-for medium between the government and the aliens, however, follows Sophia to a coffee shop where he puts the same radioactive isotope in the coffee trough, adding more dots to the Sophia detector. Sterling's next resort is the tried-and-true facial recognition database.
Convolution level: GUARDED. The FBI tracks Thomas and Sophia to a warehouse just in time for the two of them to take off in a stashed ship. We do not see the ship. Also, curiously, there's no information about the people infected with the alien virus. Does this mean Martinez will follow through with his threat to execute the rest of the detainees? Mmhmm.
3. Simon, who was my favorite character until this episode, does not get on the ship (or whatever) with Sophia and Thomas, despite the fact that he will definitely be discovered as an infiltrator after spiking the coffee. He instead stays behind to help FBI agents escape the warehouse before it collapses into a Sunnydale-like crater beneath him.
Convolution level: ELEVATED. Ridiculousness level: RIDICULOUS. Simon stays behind because (we're led to believe through the arbitrary flashback series of the week) he reconnected with the ex-lover from 1954 whom Thomas made him leave behind. "I wanted to grow old with you," he says at her bedside, which is funny, because he doesn't age. I'm all for taking a stand against Thomas, but couldn't Simon have asserted himself when he wasn't facing either death or imprisonment? MMHMM!?
Final analysis: SEVERE. Michael Buchanan's sudden knowledge of the detainees spells danger, along with the neglect of the infected prisoner thread. And so help me if another flashback series prompts a poorly calculated decision next week!
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Comments
I lol'ed at "Ridiculousness level: RIDICULOUS." Good stuff.
Indeed. Also: This show sounds NUTS, like maybe we should include the convolution level of its still being on the air.
This is the week I finally gave up on this show. After watching last night's episode on my DVR (and fast-forwarding through a lot of it) I deleted the timer. I realized I have officially lost interest in whatever these people are doing.
Did you hear that, NBC?!
1. We saw the people infected with the virus get better last episode. The antidote was delivered and they were starting to recover; no need to see them again at this time.
2.) Simon stayed behind NOT because of his lost sweetie (who is most likely dead by now since the flashback was from 10 years ago) but because he was tired of being constantly uprooted by Thomas and wanted to stay behind with humans whom he felt more of a connection too than his own people. (This is what the flashbacks were trying to portray--Simon's reasoning for not following Thomas and Sophia.)
Ahh. Good call. I forgot that happened last week.
On 2, though, I still think the juxtaposition of the flashback with his conflict was jarring — especially when you consider that, in his position, staying behind was about the worst possible thing he could have done. He had just dumped a man in a car trunk in broad daylight, AFTER sabotaging that surveillance effort. But instead of going with Sophia, who he seems to be fairly close with judging from those weirdly overt prison visits, he stays with the people he's just screwed over? It does not make any sense. At all.