First, Alan and Julia headed off to another outpost in search of recovering the Narvik virus samples, which were stolen by runaway cryogenics expert Dr. Adrian. While there, they found another hatch door leading to a lower level, which inspired the best line of the night, delivered by Alan: “Please tell me there’s no cabin down there.”
There wasn’t a cabin, but there was a Viking, turned preacher, turned scientist, turned silver-eyed crazy man chained up by Hatake 29 years ago. “Free me,” he kept asking Alan and Julia. Julia did, but apparently “free me” translated to “help me kill myself,” because the silver-eyed people are immortal, apparently unless their artery to their brain is severed. But otherwise they live a very, very long time – and the man really wanted to die. But before he did, he delivered some answers:
“Constance? … I had to pick a side. Constance made me choose so I did. That’s why Hiro, he locked me up down here. There are rules we must follow. There can be no more than 500 … You can survive 4 minutes without oxygen, 4 days without water, 40 days without food. There was so much pain. Rebirth feels like dying. We had no idea the enormity of it at the time. We thought we had found the ultimate gift. Eternal life. But to live forever, is to die 10,000 times.”So being silver-eyed is equated with being immortal. There’s limit on the number of people who can be immortal. And as were later learn from Hatake, these 500 immortals run Ilaria Corporation.
Interestingly enough, Hatake said the cure didn’t lie with him, only with Julia. I’m speculating that this has something to do with her mother. I want to describe Julia as being half-human, but the Viking/crazy man’s story seemed to indicate that he was once human too. For whatever reason, Julia may be the key to the illusive cure-all for all diseases known to mankind.
The final monologue by Sarah struck me as a clue to the meaning of all of this. She says, “Science has proven that nothing disappears without a trace. Nature doesn’t know extinction, only transformation. … We’re all made up of the same atoms that created the universe, right? In essence, we all live forever.” A few episodes back, Constance made a reference to the “Willis Hypothesis,” which appears to refer to a theory by a botanist that says an area a species takes up depends on its age, assuming no natural barriers, and that species rarely actually die out, but instead spread out and change. There seems to be a common theme about species surving through transformation here.
Other thoughts:
- The cheesy music of the night was slowed down version of “O Holy Night,” made even more creepy when sung by the crazy man in the basement.
- I had to shake my head a little at the morality shown by some of the characters, based on statements I was hearing. Among them was this line from Sarah to Hatake: “You may have done some terrible things, but I can’t help but think that none of that will matter if we get this antiviral to work.” Sadly, that may be true, but maybe it shouldn’t be. Another was Anana’s comment to Balleseros that after the way Miksa treated him, Balleseros didn’t have to come back to help them, and that everyone owes him. Wait? What? Maybe she doesn’t know the full history here, but Balleseros still has a lot to make up for before earns title of victim or hero. Way to sink my esteem for Anana, one of the few characters who seemed admirable.
- Julia apparently stole the Narvik samples while she made a show of helping Alan destroy them. What do you think she plans to do with them?
So let’s talk about the episode? What did you like? What did you not like? Is the popular theory still vampires?
Interesting review. I took there the "there can only be 500" to mean that basically only a select few of the elite/rich could be immortal. Not so much that only 500 ever can be immortal. This would mean that anyone could be immune to anyting, but where would the profit be in that? I think that the reason they need the cure is to cure people of the virus but still leave them normal (not immortal like the illaria 500) and rule over them.
ReplyDeleteNice episode and interesting review, I really hope that they're not vampires. I just don't understand, if there is a limited number of immortals, 500, that run Ilaria Corporation, why would they need a virus like Narvik? That would make sense if it was Hatake's plan, despite what Ilaria wants. Because it seems to me that Hatake may whant to give the immortality to everyone, that's why he's still after the Willis hypothesis, against Ilaria's will. Or their plan is something else that I forgot? And by the way, I think Julia only saved the Narvik-A sample, the A sample is the one tha only spread the disease and don't turn people in vectors, I think.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. I'm not sure what to think about that 500 number. The way he was talking, it sounded almost like his group came across the fountain of youth, and there were ancient rules attached to it. That's where my mind went, anyway.
ReplyDeleteOn the cure, I feel like there are two things going on here. There's the cure to the virus, that Ilaria wanted so that they could control the virus, but then Hatake was going off book and conducting his own research. He told Alan at one point that he was researching a cure-all for everything. Hatake could have been lying, but if he were truthful, it would explain why he had samples of every known disease there. I'm thinking Julia might be key to Hatake's objective, the cure that addresses all illness, including cancer.
I actually had a similar thought about the 500; what if it's a very set number, dictated by some...'more powerful' force or something? Julia was made a silver-eyes, and Constance died. Now that basement guy is dead and it's implied that they might use Narvick or something involving Julia's DNA to save Sarah, which could potentially turn her into a silver-eyes too.
ReplyDeleteThis makes sense too, as there is a balance to maintain, but about Sarah I think she would be healed, to become silver eye she needed to be infected first, then be injected with blood from someone But, let's see ... anyway, if someone has to be transformed into an eye silver I would rather to be Alan ...
ReplyDelete