The gang is able to run a bit of a distance when they find an old abandoned restaurant. They hide in the former freezer section while the rest of the restaurant becomes a blaze from rapid gunfire coming from the helicopter. Soon the helicopter leaves and the gang run through the burning building before they're permanently trapped there.
Back at Monroe's office a conversation takes place to between Bass and Tom about the possibility that Miles and his friends had a chance to survive, which Tom hesitantly answers that they could have, “It is Miles.” he firmly states . Not so delighted, Monroe tells Neville that if he should come across Miles at any point that he has permission to kill him. Additionally Monroe decides with his advancement in power that it's time to start wiping out all the rebels and to expand the Monroe Republic 'from sea to shining sea'...
The next scene shows us the brutal death of some of the rebels in Manchester upon a shoot out from the helicopter. When our gang arrives at the scene, they have a conversation about what they should do next. Aaron wants to go home, but Rachel explains that there is no home to go back to and says that Monroe is going to take over the whole former United States. Nora expresses her wish to go help the rebels in Minneapolis. Charlie and Danny agree and want to go with her. Rachel says she knows where she can get missile launchers and Miles, after a small confrontation with her, says he is going to go with her to keep her in one piece. The team splits apart.
In the meantime Neville has been surveying the destruction left behind by the helicopters. Jason can't help but to express his concerns on how horrible this is, as he tells his father, there were women and children burning inside those buildings! Neville shrugs it off by saying this is war. Nora, Charlie, Aaron, and Danny reach Minneapolis where at first they come under guard, but quickly Nora is greeted by an old friend and they are introduced to Commander Ramsey and our gang explains the new situation. Ramsey's first impression is that the resistance will be done for good.
Miles and Rachel continue to make their way, but Miles feels compelled to apologize to Rachel for everything and explains that he saw a body and honestly believed her to be dead. Miles and Rachel are very close together with their foreheads touching, almost as though they are working their way to a kiss, but Rachel recoils, (no doubt after Rachel saw Miles passionately kiss Nora earlier) and asks Miles to step away and he does.
Neville and his men reach Minneapolis, when both Jason and Tom see Charlie through the scope of their binoculars. “God works in mysterious ways!”, Tom acknowledges this lucky bit of fate, but again Jason says he did not sign on to become a butcher. Tom says it isn't for Jason to choose, only to follow orders. Tom pushes Jason and they fight. Jason has a few good punches, but they are short lived when Tom beats his son down to the ground. “Never come home again.”, Tom says before he walks away and leaves Jason behind.
Rachel and Miles reach their destination and Miles and the viewers are introduced to another colleague of Rachel's, Ben's and Grace's, named John Sandborn. John is quirky and nervous, and surprised to see Rachel, but he takes him down to his basement, and like Grace did, he has electricity.
Back in Minneapolis Jason follows Charlie through a section of woods. He warns her that his father will be there with an air strike in 12 hours. He tries to explain he has know where to go, but Charlie sadly tells him that she's sorry, but you can't come with me.
At John's house we hear talk of sonic cannons, but the conversation quickly changes as John reveals that Randall had gotten to Grace, and to him, and that he was on his way here, because he has plans for Rachel, which include knowing where 'The Tower' is. John is able to take them captive.
Suddenly we flash to a scene with Randall. He tells Grace he needs her help managing the Elevators. He needs to get to “Level 12”, Grace is a little perturbed by this, as she mentions she doesn't want to be left here with a “creepy” Mr. Austen...
Back at the Rebel base camp, Commander Ramsey says there won't be enough time to evacuate every one, so instead he believes they should make a stand and go down like Americans! Back at John's house Rachel and Miles are able to escape and Rachel vaguely explains to Miles how dangerous Randall is. They take the missile launchers find some horses and cart and head on to Minneapolis.
In Philadelphia Tom reports back to Monroe that the strike is ready, that he has seen the Matheson girl, that assumingly Miles is there, but also that his own son, Jason, is dead.
Getting ready for the air strike Charlie tries to have a heart to heart with Danny and instinctively tries to make him promise that he'll go inside and help the wounded when the air strike happens, but Danny refuses and says he has to do this for their father. The helicopters arrive and the shoot out begins, as Commander Ramsey, Charlie, Danny, and Nora are on the front lines. Nora is able to hit one of the militia helicopter pilots. Just when Charlie runs out of ammo and it seems they might be out numbered, Miles and Rachel arrive just in the nick of time!
Miles uses the launcher, but is thrown back right when another helicopter comes straight at him. Most of the gang had centered around Miles to see if he was hurt, but in a glorious moment of bravery, Danny goes out and gets the launcher and aims it perfectly at the helicopter, the one with the amplifier and takes it down...
Unfortunately, Danny did not miss the guns of the helicopter. He looks down to see a series of bullets had pierced through his abdomen and stomach areas. He falls to the ground. Rachel runs to him, but Nora tries to hold Charlie back, but couldn't and both Matheson women lay at his side trying to get him to wake up, but he is dead.The final scenes however are full of mysterious intrigue. Danny's body has been brought inside and temporarily laid to rest. Rachel goes and sits with his corps, pulling the sheet back, but not before retrieving a red and blue flashing device from left side of body! Randall then shows up at Monroe's doorstep offering services...
The final scenes also tie into the two flashbacks in the episode. The first being one where Rachel and Ben feel forced to do an experimental procedure on a very sick young Danny. The second is when a young Charlie helps young Danny breathe with his asthma.
My Review & Speculation:
I though this was a GREAT fast-paced, well choreographed, and emotional episode back after such a LONG hiatus, but if I'm honest with myself, I think I would prefer to get ten episodes straight with four months in-between, rather than every few weeks taking a break. So I'm actually not going to keep complaining about how long we had to wait and I want to give kudos to both NBC and The Revolution Producers for continuously promoting the show and giving us additional tie in material while we waited. Thank you!
This episode had a lot going on, a lot of turning points for a lot of the characters. One of the things that seemed to be more hinted at in this episode was that perhaps that Rachel and Miles had a romantic past, which doesn't surprise me. I have considered that perhaps Charlie was not Ben's biological child and could be Miles for quite some time. A lot of people aren't found of love triangles, but I think if done right, it can really enhance the story. Nora and Rachel seem worlds apart, so I'm curious to explore who is better for Miles in the long run?
Jason too made a stand against his father and warned Charlie, but sadly Charlie didn't accept him either. I wasn't sure why she told him he couldn't go with her, but I suspect they will cross paths yet again, where ever it is Jason ends up. (Perhaps Charlie rejected him, because her keen intuition told her to?) For Tom, it was clear to me that although Jason is sort of dead to him in the sense that Jason can never go home, to tell Monroe that he was dead proves some kind of love and protection on Tom's behalf for his son, giving his son a chance to escape and survive on his own. This could be a catalyst for Tom down the line, but I don't think he's going to change his ways anytime soon, let alone if Monroe find's out Tom lied and just let Jason go. We also didn't get to see what Julia's reaction is, which in turn could cause more problems at home for Tom.
And then there's Danny. I was sad when I first figured out that it was Danny that was going to die, not because he's my favorite character or anything, but I would have liked him to have had more of a story before being killed, I have seen this plot device distinctively before, but there are several interesting things that came with his death.
First, Charlie again exhibited a type of prophetic-ethereal instinct relating to Danny's death. She wanted him to go inside, because on a subconscious level, she knew what would happen when he didn't. We have seen some pretty interesting moments with Charlie so far. Moments where she just gets in the zone and moments where she is there to comfort the dying, let alone I believe her experience in “Kashmir” was more than a hallucination. I believe she traveled to 'the other side'.
Then we have the childhood flashback in which Ben and Rachel allow some kind of experimental procedure to be done in order to save young Danny's life. It seems as though there is a connection to the red and blue flashing pill-shaped device Rachel retrieved from Danny's post death body.
--But this whole situation with Danny's death might be more interesting when we consider a conversation Miles and Rachel had about Miles believing Rachel was dead. “I saw a body. IT WAS YOU.”, Miles stated. Normally I would save the following for “The Bad Robot Factor”, but just very quickly, doppelgangers of various kinds are a staple note of Bad Robot works. Obviously it's hard to know for sure what this means, and if we will be seeing doppelgangers. We could have something else where Monroe put Miles on psychotropic drugs while examining the body, or Rachel was given a drug that made her appear dead, or Rachel has a natural twin sister, but it's something new to think about! It might be we're getting a little more sci-fi/fringe science like after all! (Something I would really like)
As for Danny, I think Graham Roger's did a good job, especially in this episode. I hope we'll see him again somehow though, whether on the other side, in a flashback, or maybe as a ghost, but at any rate I understand what his death does. It closes the first part of the season, which really acts like prologue of sorts, so that now the bigger stories can begin. Danny is the catalysis to get our story in greater motion.
As For Randall, I think in some ways he might end up being a bigger villain than Monroe. He just strikes me as a guy who knows too much about technology and has too many plans. Ultimately I think he showed up at Monroe's get the pendants, but posing as an alley. I'm actually surprised that Bass didn't know who he was, as I would think Bass might have known the former assistant director of the Department of Defense. It also seems like we have a general plot in terms of what other places we might start seeing this season, as Monroe says he'll start with Georgia (Georgia Federation) and then the Planes Nation....
Then there's The [Dark and/or Light] Tower might be the place where the lights get turned on and off and I'm curious to see where it is, or what kind of tower it is, and how or if it alone may turn the power on and off. What does Randall want???
Did you miss Revolution? Are you happy it's back? Anything you guys have a theory about or want to talk about? Sound off in the comments below!
And: I was thinking about condensing the Recap and My Review & Speculation section to become one section in a type of overview, as opposed to two lengthy separate sections. I would surely appreciate constructive critical feedback, if you would prefer this, or if you like the my article the way it is?! Thank you.
References:
The Stand: - The same name as our episode title, marks the third reference to the Stephen King novel. Additionally "The Stand", like many of King's novels, and "The Stand's" protagonist, Randall Flag, tie into the next reference.
The Dark Tower: - A series of fantasy adventure novels by Stephen King chronicles the multiple universe journey of a fated group of people as they make their way to 'The Dark Tower'. This episode introduced to another reference possible reference to the novels, as Rachel and Randall speak of a mysterious tower that may be connected to how the lights go on and off.
The Bad Robot Factor:
Another parallel I had also noticed in the Pilot related to names and circumstances of characters in Alias. Charlie always struck me as a Sydney Bristow type. Over determined, heart on her sleeve, and sometimes naive.-A warmer kind of character. In the Alias Pilot, “The Truth Be Told”, Sydney's revenge story against Arvin Sloane and SD-6 is launched by the brutal death of her fiance' Danny. And like Alias, the main female protagonist also learns the truth about their mothers, who were previously presumed dead, only to be revealed to be alive.
Other mild references include the name Mr. Austen, a character we haven't met yet, but Grace suggest is creepy. In LOST Kate's last name is Austen, and she came with two fathers, her creepy abusive biological father, Wayne Janssen and her kind step father, who was in the U.S. military (fought in Iraq and Korea) and taught Kate to track and hunt, Sam Austen.
Additionally we were told of a SONIC cannon that can block frequency and cause electrical objects to be shut down.In LOST, thinking about the episode,
“Left Behind” (because of Elizabeth Mitchell and the Austen
reference), was one time where we experienced the power of
Dharma's/The Others' sonic fence against the smoke monster/Man in
Black. “Man in Black” is shared Dark Tower reference.The name John Sandborn also immediately made me think of John Locke of LOST, but I have yet to see any direct connections, except that perhaps, thinking about "Left Behind" once more, that both Johns come off betraying other people, and John Locke has an association and juxtaposition with the Man in Black (Smoke Monster), as the Smoke Monster often appeared in the form of a dead doppelganger. John Sandborn has an association with Randall, and again, Randall Flagg and The Man in Black are antagonists of the Stephen King's The Dark Tower series and beyond.
Red and Blue, especially contrasted, is something also seen in a lot of Bad Robot works. In Fringe we have the obvious red and blue universes and in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol for instance, we have magnetic gloves that when they stick, they light up blue and when they don't they are red which paves way for that rather memorable Dubai scene shot by Brad Bird. In this episode of Revolution the device Rachel retrieves from Danny is flashing red and blue.
And lastly also with Fringe: Sometime when I watch some of these Bad Robot shows, especially the first seasons, I notice that the feel of the show and some of plots change and/or get dropped for various reasons. During Fringe's first season, I often thought the show was going with a more film noir-detective feel & Government conspiracy until the elimination of of the character John Scott (which was due to personal issues between Mark Valley and (at the time) his wife, Anna Torv, deciding to split). One of those early plots that came with John Scott was the reveal of these flat little glass discs, one of which was in John Scott's arm. Ultimately they turned out to relate to minor drug company that was using them to genetically mutate into a some kind of beast! These discs when originally presented seemed like they were going to be something relating to the long haul, but ultimately just represented a similitude with things relating to various kinds of shapeshifters through out the series. But really, many things in both Fringe and Alias alike have been found inside peoples bodies. So it's anyone's best guess what the device inside of Danny actually did/does!
