Helix – Episodes 1.1&1.2 Pilot/Vector – Review & Discussion

So how creepy were the frozen monkeys? How about monster-rat assault? My favorite scene was probably the frozen monkeys, but there was much to choose from in this scary, mystery-packed premiere of SyFy’s new series.

Helix got off with a strong start - non-stop suspense and horror - and ended with an upcoming promo of even more hair-raising thrills to come. In addition to the mystery, the characters were appropriately fleshed out with just enough detail and backstory to leave you wanting more. The thing I liked most about the character piece is that the players appear to have layers and are not being written into stereotypical roles. I appreciated that Sarah Jordan showed some spine and competitiveness, rather than playing the role of typical naïve heroine. And Alan Farragut’s relationships with both his brother Peter and ex-wife Julia Walker were complicated. It left me wanting to learn more.

I thought some of the competitive positioning between characters was overdone a little at the beginning – particularly the exchange between Doreen Boyle and Major Sergio Balleseros, with Doreen calling him a “glorified plumber.” But we quickly got past that. The one eye-rolling moment to me, in that it didn't seem believable, was the scene with Maureen coaxing the monkey out of hiding with no protection for herself. At this point she knows the monkeys had been experimented on with a highly dangerous virus, and that they had apparently broken themselves out of their cages. This wasn’t her pet.

But overall, I loved the premiere and can’t wait to see where it leads. So where to begin in talking about it? I guess I’ll just break out of some of the highlights and plot questions and look forward to hearing your thoughts and theories in the comments.

The Infection

“This thing doesn’t kill, it annihilates.” An apt quote from Alan, but as we’re to learn in the second hour of the premiere, they’re dealing with not one but two viruses. The first virus, Narvik-A, annihilates. The second, Narvik-B, turns a human, or a small furry creature, into a “perfect contagion machine,” as Julia puts it. Those infected experience increased strength, spidey agility, a compulsion to spread the disease, and a gross black goo that passes as blood.

Questions:
- Is this a very old virus found in the ice, as theorized by Sarah, or something else?
- Does water affect the incubation of it? Hatake was pushing water pretty hard on a writhing Peter, who has just recently been infected.
- What was working its way up Peter’s throat in the opening scene? Was that just a symptom of the changes his body was going through, or was something moving around in there?
- What are the creatures that the infected are turn into? Are they still a singular organism, or are there multiple beings contained in the host? Dr. Tracey’s use of the plural seemed to indicate there was more than one organism in there. Do they retain some humanity? Are traces of Peter still there, or has he been transformed into something completely different?

The Players

We learn at the outset that Hatake is an active promoter in developing this infection, as he calls Peter’s state, or probably more specifically the fact that Peter lived through the infection, “progress.” We also learn that Hatake, as well as Balleseros, are working for a group and are expected to deliver something. More interesting is that Hatake has some kind of obsession with Julia, and that he doesn’t appear quite human with translucent blue eyes hidden behind normal-looking contacts.

Questions:
- What is with the interest in Julia? I’m wondering if the key is related to the seemingly innocent conversation about Julia’s mother, a cellular biologist, who died when she was very young. Julia was also asked by Hatake about her father, but before she could answer, her attention was diverted by the rat attack. I’m wondering if there’s a connection between Julia’s parents’ research and Hatake’s blue eyes.
- Infected Peter seems to know about the connection to Julia, but was this Peter talking when he said Julia was brought there for a reason, or the organisms inside him voiced that?
- Speaking of why Julia was brought there, the distress call was specifically addressed to Julia, but according to Balleseros, the people he and Hatake work for consider the CDC’s presence unwelcome. So who issued the distress call if Hatake and Balleseros didn’t want the CDC there?
- Also worth some speculation: Julia says early on she’s worried, but when Alan assumes it’s about Peter, she says that’s not what she’s worried about.

The White Room

Peter says the thing that happened to him occurred in The White Room, and Dr. Tracey fears being brought to the White Room. Episode 5 is titled “The White Room,” so I guess we’ll have to wait on that one.

Questions:
- This may or may not be related to The White Room, but the show opens with Peter running from something or someone. He runs right into the sources of the infection – the lab where the monkeys presumably broke out and spread the virus to humans. So if Peter wasn’t running from the infected people or monkeys, what was Peter running from?