Dark Matter delivered what may very well be its highest-stakes episode yet. While the crew has dealt with the devastating loss of One there was nothing any of them could have done to help him in the end. Two, on the other hand, was with them and rapidly deteriorating before their eyes which left them scrambling for some way to save their fearless leader. The chance that they could have lost her was very real and the stakes were extremely high. This was an intense episode that never let up from the moment it hit full speed until it came to a screeching halt as the episode faded to black.
Before I get into the actual review of the episode I have to take a moment to praise Melissa O’Neil. What she did in this episode was nothing short of astonishing. She took Two on an intense emotional journey that spanned from primal vulnerability to fearless strength. When Two was dealing with the realization of her condition O’Neil perfectly captured Two’s struggle to maintain her composure in front of her crew. When Two was supercharged and at her strongest O’Neil was fierce and had a fire burning in her eyes as she conveyed Two’s determination to fight for her life. All of that doesn’t even take into account the Rebecca flashbacks which showed O’Neil’s vast range. I’ve been impressed by her acting from the beginning of the series, but this episode topped even her prior bests. She threw everything into this episode and it paid off in spades. She deserves major accolades for this episode.
Dark Matter gave her a big opportunity to show off a new side to Two and she delivered. O'Neil should be extremely proud of this episode because this was a tour de force performance for her.
While this was Two’s episode it did have a lighter than expected opening. It ended up being kind of necessary because from the second Five found Two this episode hit the accelerator and never let up. I have to admit that I was surprised that they chose this encounter between Four and Nyx to open the episode, but I’m very glad that they did. This was a relationship that I was very hesitant about at first. I trust the creative team, but I just couldn’t foresee how Four and Nyx could possibly work. Well, that goes to teach me to question them, because Alex Mallari Jr and Melanie Liburd have really amazing chemistry. Not to mention that this storyline has given Mallari a lot more dialogue than is usually thrown his way. It has also given the audience a chance to see a slightly different side to Four and provided him with some nice moments that didn't involve fighting or worrying about his home planet. Those are great moments, but this was a much softer side to Four than we've seen yet and Mallari fed in enough softness to his performance that it was a great look into the inner workings of this incredible warrior's brilliant brain. He may sometimes seem larger than life, but under the warrior exterior Four has a heart just like everyone else and it is capable of very real feelings for others. In fact, I think Four was a bit taken aback when Nyx immediately tried to brush off their encounter. While he tried to counter with his own brush off he seemed to be a little confused as Nyx exited his room. The awkwardness over breakfast really helped to portray that there could be more here than either Four or Nyx wishes to admit. They may both be brushing it off for now, but I can't help but think that this bond between them will only keep evolving. I kind of hope it does because, while I know this isn't a relationship show, I'd love to see the show tackle a romance with Four who is easily the character that struggles the most with emotional expression. Then the stuff over breakfast with Three was hilarious and certainly didn't help the tension between Four and Nyx. Poor Five though, she was exposed to the ultimate nightmare for any teenager, the discussion of adults she is close with discussing sex even if it was done in innuendos. That moment really showed her age. And, it must be noted, that Anthony Lemke had far too much fun doing that scene. Absolutely no one else could nail Three’s sarcastic lines like Lemke does. This lighter tone was definitely the perfect way to start this episode.
Everything kicked into high gear when Five found Two collapsed on the floor. It’s hard to figure out how long she had been lying there, but I think it’s safe to gather that she had been there for quite some time, down for the count. Jodelle Ferland expertly played that moment as she showed Five’s shock and horror over finding Two like that. These two characters mean the world to each other and for Five to see someone she cares about and looks up to in that condition had to be terrifying. Even when she called out for help there was a catch in her voice as Five tried to keep it together to take care of Two. The fear was even more evident when Two finally woke up. Five was terrified over the realization that Two might not be long for this world. The fear grew exponentially throughout the episode until she was near an emotional breaking point. That's when the Android, and her impeccable timing, intervened to try to comfort the youngest member of the crew. Having the two people most important to Two commiserate over their ailing friend was much needed, especially since these two couldn't be by her side in what could have been her final moments. The Android really didn't know if Two would survive and Five was petrified that she wouldn't. At least from all the melancholy came the great hot chocolate scene which will almost certainly be a fan favorite moment. Good to know that even in the future humans and even android's will still turn to comfort foods, and drinks, in this case, to get through scary and stressful situations. The back and forth of the hot chocolate cup was expertly executed by Ferland and Zoie Palmer to show the nerves both characters were experiencing. Neither of them liked seeing Two so weak and the ticking time clock looming over her helped nothing. Not even the Android could hide the fact that Two's status was extremely critical. When even the Android is concerned everyone should be concerned.
I think it was as jarring for the audience as it was the characters, to see Two so utterly vulnerable and weak. When she woke up in medical the weakness and pain she was suffering through was evident on her face. She is a fearless fierce warrior and to be taken down by something she couldn’t even fight back against had to be extremely frustrating. For someone who normally leads the charge, she was reduced to sitting on the sidelines while her crew valiantly fought to save her. The scene where Six told Two she couldn’t come with them was utterly heartbreaking. Two looked so defeated and broken in that moment. O’Neil played this moment with such rawness that it was impossible to not feel Two’s pain. As Two accepts her fate her eyes are on the table, unable to meet the eyes of her crew, and when she looks up there are tears glistening in them which really sold the seriousness of the situation. If even Two was scared things were about as dire as they could be. In that moment she had to accept that her fate was completely out of her hands and for someone like Two that was a tough thing to accept. And, as it would turn out, she didn’t actually accept it.
While the crew was busy doing recon on Earth, Two was left behind with the Android as her distraction companion. This allowed the show to delve a bit more into their friendship. As we learned last week, Two had something to do with the creation of the Android as we now know her. She played some part in the “glitch” that has made the Android special and unique. While we’ve yet to learn what all that means, we do know that these two have been bonded longer than we’ve been privy to. Memories or no memories the residual feelings of that connection forever bond them together. The Android could barely even break the bad news to Two when she first woke up. Zoie Palmer made a great choice by bringing her voice just to the breaking point then she reigned it back in which created a powerful expression of the emotional struggle going on within the Android. Palmer and O'Neil are great scene partners and I'm grateful the show built on their natural chemistry to show how much the Android cares for Two and how well Two knows the Android. Throughout the early part of the scene the Android was trying to distract Two, but Two knows her so well that she saw right through the act. They are friends and it's a friendship that carries great weight for them both. Though, I think she was partially trying to distract herself as well. The thought of losing Two was as devastating to the Android as it was to all the other members of the crew.
Even though the Android allowed that relationship to make her vulnerable to Two’s request for help, it showed the true depth of their friendship. The Android knew that Two would rather go out fighting than to fade away in agonizing pain. Her actions forced the crew into a race against the clock she but did so with the best of intentions in mind. If they had failed to save Two that moment would have eternally haunted the Android, but thankfully it didn’t come to that. I have to note that after seeing Two so weak and vulnerable it was amazing to see her back in fighting order. I think the Android felt the same way, because while she was nervous for Two, everyone knows the odds increase greatly when Two is able to be a part of the fight. After Two was saved, and after the Android scanned her, the relief that flashed on the Android's face was incredibly human-like. She may understand and experience emotion differently than humans, but there is no question that she does have emotions and feels things. Two is her friend and the idea of losing someone you care about is a terrifying prospect. Relief in that moment was as atypical a reaction as one can get for an android, but for this android it was everything we've come to expect from her.
The one good thing that came from this who situation was that it led Two right to the front door of Dr. Eric Waver (Jonas Chernick) who finally filled in a very important chunk of Two’s creation and early life. Last season Rook led us to believe that Rebecca may have originated as a child and while she does age she seems to have come into existence as a grown adult. I’m sure that only served to make all the horrific things they did to her all that more traumatizing. She was brought to life with only the most basic understanding of things only to be endlessly tortured. While she appears to learn at the speed of light there had to be a small time frame where her mind was at a childlike state. It had to make her feel so helpless and confused to be subjected to these horrors for no crime other than just existing. It did help explain why she had such a bad reaction to being confined in solitary back on Hyperion-8. Every second of her existence, up until the second she escaped, was an almost a solitary existence full of horrific torture. Except for the tender care Eric gave to Rebecca, she was nothing but a lab rat to the researchers. I really wish we’d got to spend more time watching their bond grow in more detail. O’Neil and Chernick forged a beautiful bond between Rebecca and Eric in an incredibly short span of time. O’Neil organically captured Rebecca’s evolution and during the education scene, it was evident that the woman we would come to know as Portia Lin was coming to life inside of her. Dwarf Star Technologies created Portia Lin, but Eric Waver created Two. My favorite moments were when we got to see Rebecca expressing a childlike mentality. When she launched herself at Eric and embraced him it was evident that he was the only person in her short life that she had any emotional connection to. In a future episode, I would really like to see the show find an excuse to delve more into this timeframe of Rebecca’s life.
I’m curious where Rebecca came up with her Portia Lin alias. Does the name have some connection to Eric? Was it a name she heard during her education? Whether he influenced her name or not, it’s obvious that even today he still has a significant influence in her life. He played a big part in giving Rebecca the tools and life experiences she needed in order to become Two. I have this image in my head of Eric sitting around on the floor with Rebecca teaching her basic parental things. Quite obviously he didn’t get around to teaching her how to cope with her temper, but he did teach her a very important lesson about compassion. By showing her compassion and allowing her basic human interaction he showed her that not all of humanity are monsters. There are some genuinely good people and those people are worth helping. In turn, she returned the favor by sparing his life despite his association with her creators and captors. The concept of compassion had to be inside of her all along for Two to become the leader we have come to know her as, but the question has always been how she came by it when Portia struggled with the idea of compassion. In the absence of her memories of horrific torture the compassion that Eric taught Rebecca was able to surface. That was something Portia Lin was obviously working quite hard to suppress, but it was a critical piece of the puzzle to allowing Two to exist.
After surviving her creators and torturers all of the bad she had experienced boiled to the surface and manifested in Portia Lin. She was the product of her creators and with no real sense of right from wrong she set out to just survive by the only means she knew...brutality. There is one glaring piece of the puzzle missing. We know Rebecca murdered everyone but Eric to escape, so she wasn’t exactly in a stable mindset, but we still don’t know what happened in the alley that Five discovered during the neural link debacle. If Rebecca was capable of taking down an entire station worth of people what could have happened to her in that alley that she wouldn’t have been able to immediately overcome? That’s something else I’m really excited to see delved into more in a future episode.
This episode would have had a lot more room to delve into Rebecca’s life with Dwarf Star Technologies if it weren’t for the Three being possessed storyline. Don’t get me wrong, I actually really liked this and it was a really cool concept and introduced a whole new element to the series. I just wish they’d held it for a future episode to free up more room to flesh out Two more, though I imagine this storyline was slipped in thanks to Three’s proximity to the mad scientist, Alexander Rook (Wil Wheaton). Lemke was nothing short of brilliant throughout this entire part of the episode. They couldn’t have picked a better person to play possessed than Lemke. He completely changed everything about his performance and made it abundantly clear that something was wrong with Three. The acting was brilliant, but I would have loved to see Lemke get to play this out across a larger portion of the episode. This bit would have done so well as an anchor for another episode, but in the end, I must concede that it ultimately worked. Saving Three allowed Two to jump right back into leadership mode and after everything she’d been through I think it was important to see Two back in charge. The episode flowed perfectly, I just selfishly wish that Lemke and O’Neil would have been given more time to continue to wow with these awesome storylines that were bestowed upon them. Though the whole concept of the possession was very confusing, but that seems to have been by design as the question of what was inside of him is still unanswered. I look forward to seeing that resolved. I am curious as to what everyone thinks it was that Rook saddled Three with, so leave your theories down in the comments section.
At least we go to see Six finally start to put the final patches on mending his friendship with Three. They had each other’s backs during their captivity and ultimately Six’s actions helped save Three. It was obvious that Three is finally starting to accept Six back into his life. Things may not be like they were before, but at least things are on the right track now. This episode also gave Six a chance to really reconnect with the whole crew and it was ultimately his quick thinking that brought Two back from death’s doorstep. I’m sure there is still some lingering distrust, but he definitely proved that Two was right to spend so much time and valuable resources to save him and he repaid that favor in spades. I can’t help but draw some comparisons between Six and Eric. Both men were at one time standing on an opposing side to Two, but in the end, both men ultimately risked everything for her. When Six cradled Two in his arms, after reviving her, it was a poignant moment. Two seemed content to just rest in his arms while she regained her bearings. She looked up at him in the same way Rebecca seemed to regard Eric. What that relationship can be defined as is quite subjective, but Six is someone Two feels comfortable with despite his prior betrayal. It was also evident how much Six cares about Two. Roger Cross delivered a heartfelt performance as Six watched his friend dying right in front of his eyes. The way his voice shook with emotion was powerful acting. He did a lot to convey the bond that still exists between these characters and he deserves accolades for it.
While Six and Two were the focal point of that moment there were others watching over Two. Chief amongst them was Nyx, who earlier in the episode was finally let in on the big Two secret. Now, I know, some fans will hate this development, but I personally think it was long past due. Nyx has more than proven herself loyal to Two and the Raza crew. By lying to get them to help her save Milo she didn’t do anything that any other member of the crew has already done or tried to do. They've all been opportunistic with the others at one point or another. Then when Two was rapidly failing during the fight with the new prototype she charged into the middle of it without any consideration for her own wellbeing. Two was in trouble and despite Nyx knowing she was no match for the prototype she came to Two’s aid. They tag teamed him right up until Two could no longer stand. Then Nyx did everything in her power to keep him away from Two. If that isn’t a sign of loyalty I really don’t know what is. She put her own body between Two and imminent danger which is a powerful gesture. I also like that she was so quick to get to Two’s side once Four executed the prototype. She had just been tossed around like a ragdoll, but Two was still top her priority list. Two has supported Nyx more than a few times since Nyx arrived on the Raza and it was nice to see Nyx repay that. Even as Six rushed around to get the nanites to save Two, Nyx never left Two’s side. The entire time her hands were on Two, in what I gather to be an attempt to reassure the then unconscious Two that she wasn’t alone. If those were indeed her last moments people that love and care for her were right there with her and Nyx made sure Two was well aware of it. Of course, I would have preferred that moment to have been bestowed upon Five or the Android because of their history together, but given the environment they were in Nyx was definitely a worthy substitute. Not to mention, Melanie Liburd and Melissa O’Neil are a brilliant fighting duo, so it was fun to watch them get to work together during that sequence. O'Neil perfectly captured Two's failing health and Liburd was on point with every part of the fight sequence. I have enjoyed watching this friendship evolve throughout the season and it's definitely starting to pay off now.
Also, loyally by Two’s side were Four and Three. While Four appropriately showed fear over Two’s condition it was alarming to see Three so disconnected, but it's safe to assume that's what they were going for. Another reason I really wish the possession storyline had been held for another episode is because I would have really loved to see Three’s reaction to Two taking what appeared to be her last breaths and to her glorious return to life. His lack of reaction made it obvious that Three was in trouble, but at least they got that moment at the end. While it wasn’t quite the same as it would have been in the moment, it was still a nice way for the show to let the fans see how concerned Three really was for Two. Yes, he tried to cover it over with a bit of his normal sarcasm, but it was abundantly clear how much he cared and how happy he was that she was okay.
This episode delivered a lot of new information about Two and dealt with Three being possessed along with trying to save Two. A lot of heavy material was covered, so I foolishly thought that they’d give us a light and fun ending to bookend the episode in a similar way to how the episode started. Instead, we got what I can only describe as a complex yet utterly brilliant cliffhanger ending that caused a ton of questions to rapidly flow. We didn’t get a nice relaxing ending, but they did choose to go out on a quiet note with the Android in her human form waking up in a serene room. It’s sure to stoke a lot of speculation over the next week. What does it all mean? When we last saw the Android she was going off to recharge, so was this a dream? Can android’s even dream? Is this supposed to lead into some alternate universe type storyline? I want to know everyone’s theories, so please drop them in the comments below. We might as well pass the time over the next week speculating.
I really enjoyed this episode. Despite my selfish complaint earlier in the review, I did really enjoy the flow of the episode. Everything worked perfectly and the focus on the relationships of the crew was handled exactly the way I hoped it would be. As usual, the entire cast was on point, but Melissa O’Neil was really the all-star of this episode. I was extremely impressed by her work throughout. I’m curious to see what the new nanites will do for Two and how O’Neil will handle showing any changes to Two after this whole traumatic event. The Three possession storyline was fun and the cliffhanger ending on the Android left me anxiously waiting to see what comes next. Wil Wheaton as Alexander Rook was the perfect foe for this episode. Just when viewers don't think Rook can be any eviler and sinister he finds some way to one up himself. I can’t wait to see Wheaton return with Rook’s next diabolical plan for Two. Even though I love Wheaton on this show I can’t wait for the day where Two can take down Rook and finally get some much overdue revenge. While it wasn’t a perfect episode it was pretty darn close. This episode is definitely high up on my list of favorite episodes from this season so far. This was a terrific episode that was perfectly executed by the entire team.
Tune into next week’s episode to find out what that unusual cliffhanger means. That episode airs
next Friday, September 2nd at 10/9c on Syfy in the US and Space Channel in Canada.
Hit the comments section with your thoughts regarding this episode. Did you like the possession storyline being included in this episode? Did you like Nyx being let in on Two’s secret? What do you think will become of Two now that she’s upgraded?
About the Author - Aimee Hicks
Aimee works for a newspaper in North Carolina and has a BA in Broadcasting and Cinema. She has been a TV lover since before she really understood what TV was. She has a long list of shows that she loves to watch and can be found on twitter (@ahicks83) live tweeting about each new episode whenever she can. If the show is sci-fi, fantasy, comic book based, drama, or action the odds are good she watches it or has at least watched a few episodes of it. She also has a love for comedies 2 Broke Girls and Mom. She was the original creator and co-founder of LOST Video Island (lostvideo.net) which is still operating under the management of the very capable and skilled group she turned it over to.
You can email her at aimee@spoilertv.com.
