Continuum: Second Degree

Carlos: "What's the angle?"
Kiera: "Dead time travelers, mysterious body snatchers. You know, the usual."

Lots of intertwining plot threads and ambiguity, making it difficult to tell which side many of our characters were on.

Julian took center stage this time with parallel present and future trials that ended in similar ways, only differing in degree. Present day Julian shot a cop I happen to like and tried to bomb a building. Future Julian is Theseus, the "Butcher of New Pemberton," accused of causing the deaths of millions of innocent people. Wow, that's not heavy at all.

I was particularly confused by what happened in the flashforward. Future elderly Julian was transferred to "corporate detention as ordered by the chairman of the superior council," whom I assume was future Alec because he was smiling. Future Julian said, "No, that's not the plan! Not him!" Why did future Alec save Julian? Did future Julian hope to be executed rather than remanded into his step-brother's custody?

Present day Alec had to make a particularly difficult adult decision after his mother Ann lied on the stand to protect Julian, and I liked that Alec decided he had to tell the truth. Ann was right that she shouldn't have expected Alec to perjure himself for her, or for Julian. And all through this trying time for Alec, Emily, who is now sleeping with him, was there being the perfect sweet and supportive girlfriend. Emily, who works for Escher and who can kill a big bad guy with her bare hands. If she weren't so scary and her loyalties a great big question mark, I'd be of the opinion that Emily is very good for Alec. Oh, well.

At least Carlos is very good for Kiera, now that he's a member of the in-the-know club. It was so much fun seeing Kiera and Carlos interact without lies or subterfuge. He was amused and interested in everything, particularly Alec using future tech to find the boat with the hostages on it, and Kiera using her invisibility suit to beat up the bad guy on the boat.

(The guy appearing to beat himself up was fun to watch, although I'm not really a fan of the invisible suit. It's just a little too far over the line into fantasy.)

There was also a fun change in Kiera's nasty adversarial relationship with Gardiner, after she asked him to help her track the mysterious "Agent Warren of Section Six" who took the bodies of Elena, Jaworski and Chen. It's like the writers heard me complaining about Nick Lea playing a bad guy. I wish I believed that it was a permanent change.

Finally, there was the return of Tahmoh Penikett as Jim Martin, soon to be Vancouver's mayor and caught between Sonya and Travis. I'd almost feel sorry for him except that he's, you know, evil. At the beginning of the episode, Carlos couldn't conceal his distaste for his old friend Jim Martin. At the end, Carlos appeared to be taken in by Martin's lies. Too bad.

Quotes:

Clayton the coroner: "Agent Cameron, never sneak up on someone in the morgue. It's like the number one rule."

Alec: "I don't know why you're letting Gardiner help you."
Kiera: "Give a dog a bone and he'll chew on it for hours."

Carlos: "This whole time, Section Six has been that kid Alec?"
Kiera: "Yep."
Carlos: "Well, he's good. I'll give him that."

Kiera: "This is CPS standard issue. Sadtech mark four polymeric nano-composite body armor with integrated electromagnetic offensive and defensive systems. Police model."
Carlos: "Fancy. What kind of mileage does it get?"
Kiera: "Sixty-five years, apparently."

Interesting episode with a lot left unresolved. Three out of four vanishing bodies for reasons we still don't know,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

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