Syfy ’s 12 Monkeys show may be concerned with stretch out a two - hour moving picture into an receptive - end TV series , but it ’s emphatically not dragging its animal foot . We ’re only five hour in , and the show ’s already burn ( no paronomasia specify ) through a lot of plot . And it ’s already turned everything we opine we make love on its fountainhead .
spoiler below …
The basic secret plan of “ The Night Room ” has to do with Cole and Railly eventually tracking down the Night Room where the computer virus that ’s destined to pass over out humanity is lay in — only to find that the Army of the Twelve Monkeys has gotten there first and nothing is what they expect .
But the composition of the episode has to do , much more , with the whimsey of the ends justify the way . Both Cole and his Bos , Dr. Jones , are confront over the utmost thing they ’ve done in the name of change history . And in the end , Cole seems to triumph — only to see that his triumph is n’t what he expected , and maybe his ruthless approach did n’t pan out so slap-up after all .
The sequence begins with some strong hints that Dr. Jones is cutting turning point on safety with the whole meter - travelling project , what with the time auto being severely damaged in the West 7 attack :
She assert it ’ll be fine for Cole to “ splinter ” the next good morning — even though Ramse points out that it ’s a fourth dimension machine , and they could wait a calendar month and still send Cole back to the same twenty-four hours and metre . Jones is worry because the clock time political machine ’s core is degrading , and meanwhile the computer virus could mutate and become deadly again , plus Deacon could lash out again . And meanwhile , Cole seems worn out by having taken more jump than anybody planned on , and he just want this to be over with , so he can finish to have ever existed .
Jones has some drinks with Cole , Ramse and Max , and seems to be becoming part of the gang :
The show even seems to be advance its witness to come up with a boozing game , like take a shot every prison term Jones says something about Cole ’s vital mission . This show eff it ’s a Friday nighttime straits - scratching time - locomotion show , and it ’s not going to pretend to be anything else . Heh .
So here is where I started to have some slender abatement of mental rejection issues in this installment , which were mercifully abbreviated . Max has get word horror stories about a German Dr. who turn over people inside out , and now she think she was find out about Dr. Jones . She heard these story from Deacon , the thug drawing card of West 7 — and she always dismissed them as just scare level , to frighten masses out of abandoning the gang .
But I ca n’t quite bribe Deacon , based on what we see of him last hebdomad , sitting around spinning tarradiddle about German doctors doing crazy meter - travel experiments . Or , for that matter , caring about other mass ’s rumor . Deacon would n’t need any additional threat on top of “ I ’ll torture you to demise lento ” to keep citizenry from give up West 7 , and I do n’t see him as the queer case , exactly . But maybe we ’ll get a line more about him presently , and his patent fascination with a German mad scientist that he ’d never met will suddenly make sentiency .
In any eccentric , Max was right , and Jones was in fact a insane scientist who experimented on masses . Ramse breaks into Jones ’ quarters and finds some needlepoint , a music box seat , and hints that Jones maybe had a tyke in addition to the dead - subsist marriage she mentioned when they were drinking . And he find macabre photos of nasty time - change of location experimentation :
Jones insists that it ’ll all be worth it , if they can alter what happened . And it ’s not just the 7 billion pest victims she ’s trying to save , but all of human refinement . The art , the music , the lit , and the accumulated knowledge .
But Ramse points out what he already tell Jones earlier in the installment — it ’s not working . Nothing has exchange . They ’re still here , and there ’s no sign that Cole has change the timeline at all . And even if Cole does commute the timeline , what they do here and now still matters , it ’s still real , Ramse argues .
Oh , and incidentally , among Jones ’ stuff and nonsense is a uncanny chart of timeline , with musical cosmic string sequester to it , in which 1987 ( a year they have n’t pose enough powerfulness to jump to “ yet ” ) play a huge part . Hmmm …
Meanwhile , Cole is face his own music — the Pale Man reveals to Cassandra Railly that Cole killed Henri , Cassandra ’s lover , in Haiti . This is after Cassandra has already drop a chunk of the sequence talking about how she ca n’t be as remorseless and gung - ho as Cole , and she just wants to be a doctor and help oneself people and cure diseases , not fight terrorists and break into labs all the meter .
Here ’s Cassandra ’s side when she finds out Cole murdered a good man for , apparently , nothing :
Later in the episode , Cole launches into a whole story about how he and Ramse stress to set limits on their use of violence in the post - apocalyptic world , but slowly descended to wipe out hoi polloi for food and tax shelter . Until they kill an old couple , and the woman fight back , but then seemed to forgive Cole when she was dying . Cole state he ’s been chase pardon ( which he can never deserve ) ever since .
And Cole say to Railly that she should n’t ever be like him .
Which is where the installment draw one of its tricky reverse . They convey in Jennifer Goines , who ’s been a prisoner of the Twelve Monkeys since the second episode . And she ’s just found out that Cole killed her father — and you think this is going to turn into another cycle of blaming Cole for being goddamn unpitying and horrible .
And instead …
Jennifer is pretty stoked . In fact , her existing crunch on Cole ( which amusingly cause her to be a total jerk to Railly ) gets cemented once she know he kill her daddy . afterwards in the instalment , the Twelve Monkeys dudes provide because they ca n’t get into the vault with the proto - computer virus — there ’s a security system organisation that fundamentally cause them to melt and stuff and nonsense . But they know that the one person Jennifer will afford the vault for is Cole , as long as Cole recollect they ’ve take off . Jennifer , apparently , will do anything for Cole .
Anyway , this is an interesting turn in the “ Cole is reprehensible ” plot line — he abruptly meets someone who okay of his methods , whole - heartedly .
Also , at the beginning of the sequence , we get a better look at Young Jennifer , visiting the Night Room before the heavy massacre that sent her to the mental mental hospital . And it seems as though she was definitely skating on the boundary already :
Meanwhile , while the Pallid Man is busy torturing Cole and expounding about why they need a superintendent - computer virus to touch on the world , he also shares another new piece of the puzzle — he ’s taking orders , or brainchild , from someone called the Witness . A guru ? A drawing card ? My guess is , the Witness is another time traveler . But maybe that ’s too obvious .
So we finally get a look at the reference of the virus , and it attend like this :
This image is intercut with some of Dr. Jones ’ weirder experimentation , so it certainly count as though this skeleton was sent back in meter . At one point , the Pallid piece mentions the skeleton is very old — at least , the virus is hundreds of years onetime . So perchance the skeleton was sent back in time hundreds of years in the past ? This is an unexpected piece of evidence for the possibility that Jones and troupe caused the pest apocalypse they ’re trying to forbid .
Except that there would have to be a timeline where they live in a pestis - costless future and still decide to send someone back in time , for some other rationality . And that somebody somehow is infected with what becomes the plague . At the very least , I ’m going to be very bad-tempered if this turn out to be a grandfather paradox variety of deal , where A leads to B run to ampere-second contribute to A , and there ’s no actual first case . That ’s a massively overused trope , and I ’m still hoping for something a bit dissimilar here . But we ’ll see .
And then something else surprising happens :
When Cole gets too close to that skeleton in the cupboard , he pop wigging out , in pretty much the same way that he did when he came too airless to his preceding self in last hebdomad ’s episode .
So is that Cole ’s skeleton ? All signs point to yes — unless this is a massive sham - out .
And then Cole and Railly manage to initiate the Big Burn , sterilizing the lab and destroying the samples of the computer virus . ( And killing a couple of the Monkey thugs . )
And it ’s very , very satisfying :
In the end , the Pallid Man flees , but he ’s got Cassandra Railly as his captive . Will he be able-bodied to coerce her to help him ? And even if she does , what skillful will she be to him ?
And meanwhile , Jennifer sees Cole vanish , on top of him angsting in front of her about his unsuccessful person to break up along with his timeline . So she in spades knows something is up here :
Alas , Cole return to a future that ’s very dissimilar from the one he go out . Cole has n’t been erased , and the time machine is still there . But the facility looks a plenty less burnished and official , and it ’s full of junk . And there are no helpful scientist around . or else , just lots of huddling refugees . Now the facility is die hard by West 7 :
So it looks like Cole can change the past , in pretty major ways , after all . I was starting to inquire . ( And apparently Cole can commemorate the “ original ” timeline , which is commodious . )
So there you have it — Cole already succeeded in his mission , apparently , but the effects are n’t what he expected . This has a nifty core of both levy the stakes and avoiding the look that we keep furrow the Road Runner only to watch it slip away , week after workweek — instead , we ’re seeing lots of advance , but with some surprising complications . And now , we ’re leave wondering about this new timeline , but also about that skeleton , the Witness , and just what really caused the plague Book of Revelation , since the Big Burn did n’t solve anything .
And this show also gets major points for dealing with the “ ends justify the means ” thing in a surprising way — instead of doing what most TV shows of late would do , which is to “ prove ” that in the end , results are the only thing that count .
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