‘Continuum’ 2.03 Episode Recap and Review: Second Thoughts

It is a period of not-so-civil war on this week’s episode of Continuum!

There is so much trouble in Liber8’s paradise that it’s spilling out into the streets of Vancouver. Sonya’s of the opinion that she and Lucas will never be able to survive against Travis on their own, so she buys herself some help. Her knowledge of futuristic pharmaceuticals allows her to recreate a street drug from her own time and sell it to the Coalition Kings, whom you may remember as one of the gangs from the season premiere. Travis sees, Travis knows, and Travis is not amused. He makes certain one of Sonya’s drops goes bad by taking out a couple of the gang members.

Meanwhile, the city is feeling the effects of Liber8’s little war. Gang-related deaths are up, as are deaths attributed to Retrievnol, now called “Flash.” Dillon puts Carlos and Kiera on the drug cases, as Kiera assures him that they’re connected to Liber8. Alec is sucked in as well when his new friends get their hands on a few doses and drive under the influence. When she picks him up from the hospital, Kiera tells Alec all about Flash. It used to be a drug for Alzheimer’s patients, who could use it to vividly re-experience their memories. One of Alec’s friends warns him that the memories might not be reliable, though. Her own experience, up until the car crashed, was “too perfect.”

Elsewhere, Travis is taking out more of the Coalition Kings. Carlos and Kiera attempt to warn Gabriel, an old acquaintance of Carlos’s who is slated to become the next head of the gang. The meeting doesn’t go as well as Carlos had hoped, but at least Kiera is able to tag Gabriel’s car. They trail him to a meeting with Sonya, which quickly goes south with in a blazing shootout. A really, really long blazing shootout. Like epically long. With magically reloading guns.

Anyhoo, the result of the rather pear-shaped meeting is a Sonya who’s decided that the gang alliance business isn’t her cup of tea. Travis, on the other hand, has a whole different kind of alliance in mind. He shows up to a meeting of the Syndicate with a big briefcase full of gangleader heads and declares himself the Kingpin. First order of business, get Julian under his protection, not Sonya’s. Game on, Vancouver.

Julian’s had a bit of a rough time in prison, what with Travis being gone. The role of protecting his emo-bangs had been taken up by the Coalition Kings, and now the Syndicate. Julian’s more interested in his Dad’s journals, though. Mom has an interesting piece of news, as well. The building that Kagame destroyed was hosting a secret meeting of the heads of all the major pharmaceutical companies. They were scheming to suppress a cure in order to make more money. Now, presumably this explosion also happened in the original timeline, so did it really make a difference in the Rise of the Corporations? Time will tell…

Back in whatever only-slightly-classier than gangland neighborhood Canadian college kids can afford, Alec has decided that there’s a memory he needs Flash to help access. He doses up and sees a huge fight that someone (I’m guessing his father) is having with his mum. Dad turns around to face Alec, and we can see the mysterious figure is none other than Jason! The mystery grows…

Alright, so I’m thinking this episode was kind of a building phase. There weren’t a lot of major character choices going on, but some good set-up for future plot points. My theory is that both the gang alliances and the new opposing philosophies of Sonya and Travis are going to become more and more important in future episodes. At least I hope so. Otherwise, this just wasn’t much of an episode. I mean, we’ve seen the “dangerous new street drug” episode done on a number of shows. Honestly, Arrow‘s Vertigo was considerably more menacing.

All that being said, I appreciate the glimpse into Kiera’s reaction to Alec’s being even in the general proximity of drug use. The Hannah clips were the most gripping and cohesive part of this week’s story, even if we all knew how this was going to go down. I also felt that Lexa Doig really sold Sonya’s decision to turn back to Kagame’s teachings. I could wish that there’d been a bit more lead-in for the switch, but it was a good scene.

I’ve seen you do better, Continuum. Go think about what you’ve done and come back stronger next week.

Things to Ponder:

• So we know about the Syndicate and the Coalition Kings. What about the other head(s) in the case? Who did those belong to?
• Why was the Steve Wozniak line necessary? Seeing as how Kiera and Kellog are from the same time, wouldn’t using Wozniak just make an even more confusing metaphor?