WARNING SPOILERS: If you have not watched the episode yet, there are major spoilers below.
The title was very true to its name, it was a massacre. Over 70 people within Chinatown are dead and 2 of them are main characters we have had from as far back as season 1 and 2. The first death was within the first 5 minutes. David Eick did warn us that there would be deaths coming this season, though I am not sure any of us expected them to be this soon but will there be more? There are a select group of fans who were sick and tired of Lourdes and her cult ramblings and are probably happy she is gone but lets remember she has been with us since the beginning. Seychelle is a sweet person and personally under-used in the series. She was with it since the pilot and that makes her loss one of the more powerful ones due to the length she has been with the show.
Lexi’s cold-hearted decision is proof she came out of that cocoon indifferent to humanity and her powers far stronger than ever before. For all her faults Lourdes was a good assistant to Dr. Glass and cared for everyone around her. Remember in season 3 she was only the mole because she had the eye-worms inside her.
The second death was Tector, a loyal and honest solider and friend to everyone from Tom, Weaver, Matt and Pope. He sacrificed himself for Tom, in many ways we think to makeup for the mistakes he feels he made during his time in the military and the loss of his men. I have to admit I feel like Tector’s death was the first one that wasn’t meaningless and actually went out with a fight. Whether it was Jimmy, Dai, Jamil or Jeanne, they all felt like the deaths were without purpose and no real good-bye.
Another sad death is that of Dr. Kadar. He really cared about Lexi and tried to honestly help her. It was clear that he had a child of his own at one point and that was part of the motivation that lead him to leaving underground and going with the 2nd mass. We will always remember him for his desire to have peanut butter. We will also miss Robert, who was such a great addition to the cast, and a good friend of Noah Wyle’s. It is too bad we couldn’t get a few more episodes out of him before they killed him off.
I think what angers me most is that Lourdes got somewhat of a send off from Hal, Tom and Anne but not so much as a salute or good bye for Dai. There could be a lot of reasons for this but I think ultimately it was lazy writing at the end of season 2 that lead to a not-so good farewell for Dai. On the flip side with so many people getting killed, there just isn’t time anymore for such things.
I titled this review sins of the father for a good reason. Tom has played games with the Espheni one too many times and the 2nd mass, Tector, Kadar and Lourdes paid for that with their lives. There is going to come a point where Tom is going to pay the ultimate price and lose a close member of his family. The question is who that will be and when. There is only one more season after this, so losing one of the Mason boys is not impossible.
Pope and Sara continue to grow closer as we see Sara’s tough act on the outside peel away when the danger is close. Pope comforts her when she can’t handle all the death around them. It is rare to see such a caring side of Pope.
Moving forward with the story arc, Ben runs off after Lexi to try and see if he can reach her and bring her back to humanity but she knows Ben is following and confronts him. Of all the people around her, she feels he is the one person who should understand her, being part alien himself now. His spikes activate indicating she is controlling him (like she did everyone when killing Lourdes) and a beamer sets down. She takes Ben with her, but the question is to where?
It is not clear if the overlord felt that charred body as Tom or not but they left all the same, so perhaps for now he does think that was Tom. It is a very strange thing for an Espheni to take out a personal vendetta against a human or any enemy for that matter. This is the first time we see an overlord strike out like this and its a very interesting turn. If he is that angry with Tom and the 2nd mass, whats going to happen should the Lexi experiment not go the Monks way? The Monk has plans for Lexi and used Ben as a human shield to prevent his own death.
Several are still missing including Dingaan and Maggie. At the end of the episode we see Maggie under a bunch of rubble and it doesn’t look good.
