Season 3 Episode 8 – While the fog obscures more than just the air, Vic, Cliff, Jane and Larry must relive their most shameful moments until a breakthrough occurs and Rita begins to better understand Madame Rouge.
What I Liked
1. The episode opens with Vic walking into a memory of his childhood within his subconscious. We see a young Vic in a toy store with his father while he looks for a black superhero doll. While looking for one, he drops all of the toys on the ground only to get stopped by a rude employee. After discovering that they have no black superhero dolls and nearly getting in trouble with the store’s security, Vic is berated by his father who tells him that he does not get to make mistakes. Once again, it is very easy to feel bad for Vic in this scene as we can see that his father was extremely hard on him even before he became Cyborg. After giving him a GI Joe parody action figure called General Tony, a Dada Bird appears in the subconscious and makes Vic switch places with General Tony, putting him in the toy package and General Tony in the real world.
2. Jane wakes up as a puppet and walks into the Underground where a now grown up Kay is singing with the other personalities who are also puppets. Jane is understandably confused by the current situation but is nonetheless forced into being part of it by the other personalities, who are clearly not happy about being puppets and just doing it to make Kay happy. When a Dada Bird teleports Kay out of the subconscious, Jane and the other personalities are left stuck as puppets in this Sesame Street-like Underground.
3. Cliff sees his human self and the two repeatedly shout their usual catchphrase of “What the f**k” in shock. When Cliff’s human self is transported away, his regular self is drawn to one of the parties he used to have when famous.
4. Larry is transported to his wedding day while his subconscious self goes to the real world and meets the others. While Cliff’s human self seems normal enough, Kay is in her Sesame Street-like persona while General Tony looks like a living toy with his plastic looking face and military outfit.
5. Rita appears to the group and explains to them what the Eternal Flagellation is. The Sisterhood of Dada plans to have the Dada Birds bring out everyone’s subconscious self into the real world while their regular selves relive their most shameful moments. After they are able to overcome them, they can accept who they really are.
6. In the past, we see Madame Rouge join the Brotherhood of Evil. We finally discover why she traveled to the future in the time machine as she was assigned to take it to 2021 in order to steal Niles Caulder’s inventions and bring them back to the past so the Brotherhood can take over the world. The Brain and Monsieur Mallah then officially give her the name Madame Rogue.
7. Larry sees a memory of his mother who guilts him into marrying Sheryl. When Larry attempts to persuade her that he is gay, she refuses to listen to reason. It’s such a heartbreaking scene and shows that while Larry has himself to blame for the mistakes he made in his life, there were still others that greatly influenced his poor choices.
8. The puppets in the Underground start to freak out without Kay. When Jane tries to calm them down, Kay’s stuffed animal Harry tells them that he is the only one who knows what she needs and explains to them that what they are doing will never work. Instead of considering his point, Jane and the other personalities savagely beat him to death. Seeing the puppet versions of the underground get violent and graphically tear apart Harry honestly just had me in stitches for how grim yet silly it looked. This was hands down one of the funniest scenes from the show for me. The part in which they all laugh maniacally while holding Harry’s severed head was just the icing on the cake.
9. Rita confronts Madame Rouge who is getting ready to go to the future. After Rita accuses her of only wanting more power, Madame Rouge does not deny it and instead taunts Rita about what happened and how foolish the Sisterhood’s dreams were. When Rita attempts to strangle her, Madame Rouge shape shifts into Malcolm to make her stop. She then spitefully leaves without any hint of remorse. It is easy to see why the Sisterhood hates Madame Rouge now.
10. In Cliff’s subconscious, Bump and his racing buddies present him with a stripper whom Cliff happily accepts. What makes this scene so uncomfortable and deep is that this likely wasn’t the first or last time that this happened. Cliff is shown to have cheated on his wife several times making this all the more tragic.
11. A furious Rita takes the time machine to get revenge on Madame Rouge in the future. As a result she gains back her memories and begins her goal to hunt down Madame Rouge. It is soon revealed that this version of Rita was the one who prevented her from escaping when Samuelson murdered the Doom Patrol. On a side note, it is revealed that the out of place narrator that was speaking while Rita lost her memories was actually the time machine speaking. I don’t know why or how that works, but I absolutely love it.
12. We get a shocking revelation that just before having sex with the stripper, Cliff discovers that he left his daughter in the car the whole time. A horrified Cliff leaves his subconscious and goes to rescue the others.
13. While being rescued by Cliff and Larry, Vic leaves a rock for his younger self. I love the fact that even though he will probably never see it, Vic insists on leaving it just in case.
14. After Jane is rescued by others, the puppet personalities vow to never let her leave them in another mess again. Jane’s unstable relationship with the personas in the Underground has only worsened.
15. While escaping their subconscious, the team drives through a weird psychedelic portal. It is as trippy as it sounds. What makes it even weirder is that while Cliff, Vic and Larry are their normal selves, Jane is still a puppet.
16. We get a fascinating scene in which the team all talk with their subconscious counterparts and attempt to come to terms with their true selves. Larry is convinced by his subconscious self to let others in regardless of the trauma he thinks that it might cause them. It is very rare to see Matt Bomer interact onscreen with Matthew Zuk, but it was amazing.
17. While talking to his human subconscious self, Cliff realizes that his internet addiction stems from his desire to live his past life in which he partied all the time and didn’t have a care in the world. Cliff’s subconscious self warns him that he needs to stop otherwise he’ll lose his second chance with his daughter and grandson. However, instead of taking his advice, Cliff curses him out and refuses to admit fault despite knowing that he’s in the wrong.
18. General Tony confronts Vic on forcing himself to lose his innocence after the day in the store. He urges him to have fun before it’s too late. A tearful Vic angrily states that he didn’t even want General Tony before a Dada Bird transports him away.
19. Kay tells puppet Jane that she is one of the factors of her trauma and that she no longer needs her, finishing by saying that she wish she died, leaving her heartbroken. Even though there is no facial expression on the Jane puppet, Diane Guerrero excels in this scene both with her voice performance and as an adult Kay.
20. After getting back to normal, Jane destroys the pillow fort out of rage while sobbing uncontrollably. The team then realizes that their Eternal Flagellation is over and are sent back to the locations that they were taken from.
21. Clara discovers Cliff’s internet addiction and realizes that his behavior isn’t healthy, deciding that this is not working. A depressed and speechless Cliff can do nothing but agree with her.
22. Jane discovers that the other personalities in the Underground are now gone, meaning that Kay was serious about not needing them anymore.
23. Vic’s surgery went through, giving him the synthetic skin that he wanted. A look of unease is seen when he gets off the surgery bed. It will be very interesting to see where his story goes from here.
24. The episode ends with Rita finding Madame Rouge, which should lead to a dramatic confrontation next week.
What I Disliked
Nothing to report this week.
Favourite Moment
My favorite moment in the episode has to be the scene in which the subconscious selves argue with one another. After a lot of bickering, Cliff opens up by revealing that he came from nothing and only gained the acceptance of others when he became a race car driver. However, even after he got the admiration he wanted, he never felt like he deserved it. He then breaks down about how he ruined his own life with his choices and that he deserves to die and doesn’t even care anymore. I don’t normally get emotional when watching a television show or movie, but this scene just had me in tears. It might just be my favorite scene from the entire show so far.
Standout Character
I have to give the MVP award to Cliff for this episode. We do not get to see Brendan Fraser physically appear often in the series so it was already great to see him on screen, but this might just be his best performance yet. His story during the episode from his realization that he left his daughter in the car while he cheated on his wife, to his subconscious self opening up to him once again damaging his relationship with his daughter was all incredible. Brendan Fraser absolutely deserves an award for this episode.
Verdict
This episode was a masterpiece. Every moment from start to finish was incredible. We got the always enjoyable bizarre and deep features from the show with a few answers to some of the mysteries set up at the beginning of the season thrown in as well. The subconscious selves were incredible to see and served as a terrific contrast to the normal versions of our characters. In terms of acting, everyone knocked it out of the park, but Brendan Fraser gave one of the best performances I have ever seen in a tv show. It pains me that this show doesn’t get nearly as much recognition as it deserves when we have scenes like this. I can say without a doubt that this installment has topped Jane Patrol as my all-time favorite episode of the show.
Rating 10/10
Ratings
Story - 10
Action - 10
Characters - 10
Entertainment - 10
10
Perfect
This episode was a masterpiece. Every moment from start to finish was incredible. We got the always enjoyable bizarre and deep features from the show with a few answers to some of the mysteries set up at the beginning of the season thrown in as well. The subconscious selves were incredible to see and served as a terrific contrast to the normal versions of our characters. In terms of acting, everyone knocked it out of the park, but Brendan Fraser gave one of the best performances I have ever seen in a tv show. It pains me that this show doesn’t get nearly as much recognition as it deserves when we have scenes like this. I can say without a doubt that this installment has topped Jane Patrol as my all time favorite episode of the show.
