The 100 surges forward at breakneck speed, with Lexa and the Ice Queen having their showdown. Meanwhile, at Arkadia, idiocy prevails.
PROCLAMATION: As of today, February 12, 2016, Lexa is officially my favorite character. On The 100, and possibly on television in general. Peggy Carter, you have competition.
Not only is Lexa wise, compassionate and strong (see what I did there?), but she is so damn sensible in a sea of short-sighted, war-hungry men and women. And speaking of awesome things: the showdown between Lexa and Roan was pretty much the ultimate proof of why The 100 beats Game of Thrones. Where the latter chose to shock its viewers with the unnecessarily gratuitous slaughter of the best character on the show (RIP Oberyn), The 100 managed to shock its viewers without resorting to the lowest form of storytelling (killing off a conflict rather than resolving it).
Related: The 100 season 3, episode 3 review: The Red Wedding
Lexa, literally Katniss, ended the fight by spearing Nia instead of Roan, offing what was assumed to be the season’s “big bad” (to the extent that term can be applied) and leaving the artist formerly known as Icicle in charge of Ice Nation. Unfortunately, back at Arkadia, all of Lexa’s best-laid plans are going to crap because someone swallowed a stupid pill. Let’s review:
All hail Lexa, for she is the best of us
Everyone’s predicting that Lexa will die this season, but rejoice, for today is not that day! The episode almost had me fooled though, by showing a new, softer side of our favorite Heda. After learning that Lexa has introduced a semblance of democracy to Grounder culture (because of course she has), Clarke walks in on her teaching a group of young Nightbloods the three pillars of Hedaship: Wisdom, compassion and strength. Wonder if she’s been reading some Confucius in her downtime.
Lexa has been challenged to a fight to the death, and wisely refuses to let someone else be her champion: The Grounders are only grudgingly complying with her civilized coalition, and they still recognize strength above all else. She’s confident in her abilities, but also very clear about the fact that Roan may very well win the fight. That’s a risk she’s willing to take, and she already has a successor lined up.
She introduces Clarke to Aden, the young boy who will likely be the next Heda, but Clarke is having none of it. Lexa is doing everything in her power to protect Clarke’s people, including having Indra raise an army to protect Arkadia, so naturally Clarke will do what she can to save Lexa right back.
She conspires with Roan to kill Nia (did anyone else think Roan was offering to help Clarke become Queen? Just me?), but her plan to poison the Ice Queen is foiled by Nia’s guard. So more for that easy solution.
Nia pulls a Carrie on Clarke and pours the guard’s blood all over her face, and we learn what constitutes a “Nightblood”: some Grounders’ blood is a dark, thick substance harking back to the first Commander, and very likely caused by some radiation-induced mutation. It’s the Nightbloods that are chosen and raised for Command, very literally having “blue blood” running through their veins.
Revenge for Costia at last
So… after she finished with Confucius, I guess Lexa picked up the Hunger Games trilogy? That fake-out shot was straight out of Mockingjay, Part 2. And I still didn’t see it coming.
The fight scene was amazing. So intense, and it’s one of the ways the show continues to astound me: It could literally have gone either way, because both Roan and Lexa dying would have interesting story consequences… and instead, the writers chose secret door number #3, having Lexa aim her spear at the thrones and kill Coin, uh, I mean Nia.
“All hail the King!” Lexa cries, and isn’t she just 50 shades of brilliant? In one stroke, she a) disposed of her greatest dissenter, b) put a man on the throne who owes her his life, and c) proved to all Grounders that she can best the Ice Nation’s new King in one-to-one combat. She is now officially the strongest, and must have the Ice Nation’s respect. Gorgeous work.
After the fight, Lexa goes to see Clarke. At this point the writers are just messing with us, because these co-Hedas are all over each other. But instead of a long-awaited makeout session, all we got was some more insight into Lexa’s beautiful mind (which is NEVER a bad thing).
She lets Clarke bandage her up, and explains why she is letting the councillors who renounced her stay in power: “They’re doing what’s right for their people.” Just like Clarke is doing, and just like we’ve seen Lexa do.
Now all we need is for Lexa to take a trip to Arkadia and hit Pike and Bellamy with her wisdom stick, and all would be right on Walton’s mountain.
‘Camp Jaha’ lives up to its name
Exclusive deleted scene of Kane from this week’s episode:
Source: What Should Theatre Call Me
The Arkadia storyline is very frustrating. The alliance between the Grounders and the Arkadians was too good to be true, but I really wanted to believe it was possible. They were so close to peace, and then enter Pike, who wants to strike back against the Grounders after what happened at Mount Weather… which, hey, it’s fair in theory.
What floors me though is that he somehow completely fails to comprehend that there are different factions of Grounders. His whole “All Grounders are the same” spiel falls flat real fast considering he was at the summit when Lexa got the news of the Ice Nation’s attack; he may not trust Grounders in general, but he should understand that within the Grounder society, Ice Nation and Trikru are two different, now warring, clans.
He should also understand that killing 300 Grounders doesn’t eliminate the threat against Arkadia, because there are thousands of Grounders out there, and they are just (by Pike’s own logic) waiting for an excuse to wipe out the Sky People. I understand that his stubborn mindset is necessary for the story, but I wish it didn’t have to be. It feels contrived and inorganic, but unfortunately, short-sighted people like Pike exist in the real world, too, so I guess I have to suck up my righteous anger.
Anyway, I shouted all of my protests at the screen but for some reason they didn’t hear me, so Pike and Bellamy proceed to organize an armed strike against Indra’s peacekeeping troops. Lincoln tries to stop them (joined for a hot second by Monroe and my bae Harper), and luckily Kane and Abby manage to halt their stupid act of war… until Pike wins the election by a landslide.
This is Battlestar Galactica all over again, but our Roslin and Adama will regain command, I’m sure of it. Admiral Cain (…too obscure? I’m a big fan okay) just needs a few episodes to really f*** them all over.
We need to talk about Bellamy
I’m going to reserve the right to be incredibly hypocritical for a second. While I abhor Pike’s short-sightedness and will continue to uphold that he should Just Know Better, I actually see where Bellamy is coming from.
Not only is Bellamy a lot younger than Pike, but he has also been indoctrinated with an “us vs them” mindset since Octavia was born. His people are hiding in the floorboards, and everyone outside their room is a threat. He has vowed to protect these people — his family — and he has already failed 49 Octavias. Abby and Kane couldn’t save them with their talks of peace, so maybe a brand new type of leadership will make a difference. This is exactly why people vote for tyrants in hard times.
We knew Bellamy would make some bad choices this season, but making bad choices doesn’t make him a bad character. Unlike Pike (who sounds and feels a little too much like a plot device for my liking), Bellamy’s development is consistent. He doesn’t have a Lexa or a Lincoln to force him to rethink his perspective, and he doesn’t try to rationally argue his actions — he just acts.
Related: Bellamy Blake, or: How I learned to stop resisting and love The 100‘s bad boy
But the promo next week reveals that Bellamy is already backtracking. He was desperate, blinded by his and Pike’s shared desire for revenge, but slaughtering an army of peaceful Grounders out of a misguided belief that they were there to hurt him? Well, he’s reached the level of desperation that caused Finn to gun down an innocent village in season 2, and he’s in for a rude awakening. It’s not like Bellamy acting rashly and then having to scramble to make amends is exactly new territory for him, though, so this feels like a reasonable (if extreme) development for his character.
This is pretty much rock bottom for Bellamy, and I’m very interested to see where they’ll take the character from here.
For your consideration
- I’m going to talk about Monty/Miller ONE LAST TIME and then I’m done forever, promise. Shipping (such as I understand it) is about perceiving a connection between two characters, of either gender, and hoping it was intentional from the writers/director/actors’ side. When it looked like the show was building up to a Monty/Miller romance I was intrigued, not just because of their genders but because it would have been a great development for those particular characters, and another example of The 100 defying expectations to tell an interesting story. Anyway, guess I misinterpreted the signs, that’s fine, I’m over it now. Miller/random introduced-to-be-gay character works too, even if it’s not as impactful as pairing him up with an established, main, assumed-to-be-straight character would have been. I get that The 100 has no obligation to single-handedly fix society’s perception of male sexuality, but you know… it might just be the only show that has the balls to do it, so excuse me for getting my hopes up.
- Alright! Getting off that soapbox (but staying on the subject of shipping), where is that Kane/Abby kiss we were promised?
- Lincoln refuses to leave Arkadia and join the Grounders, despite his kill order being lifted. Depending on how things go, Octavia might find herself having to make the bizarre choice between the Grounders and Lincoln!
- The Monty/Jasper story was very self-contained, but it was a great couple of scenes between them. Jasper continues down his downward spiral, and Monty finally breaks away from what has become a truly toxic friendship. It’s very sad, but I’m very intrigued (and worried) about where Jasper can possibly go from here. Now that Jaha is back (based on the promo), maybe my theory about Jasper converting to the City of Light will prove true.
- Seeing the dropship again was a sharp jab to the nostalgia bone I wasn’t expecting, well played show.
- Now that Monty’s mother is on Team Grounder Slayer, how will Monty react? Can we just… have an entire episode of Monty or something?
- Finn’s ashes, guys? Ouch.
Next week on ‘The 100’ season 3, episode 5
In “Hakeldama” (which is Aramaic, and means “field of blood”), the Arcadians orchestrate the biggest massacre on the show to date, and Lexa and Clarke have to clean up the mess Pike made:
