Extant launches us deeper into the mystery surrounding the baby and Molly’s solo mission. It opens with Ethan having a nightmare (which he’s not programmed to have), making us think he’s starting to remember what happened to him on that island. By the first commercial break, the lab where the baby is being held is taken hostage by a top scientist who has clearly lost his marbles. It could have something to do with that same pattern of circles we’ve seen all season appearing on the back of his head. Is this baby starting to run things from inside the robotic womb?
Extant Recap: What Baby? >>>
What Kind of Baby Is This?
Alan Sparks has a crisis on his hands when the scientist appointed to keep watch over the baby suddenly goes AWOL. He locks down the lab, taking a crowbar to everything from the cameras watching him to his colleague, killing him. Later on while being interrogated by Sparks, the doctor is back to his senses and in disbelief over what he’s done. He says that he saw his dead friend in the lab, the one who told him to kill his co-worker and let the baby out. If this baby can do these mind tricks now, I don’t want to see what it can do when it grows up!
A Robot Having Nightmares is a Scary Thing
It’s clear from the title of the episode that the concept of nightmares is going to be used throughout tonight’s show. The fact that Ethan even had a nightmare was unprecedented; the technology to program the REM sleep cycle needed to dream is light-years away. John wants to get him to the lab right away but not before Molly gets a chance to mother him, easing his fears and lying with him until the morning. Ethan was clearly scared — for his mom.
Molly’s son doesn’t want to talk about his dream and it was so terrifying that there isn’t a record of it anywhere in his program. But we do know how it ties into everything that’s going on. When Molly walks in on him drawing furiously the following night, she sees that he’s sketched the same symbol of circles. Ethan explains that he’s drawing his nightmare and that he saw it on Molly’s belly when she passed out. This pattern is connecting everything, but what do they mean?
Spying on Sam
Besides figuring out the whole nightmare thing with Ethan, John also wants to get to the bottom of what’s going on with Sam. Her and Molly had been friends for way too long. In fact, Sam is Molly’s only close friend and there has to be something major going on for her to betray them like she did. So he takes a part from one of his androids that can transmit audio to Molly’s cell phone, once it has absorbed into Sam’s skin. That morning at the ISEA, Molly pretends to run into her, wanting to set up an appointment as she plants the listening device on Sam’s hand.
Sparks, who’s always watching, saw their exchange in the lobby via video and storms into Sam’s office demanding to know what happened between the two. Molly learns that he was using Sam’s brother to manipulate her and confirmed that Sam was indeed lying to her.
CBS Adds an Extra Week to Big Brother 16, Extant Finale Moved Up >>>
A Walk in the Park
Molly’s day of spying gets interrupted by a security breach at the ISEA. The man responsible is none other than Harmon Kryger. He steals the fingerprints he needs to get in from Gordon Kern, Spark’s right hand man while on a trip to some futuristic salon. Kryger takes a file from the central server, sending Sparks on a rampage. That night Molly gets a call from him, asking to meet up in a park that next morning, tell her he has something to show her. Meanwhile, Gordon is tracking him down, roughing up the salon owner in exchange for info on his park meeting.
Molly gets to the park first and sees Gordon at the other end of the park. In a brilliant move, she heads into the subway station and calls Sam. She tells her to let Sparks know that Kryger called her and asked her to meet at the Camden library. That sends Gordon away and buys her time to meet with him as well as John who also shows up for the meeting.
Before Kryger can get into what he has for Molly, she asks him about the pattern of circles. She saw it drawn on his trailer wall and showed him a picture she took of it on her phone. Harmon first saw it on the Seraphim, months before his encounter with his dead mom on a transmission that came in from a unknown source. The pattern appeared on his screen very briefly and then quickly shut down. The ISEA told him it was an Emergency testing signal that he can disregard. However, since he saw Molly last he couldn’t stop thinking about that pattern.
To get answers, he broke into the ISEA to get a copy of that original transmission. Unfortunately it’s encrypted so he can’t access it. Molly hands the fancy USB to John to see if can take a crack at it and Kryger promises to keep in touch. It’s a promise he can’t keep though. Stepping off the escalator, Gordon sneaks up behind him and zaps him unconscious.
S.O.S
Molly and John get back to the lab to get working on decrypting the file, with Ethan playing in the background. Seeing that his Dad is obviously struggling, Ethan takes a crack at it and successfully decodes the whole thing in a matter of minutes. The file reveals an emergency transmission from Katie Sparks, Alan’s daughter. She was part of the Arula crew that went up the same time Kryger did. They all supposedly died in an oxygen explosion. The video tells a different story though. Everyone on the ship is infected with some type of virus, causing them to hallucinate and start killing each other. The circle symbols appear on her stomach too, so she’s also infected. That’s why she made the decision to launch herself into deep space so she doesn’t infect anyone else on Earth.
Alan Sparks knew what was waiting for Molly up there and not even the death of his daughter would keep him from pursuing whatever that baby is. The baby is alive and Molly is more determined then ever to expose him and this entire alien conspiracy.
In Other Extant News
-It was really refreshing to see Molly and Sam’s friendship on the mend. Knowing that Sam was just as much of a victim as her, she lets her know in a subtle but heart-warming way that she knows what’s going on during her routine brain scan. That’s a real friend!
-Is anyone wondering why Julie is even on this show? First she’s carrying a torch for John and now this new guy,Odin, is in the picture. I’m not sure how this all plays into what’s going on with the rest of the show.
Extant will air a special two-hour event next Wednesday starting at 9pm on CBS.
Want to add Extant to your very own watch-list? Download BuddyTV Guide for free for your phone.
(Image courtesy of CBS)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
