DEFIANCE – 2.08 ‘Slouching Towards Bethlehem’ Hate Sex & Ark Rise.

Now that her secret is revealed, Irisa shares everything with Nolan. Her perceived possession by Irzu as well as her failed suicide attempt. The two share bonding moments and witty banter topped off by Nolan directly addressing the resident deity threatening with a wrath of his own.

Nolan is called in by Viceroy Mercado to capture Amanda’s employee, Vesuvus Gorath who is suspected to have knowledge of an imminent bomb threat in NYC. Nolan proceeds to torture the truth out of the suspect, via burrowing Alien Bed-bugs. This brought back flashbacks from Star Trek when Khan placed the Ceti eel larvae in Chekov’s ear. Aaak! Blech!

Amanda receives a call from someone in the previously unexplored, Collective demanding she secure Gorath’s freedom. They threaten to kill her long thought dead sister, Kenya, if she fails in her task. Whaaat?? I thought Stahma ‘loved” Kenya to death as it were. Why didn’t we get a clue of this before? Don’t get me wrong, I am happy about the return, but this smacks of poor planning on the part of the writers.

Stahma alerts Datak to the danger of a captured Gorath and, after  rather violent hate sex, enlists aid, via shotgun. When will Datak learn? Dude! She’s just not that into you!  Stahma always places her own best interests first. You were ,once again, just a very convenient pawn.

After a few attempts at gauging the difficulty of freeing Gorath, Amanda caves, and enlists the aid of Nolan. The Lawkeeper and Rosewater are forced to get creative when Datak foils their escape attempt and kills Gorath. This had me giggling as I was reminded of the popular Board Game, Clue. Datak. On the stairs. With a shotgun. Go figure? But, that’s how my head works.

In the end, Nolan and Amanda confront and kill the kidnapper thus reuniting the two sisters. Stahma once told Kenya, “This will end very badly for you.” Now, it appears as the roles have been reversed. Mrs. Tarr possesses many talents. Is escape from the truth one of them?

The other, and in my opinion, more important plot line came in the form of Irisa. She is reunited with her “victims’ in a ‘Children of the Corn‘ moment which reveals some crucial clues as to what we might be facing. It seems each victim carries their own personal possessed deity which dictates actions. And now that force is gathering all it’s chickens to roost. But to what purpose?
What is the meaning of Ark Rise?

This brings me back to the strange title of this episode, ‘Slouching towards Bethlehem’ also known as ‘The Second Coming‘ by Yeats. And, in that poem we might find a clue as to where Defiance is headed. What do you think will happen?

The Second Coming.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in the sands of the desert.

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

W.B Yeats