Is it just me, or is this show getting remarkably more competent?
This week, we have an episode that’s split heavily between backstory and plot movement, with heavy character. We see how Charlotte and her mother were abused by Smiley, and that, at the end, Charlotte’s mother tried to escape with her and, when that failed, refused to work with Smiley and even threatened Charlotte to try to get him off their backs. She ended up shot and falling off the giant tank, and Charlotte brainwashed, but it was a fair attempt. In the present, it’s revealed that Smiley is alive and undergoing some heavy treatment, while Lunatic sends Charlotte out to attack Empress at Lighthouse number 8.
That is, of course, exactly where Empress and the others are going. This first brings them to an orphanage where, we see, the future Hemitheos Units were raised and even largely named by the woman who would end up becoming Charlotte’s mother. In the ruins, they find a clue as to where the real, functional Lighthouse is, and follow it to an abandoned mine shaft. There, a message left by their surrogate mother (who Empress even starts to remember) gives them hope in the form of a chamber that can be used to either drastically empower or undo Hemitheos transformation. The decision is made to use the one shot at this to power up Empress, who swears to save Charlotte with her own power, rather than needing to use the chamber to undo her partial Hemitheos transformation.
At that point, Charlotte arrives with her goons. She ends up fighting her father, and while his words can’t get through to her, it’s possible that part of her is beginning to recognize if not him properly than something through her brainwashing. He doesn’t fight back all-out, though (as one might expect), instead struggling to communicate with her, but as she tries to choke him to death, Empress dramatically emerges from the tank, upgrades finished, to declare that nobody else is getting killed today.
Dawn Fall still is what it is, but it’s gotten better at portraying motivation and emotion than it was early on. We see where the Hemitheos units came from this episode, how they related to each other, and how their strong bonds to Empress developed, as well as learning not just the origin of their names but what those names mean to them. We get a view of the Major’s family, his wife even as a posthumous character, and what Charlotte went through that resulted in her being brainwashed to obey Smiley and Lunatic. And, in the present, we get a conflict between a loving father and his transformed crazy supersoldier daughter, with enough feelings underscoring it that it’s not just a bland fight scene. Instead of 100% puerile edge we get… less than 100%. It’s still there, but because the subtleties are coming out more the dark stuff feels more legitimate.
I don’t know if there was a shake-up in the creative team somewhere around the episode with the big battle against Smiley or what, but on the whole, the show is trending upwards as it enters what’s almost certainly its final act: dealing with Charlotte, and then Lunatic, the Space Elevator, and presumably a new boss form of Smiley. It’s got three episodes for that, and if it uses them as effectively as it used the last two, it’ll be a pretty good finish and a shame that’s stapled onto a show that insisted on going so childishly vulgar to begin with.