Part of what makes the vampire such an imposing monster is that its particulars are just this side of desirable. After all, eternal youth? Freedom from family, from laws, from gravity, getting to wear a sweet cape? These are all things which we, as a species, covet all the time. Especially capes, capes are cool.
But of course, vampirism doesn’t actually deliver on these promises. It delivers a mutated, hateful version of these enviable abilities, revealing slow rot of the soul that such power would yield.
(Then again, sometimes vampires sparkle in the fucking sunlight, and people seem to enjoy that plenty.)
Had tonight’s episode of The Strain ended ten minutes before it did, I’d probably be here shrugging my shoulders at another episode that largely plodded along, moving characters sort-of in a generally forward-ish direction but not really. Fortunately, the closing act of the episode brought all the stories together in a tremendously effective way, blowing up The Strain’s emotional warfare to operatic proportions.
Still, the bulk of the episode was pretty shapeless. Dutch came back (this is like the fifth time in the [short] life of the show that someone has gotten fed up with the game plan, stormed off, only to arbitrarily return like an episode later. Either cut the shit with the negligible conflicts or actually commit to a character striking out on their own) with a plan to use the emergency broadcast service to transmit a message of Eph warning everyone about the vampire plague.
(Completely arbitrary sidenote: When Eph read aloud “This is not a test.” I couldn’t help but cackle at being reminded of the future-transmission sequence from Prince of Darkness. “This is not a dream.” Prince of Darkness is awesome and you should watch it. Anyway.)
This is the kind of plodding busywork that isn’t really acceptable in the penultimate episode of the season, although it does result in a nice scene on the rooftop between Dutch and Fet. Dutch did not exist in the book, and you can almost hear the writers sighing in relief at having a character whom they can develop and play with on their own. I like that Dutch neatly sidesteps the “angry at Daddy” characterization of most rebellious women in pop culture. There are a lot of factors that went into Dutch becoming Dutch, and even if we don’t ever learn all those details, it’s good to know that Dutch is a fully-formed person because of her own experiences, not because of some looming parental figure.
I’m glad the show had such a strong moment for a female character (there’s another a little later that we’ll talk about soon) because the treatment of Abraham’s wife in this episode is pretty reprehensible. “Wait,” you may say, “Abraham had a wife? We’ve never, ever seen her on this show before? What is she like?”
Well, phantom question man, what she is is dead. We flashback to Setrakian in post-World War 2 life trying to track down The Master and Eichorst, determined to avenge all the bodies those two racked up in the concentration camp days. Abraham has his wife with him, and she has about three lines showing how sweet and loving she is, and then a couple scenes later she gets murdered to teach him a lesson.
Bull. Shit. On. That. Look, I know that there’s only so much time that can be afforded to various storylines and characters, but if you are breaking down the arc for your show and this is the ONLY time that can be spared for, you know, the woman who will define every action that our hero will take for the next few decades, then maybe you need to arc your goddamn story better. In general, The Strain has done nice work at providing well-defined characterization to both genders, so to see them punt Abraham’s wife into the refrigerator for the purpose of hustling through some backstory is deeply disappointing.
Also disappointing: Watching Gus do…stuff. After last week saw Gus develop a more driven, angry side, here he’s back to his dipshit ways, kidnapping Creem to hijack some weapons and cash. Dipshit Gus decides to get greedy and open up some shipping crates (IT IS THE APOCALYPSE AND YOU ARE FLEEING, GUS. WHY DO YOU THINK THERE WILL BE SOMETHING YOU CAN TRANSPORT OR USE? WHY DO YOU SUCK SO MUCH?) and discovers that someone is transporting a host of vampires in said shipping crate. There’s a quick gunfight, and then the commando-vamps appear and whisk Gus away so he can go dipshit somewhere else.
Like I said, the body of the episode wasn’t great, but The Strain manages to go out with a bang. After the gang completes their broadcast, the pawn shop is suddenly attached by Eichorst and his own little undead strike team (which includes Bolivar. Remember Bolivar? They spent a loooooooot of time on Bolivar).
In a sequence beautifully cut together by this week’s director, Robocop, Nora’s mother is infected, cross cut with Setrakian’s wife returning to him as a ghoul, flanked by the children whom he had earlier mused about adopting to help start a new family post-Master murder. Setrakian releases his wife, then carves her still beating heart out of her chest as a reminder to himself of his failure. Nora decapitates her mother (beautiful moment for Mia Maestro. She’s been largely underserved so far, but here got a chance to bring an anguished, wrenching humanity to a familiar genre moment), and the gang escapes through a secret passage while Eichorst calls after them, mockingly.
(I love that Eichorst is characterized not only as a wretched pestilence against humanity, but also as a MASSIVE dick. He’s someone who really and genuinely seems to enjoy being an asshole to the people he’s trying to murder. It’s delightful.)
About the only person who gets a happy ending this week is Palmer, who finally receives a visit from The Master. His long-standing faith is rewarded, as The Master drips some of his goo into the old man’s mouth, and Palmer finds himself almost immediately rehabilitated.
The final shot of Palmer crowing with victory in the rain feels like a deliberate slap in the face to The Shawshank Redemption and other big-redemptive moments in movies. But Palmer better watch out. The trick of the monkey’s paw is that you think it’s coming in for a handshake, when all the while it’s winding up for the backhand.