Sadness and emotions sink in
Eph goes looking for his wife as we learn what happens to her.
That is pretty much what happens in this episode. There really isn't much to it other than seeing Eph's wife, Kelly Goodweather played by Natalie Brown, succumb to the vampiric virus thanks to her boyfriend. It really was a slow and tense episode as it shows her slow transformation from loving mother to blood driven monster. This is actually the first episode that focuses entirely on Brown's character, but unfortunately for her she doesn't get to shine. If you want to consider being a walking corpse and acting like a bloodhound counts as a performance, then yes she does deliver on that front. However for the time before she succumbs to her affliction, just a small moment in the car when she examines her eye to see the worms have already multiplied in her body was enough to tell the audience what she was feeling. Regret. It was a single moment that unfortunately is not expanded on and doesn't even have the time to be expanded on because she has become a monster now.
Through her monstrous turn we see the dispatching of her friend Diane and Diane's son. It was definitely a strong moment in the development of showing her becoming a monster, but again that was mainly attributed to the terror factor and doesn't really develop her character. We already knew she was far gone to be saved, and although we hoped that maybe Diane and her child would be okay, we knew since they're not the main cast they were going to die. Her descent to the dark side would've probably been portrayed stronger had we not seen the transformation occur with Bolivar the Rock Star at the beginning of the series. It would've amplified this episode much more, but since we've seen this transformation happen with a character no one really likes or is given enough time to develop, this episode dedicated to her fall is weakened. We do get the strong parallel between this show and Dracula as she telepathically gets drawn to The Master, the same exact way Mina Harker gets drawn to Dracula. It is a nice parallel, but given everything that has happened before, it really doesn't come off special.
Instead the one who has a real emotional arc and standout for this episode was Stoll's Eph as he searches for Kelly. His discovery of her transformation, and dread knowing that he has to give the news to his son. It really does add a lot of weight to him, but that standout moment gets quickly dissolved simply because of the presence of Maestro's Nora. Had she not exist or had sex with Eph in the previous episode, it would've made Eph's reaction much stronger instead of having someone there to comfort him.
I should add that there is a bit involving Fet and Dutch trying to bring the internet back that fails miserably and ultimately leads to Dutch leaving. This pretty much renders her presence useless. Which seems to be a recurring theme I'm having with this article.
I guess what I'm saying is that this episode would've worked if there weren't anything that was done previously to render it meaningless. The emotional power we're suppose to feel isn't exactly there, but we still feel it. However it should've been stronger, especially the scene involving Eph and his son played by Ben Hyland. However I can blame Hyland's acting for not making that scene work. There should be more, but there isn't. We feel, but not really.
Score: 7/10 - An emotional episode that is bogged down by what came before
Status: Losing patience and may drop the series if next episode does not pick up
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