S06.E011: Ashes to Ashes

[CooperTV]

Quote

Bellamy and Octavia must work together to save their friends. Echo is forced to face her past.

Original airdate 7/23/2019.

[AudienceofOne]

Good Lord, these resistance movement Gabriel groupies are dumb.

[Paloma]

I am almost totally lost at this point. I'm pretty sure that Gabriel was originally Josephine's boyfriend when Sanctum was founded and that he left Sanctum at some point because he was against their evil and murderous policies, but I'm confused about the roles played by Eduardo and Xavier (who have been mentioned a few times) and whose body Gabriel is now in. I'm also confused about the scary people who showed up on motorcycles last night and why they, and especially Layla, wanted to kill Gabriel. And who is/was the "old man" if not Gabriel?

I also don't understand why Ryker originally was helping Echo and the others and then decided to turn on her and kill her (or have Russell kill her). And I don't understand why it was such a shock that Echo had nightblood--I thought that was not uncommon among the Grounders on Earth. Also, wouldn't this have been discovered when she was held at Mt. Weather? 

About the only part of this episode that I understood and liked was the flashback to young Echo/Ash. That was an interesting story that really fleshed out her character and helped explain Echo's attitude and actions. 

Overall I don't find the Children of Gabriel or their resistance plot interesting. I wish they would have focused more on the secrets of the Primes and how to fight them from within.

[ottoDbusdriver]

I'm not sure if I'm just bored or don't care anymore.  This show is becoming tedious to watch, with it's Calvinball rules for screenwriting.

There's only 2 episodes left in this season, and it is a complete and utter mess.

Diyoza -- still missing in the time anomaly
Jordan -- apparently still recovering somewhere offscreen
Raven -- seems to have disappeared, she was nowhere to be seen (though I may have fallen asleep)
Abby -- managed to avoid showing up at all in this episode

Echo isn't really Echo -- yawn. 
What was the point of guarding that secret for so long ?  For the inevitable Grounder uprising on Sanctum which will kill off the Primes and the Children of Gabriel.
What's next -- we find out that Murphy was a Grounder spy on the Ark and it was all part of a secret plan ?  </sarcasm>

At this point, I'm just waiting for Monty to walk out of the time anomaly -- with his youth fully restored.

It's just incredibly stupid that the Children of Gabriel have no idea who their actual leader is.
And now Gabriel is building a psychosis bomb, which makes about as much sense as anything else at this point.

Someone needs to remind what the flickering red Xmas tree lights in Gabriel's compound means, because the camera seemed to focus on that.

Don't care about Madi being farmed for bone marrow to make nightblood -- maybe it will dial back on the dark commander nonsense.

[AudienceofOne]

1 minute ago, ottoDbusdriver said:

Someone needs to remind what the flickering red Xmas tree lights in Gabriel's compound means, because the camera seemed to focus on that.

Yes, I was like, "is that a Xmas tree? Why?"

2 minutes ago, ottoDbusdriver said:

It's just incredibly stupid that the Children of Gabriel have no idea who their actual leader is.

Considering how blisteringly stupid the Children of Gabriel are, the fact they haven't seen the old man in 10 years and don't care is par for the course as far as I can tell. 

49 minutes ago, Paloma said:

I'm also confused about the scary people who showed up on motorcycles last night and why they, and especially Layla, wanted to kill Gabriel. And who is/was the "old man" if not Gabriel?

Gabriel left Sanctum because he wanted to stop the killing of Nightbloods but then he didn't want to die himself so he took Xavier's body. I don't know if Xavier consented or not. 

He lied to the Children of Gabriel and pretended to be Xavier because if they knew he took Xavier they'd turn against him. It's against what they stand for. So he lied and said that Gabriel was off communing with the anomaly or something (I don't remember, something like that). The ones who showed up on the motorbikes were the Children of Gabriel looking for Bellamy and Clarke (thinking she was still Josephine). They only wanted to kill Gabriel when they found out he was in Xavier's body because he killed Xavier and lied to them.

1 hour ago, Paloma said:

I also don't understand why Ryker originally was helping Echo and the others and then decided to turn on her and kill her (or have Russell kill her)

He wanted to help them until he realised that a revolution would lead to the death of his entire family and himself. Then he had to choose between the path that was morally right and the one that would keep his family alive. He chose the latter.

1 hour ago, Paloma said:

I don't understand why it was such a shock that Echo had nightblood--I thought that was not uncommon among the Grounders on Earth. Also, wouldn't this have been discovered when she was held at Mt. Weather? 

They turned her into a Nightblood with the bone marrow they took from Madi so she could be 'punished' by being a host to Russell's dead wife. It was a surprise to the other Earthers because she wasn't a night blood before. 

[Paloma]

Thank you, @AudienceofOne! Your explanations really help. This season's story had a lot of potential, but once again it was ruined in the execution.

[CooperTV]

11 minutes ago, AudienceofOne said:

Gabriel left Sanctum because he wanted to stop the killing of Nightbloods but then he didn't want to die himself so he took Xavier's body. I don't know if Xavier consented or not. 

Eduardo was Gabriel's adopted son, I think, and after Gabriel died (when he rebelled against the Primes he decided not to come back) he took the minddrive and put Gabriel's consiousness in Xiavier's body. Gabriel killed Eduardo in a fit of rage.

[AudienceofOne]

3 minutes ago, CooperTV said:

Eduardo was Gabriel's adopted son, I think, and after Gabriel died (when he rebelled against the Primes he decided not to come back) he took the minddrive and put Gabriel's consiousness in Xiavier's body. Gabriel killed Eduardo in a fit of rage.

There you go, I completely missed that. I thought he said he asked to be put in Xavier. 

[Lady Calypso]

Yeah, I had high hopes for this season but it's clear that they're just muddling around with several arcs, many of them which won't become important until next season. The Prime stuff is basically set to conclude this season, for the most part, so now they're setting up more Children of Gabriel stuff and Time Anomaly stuff. 

This episode did feel like it was dragging in places. There were some high points (Echo's backstory, the Blake siblings talk, Clarke imitating Josephine) but then there were low points (everything else).

Jordan is officially the most useless character they've ever had. Shannon Kook is supposed to be a series regular and he's only appeared in maybe four episodes out of eleven? And only one or two of them have been somewhat useful with him? They should have left the actor as recurring if he was going to appear as frequently as Raven (who also suddenly stopped being a main character this season).

So, with Echo now being a Nightblood (welcome to the selective club, along with Madi and Clarke and the Primes!), is she going to take on Simone as a host, or is she maybe going to take on Madi's Flame and become the new Commander? It's clear that Madi cannot handle Sheidheda. Maybe Echo can. 

I do love the title of this episode. Echo's real name being Ash really sets the tone for the title's meaning.

So, Clarke is going to trick everyone, including Murphy. That's probably a smart plan. Murphy keeps making choices that I don't agree with. I get it, but I'm really disappointed with my favourite character. He irritated me this episode, besides him getting to speak Trig to Echo. 

Bellamy also irritated me with his Holier Than Thou attitude. I get why he's hesitant to forgive Octavia, but she was actually putting in some effort. It's been a long time since we've seen this softer side to Octavia, and I liked it. I want more of that.

[CooperTV]

24 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

Bellamy also irritated me with his Holier Than Thou attitude. I get why he's hesitant to forgive Octavia, but she was actually putting in some effort.

It was the actually the very first time Octavia put any effort at all in their relationship. I think the show handled this incredibly well in portraying neurotic unhealthy relationships the Blakes always had and Bellamy now refuses to be in.

Octavia still frames her relationship to Bellamy as him being her rock and moral compass, after all these years of her being a grown-up and a leader, and her trying to contain her emotions in Bellamy. Bellamy was right to say "You're not my responsibility anymore", this is called separation. Maybe now they could finally be on equal ground, as siblings, not like weird abusive parent/child dynamic where child is the one who's abusive because they can't handle any responsibility.

[Taryn74]

5 hours ago, AudienceofOne said:

There you go, I completely missed that. I thought he said he asked to be put in Xavier. 

No. Eduardo was supposed to kill Gabriel and destroy his mind drive so he could never be brought back, but when Xavier was born a nightblood Eduardo took it as a sign that Xavier was meant to be Gabriel's host.  When Gabriel "woke up" in Xavier's body and realized what Eduardo had done, he killed Eduardo in a fit of rage.  But then he lied to the Children of Gabriel so they would believe Gabriel was still alive (in the older man's body) but had abandoned them.  They never knew Xavier was really Gabriel, until now.  And apparently Xavier was the new gal's brother, which is why she was so angry and ready to kill Gabriel when she found out the truth.

[tennisgurl]

There are a lot of individual scenes and ideas in this episode that I really liked, but I agree that the plot itself is rather convoluted. Primes, CoG, the many people inside of each other, the Anomaly, there is just so much shit going on, and the explanations come so quickly, that its hard to keep track. Because of that, a lot of characters and stories keep getting lost in the shuffle. 

That being said, there were a lot of good character scenes this week, so I cant complain too much. I really liked the talk between the Blake siblings especially, I think it showed a lot of growth in both of them, and while the wounds are too fresh for Bellamy to accept her olive branch yet, I do think they are on that path. This is probably the softest and most sincere we have seen Octavia in ages, and I think Bellamy saying that Octavia isn't his responsibility anymore was a really good moment for him, considering how often in the past he was almost obsessively overprotective of her and tried to justify all of her bad choices and take all that on him. Considering he was kind of a parental figure to her growing up (even though he isn't that much older) it makes sense, but I think them becoming more equal in their relationship is a good thing. I also really liked the scenes with Nathan and Gaia, both when they had the talk about the mistakes they've made, and when he stole their means of escape. "That was the best lift I've done since the arc!"

Really liked Echo/Ashs backstory, and it certainly both explains a lot about her, it also makes that a pretty good title!

I think that Murphy is still working with the rest of the gang behind the Primes back, but with Emoris life on the line, its hard to tell. I wish he had gotten a better plot than all of this betrayal followed by other betrayals over and over (which we`ve done before with him) after his existential meltdown after he almost died. The whole Trig bit with Echo makes me think he plans on sticking with his people though. It also made Russel look like a pretty big idiot. "Oh, those people who have every reason to hate me are having a whole conversation in that language that none of my people can speak, I am sure that nothing that could harm me was said!"

I love that Clarke's first Josephine bit with her family is to twirl her hair! So is someone just going to make WWMD (What Would Monty Do) bracelets for everyone to wear? 

[ketose]

11 hours ago, AudienceofOne said:

They turned her into a Nightblood with the bone marrow they took from Madi so she could be 'punished' by being a host to Russell's dead wife. It was a surprise to the other Earthers because she wasn't a night blood before. 

Well, Gaia is obsessed with Nightbloods, so it was probably a bigger deal to her.

I watched this again. Apparently, they were using genetically modified embryos to create hosts. Gabriel destroyed them before he escaped. Then Josephine started convincing the people that putting the mind drive in was a way to meld both people instead of wiping out the host, which was the reality.

In that case, it would be pretty harsh if Clarke and company killed everyone when only about a dozen of them are the real problem. 

[KittenPokerCheater]

I missed it...Echo is not Echo?  Who is she then?

[Paloma]

21 minutes ago, KittenPokerCheater said:

I missed it...Echo is not Echo?  Who is she then?

I'm not positive that I have this straight, but there was a flashback showing two young girls (maybe 10-11?) training together with bow and arrow and joking about imagining the queen as the target. One of the girls is named Echo and the other is named Ash. The queen wants Echo, who is training to be a spy, to kill a prisoner with her bow and arrow as he runs, to show that she is capable of killing. Echo seems reluctant and misses him when she does shoot. The queen kills him with an arrow and then says that Echo has to pick up a knife and kill her friend, and threatens that if she doesn't they will both be killed. Echo picks up the knife but seems to be trying to avoid seriously hurting Ash and encourages her to fight back to show that Ash is also worthy of the queen's respect. Suddenly Ash, who is on her back on the ground, fatally stabs Echo, apologizing as she does this. The queen then says something to the effect that the people who are supposed to be spied on are expecting a girl named Echo, so Ash takes Echo's name. In other words, present-day Echo was originally Ash and was forced to kill the original Echo (who was her friend) in order to survive.

Someone please correct me if I have this wrong.

[Taryn74]

1 hour ago, Paloma said:

I'm not positive that I have this straight, but there was a flashback showing two young girls (maybe 10-11?) training together with bow and arrow and joking about imagining the queen as the target. One of the girls is named Echo and the other is named Ash. The queen wants Echo, who is training to be a spy, to kill a prisoner with her bow and arrow as he runs, to show that she is capable of killing. Echo seems reluctant and misses him when she does shoot. The queen kills him with an arrow and then says that Echo has to pick up a knife and kill her friend, and threatens that if she doesn't they will both be killed. Echo picks up the knife but seems to be trying to avoid seriously hurting Ash and encourages her to fight back to show that Ash is also worthy of the queen's respect. Suddenly Ash, who is on her back on the ground, fatally stabs Echo, apologizing as she does this. The queen then says something to the effect that the people who are supposed to be spied on are expecting a girl named Echo, so Ash takes Echo's name. In other words, present-day Echo was originally Ash and was forced to kill the original Echo (who was her friend) in order to survive.

Someone please correct me if I have this wrong.

Nope, you're all good! 

Nya also said something about Original Echo having "true shot" (both of her arrows were dead center on the target) which is intriguing. I wonder if that's a skill they're able to train into or are just born with? 

[roctavia]

I wonder if Josephine was alive when they tried bone marrow in the past... because it seemed like Russell was waiting for her to say more or something when she saw it was bone marrow to make night bloods.... like saying, but it didn't work before, what's changed? or something... 

I just fear that he's going to figure out quickly that Clarke isn't Josephine.... but maybe Russell isn't that smart. Or Josephine has been hanging out in a mind drive longer than that...

[dju]

21 hours ago, CooperTV said:

Bellamy was right to say "You're not my responsibility anymore", this is called separation.

I agree, but in retrospect, I found it a tad troubling that Bellamy started off the episode by apologising to Clarke for failing to protect her and very pointedly framed the apology as though it was on him and him alone to do so. Which initially struck me as odd because rationally he should know that there was nothing he specifically could have done to prevent what happened to Clarke. He can be sorry that it happened to her and feel bad that it happened to her, but believing he was accountable and apologising for failing to protect her? That seemed unnecessary to me, until the cave scene and I had the thought that in the absence of Octavia, we've merely been watching Bellamy transferring that responsibility burden onto Clarke. 

 I think I'm more inclined to believe I'm reading into it though and that the apology to Clarke was just a broader reflection of Bellamy's guilt complex. But I did really like that even with that line to Octavia, you could clearly tell that he knows that just because he says it, and that it's necessary for them to both confront and be separated from it, it doesn't make it any less difficult to relinquish that responsibility. And that it's incredibly painful to reckon with what that responsibility did to their relationship, both the good parts and the abusive parts.

22 hours ago, Lady Calypso said:

It's been a long time since we've seen this softer side to Octavia, and I liked it. I want more of that.

Co-signing this a 1000%, although I will be friggin pissed if this arc leads to her sacrificing herself, which is a theory I've seen floating around and I absolutely loathe it. 

Edited July 25, 2019 by dju

[CooperTV]

11 minutes ago, dju said:

I agree, but in retrospect, I found it a tad troubling that Bellamy started off the episode by apologising to Clarke for failing to protect her and very pointedly framed the apology as though it was on him and him alone to do so. Which initially struck me as odd because rationally he should know that there was nothing he specifically could have done to prevent what happened to Clarke.

When I think about it more, I think it could be a sign of Bellamy's trauma about leaving Clarke behind at the end of season 4. He said in season 4, I think: "I could use a break from keeping you alive". Those words certainly turned into self-fulfilling prophecy for him -- he thought he left Clarke to die during Primefyia, so he did kind of get a break from saving her (in the worst possible way one could have imagined, of course). But her "death"  had great impact on him because he didn't save her then.

Finding out in season 5 that Clarke was alive must be incredibly confusing for Bellamy because he was clearly overjoyed but at the same time, it messed him up in a big way. You're absolutely correct: Bellamy did feel guilty and still does. From the writing and the acting cues, I'd say we could assume that not only he feels guilt over laving her to essentially fend for herself in a terrible environment, with only a child for any support but also now he feels like he betrayed her by not making sure she actually survived. It's not rational thing, of course, as it's pretty clear Clarke made a choice to stay behind to help Bellamy and co.

I doubt the show will give us more concise explanation of that. At least the writers tried to acknowledged it in some form and gave Bellamy time to express his issues.

[ketose]

11 hours ago, dju said:

Co-signing this a 1000%, although I will be friggin pissed if this arc leads to her sacrificing herself, which is a theory I've seen floating around and I absolutely loathe it. 

Leaders like Octavia have a poor life expectantly on The 100. On that note, it looks like Kane kind of died for nothing. Abby ended up making more nightblood anyway.

[thuganomics85]

So, Echo isn't actually Echo, but Ash who was forced to kill the actually Echo thanks to Queen Nia and the assumed the role of Echo.  Sure thing.  Cool seeing Brenda Strong again, although she really is all about playing those types of character.  I wonder who is more ruthless: Queen Nia or Lillian Luther?!  I do hope this lets Echo (if we're still calling her that) be more prominent since I like the character and think Tasya Teles is underrated here.

I guess the show accomplished what they wanted in that I was kind of thinking Bellamy was being a bit much with Octavia.  I get why he still probably wants to keep her at a distance, but mayb at the very least hold back on the snarky comments and put downs, Bellamy.  Granted, I actually find Octavia's claim that Bellamy was always her rock that kept her in check kind of troubling, because if losing your brother suddenly turns you into a arrogant, bloodthirsty tyrant, you've got issues that can't be solved by hugging it out.

Murphy continues to play both sides, but I suspect he'll end up siding with the gang again, when the time calls for it.

Eliza Taylor now gets to play Clarke pretending to be Josephine.  I do like that this season has allowed her to stretch her chops a bit, because I did find her to be a bit one note the past few season, although a lot of that was because Clarke's storylines tended to be pretty one note.

Bob Morley seemed to do a decent job directing.

While I certainly don't want any actors to lose a steady job, it does feel like the show has gotten to the point that the cast is just so stacked that a lot of people are falling by the wayside.  Jordan's suddenly disappeared, Raven's been more limited (and basically only being used to confront people and be kind of hypocritical), and Abby's... well, Abby.  Not to mention all of the guest cast like Emori, Indra, and so forth really not getting much to do either.

[SourK]

I love how we all have to explain the story to each other and then, after we understand, we still don't care.

I liked the scene with the young Echos. It legitimately went a different way than I was expecting and it helped me understand Echo more as a character. I know everyone's been calling her kind of slimey and cowardly or whatever, but it clicked for me in that scene. Her story isn't about being the best or the strongest or the most principled -- it's about getting backed into a corner where she does what she has to do to survive.

Anyway, remember when the main problem was that the sun made people kill each other? Those were fun times.

[Ziggy]

On 7/24/2019 at 7:32 AM, Lady Calypso said:

So, with Echo now being a Nightblood (welcome to the selective club, along with Madi and Clarke and the Primes!), is she going to take on Simone as a host, or is she maybe going to take on Madi's Flame and become the new Commander? It's clear that Madi cannot handle Sheidheda. Maybe Echo can.

That's what I was thinking ... that Echo might get the Flame.  I would love to see her battle Sheidheda!