Yes, so I realize that I am waaay behind on Sanctuary reviews. I got a little, um, sidetracked with another show (and more on that later).
But even though I haven’t posted every review, I am caught up with the current episodes and have been looking forward with great anticipation to the premiere of Sanctuary Season 3.5. Dear show: Please don’t ever take an extra long hiatus like that again. Sincerely, a fan.
The writers spun out a WHOLE LOT of plot threads within the first half of this season, all of which really needed to be resolved in order to move this story along. So how did they do?
First off…Hollow Earth
The big question that’s been hanging over us for months now: what is it, exactly?
Amongst the gobs of exposition we got in this episode, we learned that Hollow Earth was formed over eight thousand years ago as a refuge from vampires (which explains their need for vampire-detecting technology). Evidently a large group of [White, English-speaking] humans living topside decided to just let the vamps keep the surface while the rest of creation retreated underground.
Now, obviously, there were still pockets of human populations left on the surface, which means that the Hollow Earth folks basically left them behind as vampire bait. It also means that while they were advanced enough to create one of Earth’s greatest civilizations from within the planet, they weren’t advanced enough (or just not at all inclined) to find a way to combat the vampire menace. Instead, the little cave-dwellers they left behind would eventually rise up and completely defeat an entire superior race without the benefit of Hollow Earth’s bountiful technology. That fact alone should afford the surface-living folks a lot more respect than the outright contempt that they’re given. It’s not as though Hollow Earth is unaware of the goings on upstairs. But I digress…
The holomap left to Helen by her father was in fact a miniature model of Praxis, the major city in Hollow Earth. Aside from being just a really big underground metropolis – the logistics of which I still don’t quite get – it turns out that the ruling powers in Praxis play a critical role in maintaining the balance between humans and abnormals by keeping the biggest and the baddest of the abnormals under close control. Or so they claim. I think it’s fair to say that they’re not entirely altruistic or entirely straightforward.
Big Bertha/Kali and the other Super Abnormals
Who are they?
We weren’t given whole lot of information in this episode, at least not much more than we already knew. What exactly the avatar chamber is, how the super abnormals (or “hyper-species”, as Ranna calls them) interact with each other or with certain humans within the chamber, or why they would choose to do so at all, is still entirely unclear. We did meet the super abnormal responsible for the counterwave that mitigated Kali’s little temper tantrum: a giant salamander-looking creature called Kanaan. But poor Kanaan has a bit of a parasite problem, and when the powerful being that controls the Earth’s geothermal vents is sick, it’s just bad news for everybody.
Kanaan turned out to be remarkably tolerant of human hands fishing around in his arteries, and the day was saved. Go Team!
Helen’s Illness
Helen was dying from radiation poisoning. And then she was killed. And then she was revived…but the radiation poisoning was still killing her. And then they fixed her. The End.
Helen’s Dad
One of the biggest questions hanging over us since last season: what is up with Helen’s dad? He’s a doctor and researcher who in his free time built a phenomenally complex puzzle within the labyrinth beneath the abandoned vampire city of Bhalasaam. The man was not only involved with The Cabal from the very beginning, but he’s been in on this whole Hollow Earth thing for well over century, given the clues he’s been leaving for Helen since her 26th birthday.
Really, it’s no wonder that Helen’s a workaholic.
Turns out that Gregory Magnus was a resident of Hollow Earth for some 65 years before he ‘disappeared’. I’m guessing that disappearance coincided with his being kidnapped by The Cabal? I’d love to see a timeline of Gregory’s life, just to have a clearer picture of how and when he did all this stuff.
At some point after his whole beetle-in-the-brain incident he returned to Hollow Earth, and the next time we see him he’s infiltrated the avatar chamber with Kali and the other super abnormals. He gives Will a cryptic message that leads Helen to find the hidden map to Hollow Earth, and his actions have him branded as a traitor. And yet he still managed to retain some allies, because when Helen finds him in the tunnels outside the city, he refers to “his men” being killed during the recent geothermic instability.
In the end, little is explained but all is forgiven for Gregory Magnus. He remains in Hollow Earth as an ambassador to the surface.
Adam
Dr. Jekyll. Mr. Hyde. Adam Worth.
Adam was shot by Helen in 1908. He was found in the river and brought into the city, where he lived for almost thirty years. His experiments with anti-matter led to the death of hundreds, and as a result he was executed/placed in stasis for several decades, until he was revived by Fallon. When the government found out that Adam was alive, he was forced to flee the city and sought out Helen Magnus in order to find a way back into Hollow Earth. Adam claims to be a champion of the oppressed, but as Will points out, his actions are motivated almost solely by his ego and desire for recognition. Though it’s never made clear what he truly intended to use the calorem device for, it probably wasn’t anything good.
That said, Adam is a great villain. He’s smart, he’s funny, he’s slightly unhinged, and incredibly skeezy. Ian Tracey is just fantastic in this role, and he brought a truly nuanced performance that none of the other guest actors in this episode could match. The only other actor that gave me actual chills was, of course, Christopher Heyerdahl. Druitt was as Bad Ass as he’s ever been, and Adam and Druitt together are just magnetic. I know Adam was evil and all…but I was kind of sad to see him go. If he is really gone.
Which just leads me back to…
Hollow Earth
When you bring back a contemporary of The Five, you better have a damn good explanation for how they’re still living and breathing, or else I’m just going to believe that there was something in Oxford’s water supply circa 1885.
Are we meant to assume that the underground dwellers have some kind of life-extending abilities that were not at all touched upon in this episode? Adam was an Oxford student in the 1880′s (since Gregory Magnus was still around on Helen’s 34th birthday, we can assume that The Five’s experiments occurred when Helen was in her 30′s). Whether or not he graduated is unclear, but at some point he left school and became a father. The death of his daughter drove him to madness and in 1908, Helen shot him and he floated downstream to the great underground city. Even if we ignore the fact that he doesn’t appear to have aged in the over 20 years he spent above ground, he then went on to live for almost 30 years in Hollow Earth. Which makes Adam at least 70 by the time he is (temporarily) put to death.
Then there’s Gregory Magnus who was born in 1829, making him over 50 years old at the time of his disappearance. It would be at least 120 years before he reappeared looking none the worse for wear, but barely half of that time was spent living in Hollow Earth. As has been explained to us previously, Helen’s alive because of the Source Blood and Druitt’s alive because of Helen’s blood. Tesla was immortal, and Watson was just a genius with a steampunk suit. So how, exactly, has Gregory Magnus managed to defy aging?
Memory Stealing Invisi-People
Adam’s little albino warriors.
Yeah, I’m still not sure what’s happening there.
Tesla
Okay, I’ll admit, I just wanted to see Tesla. In fact, I would have loved a whole montage of clips featuring Tesla and the Big Guy holding down the fort back home while everyone’s off dying in Hollow Earth.
Sanctuary, you let me down.
In Conclusion
To borrow a phrase from one Samantha Carter: Holy Hanna, that was a lot of exposition. Tunisian serapods. Tabors. The calorem device. This episode had entirely too. much. terminology. And for all the build-up, I’m not entirely sure that the pay off was worth it. We had way to much explanation and way too little action, and all in all, I’ll be glad when this Hollow Earth business is over and our heroes can go back to their crazy lives as usual.
Stray observations…
- “I know that smell.” Nice little nod to Henry’s latent wolfey abilities.
- An internal parasite that matches its coloring to “blend in”. Really?
- I swear, I won’t harp on the crazy biology lessons (*cough*positive ion wash*cough*), but how easy would it really be to cauterize the skin of a creature that swims in molten rock? Wouldn’t he have some kind of built-in defense to, say, heat?
Helen: “They need our help.”
Will: “Look, I’m not one to hold a grudge or anything, but…they killed us.”
Henry: “Yeah, and they won’t cure you.”
Kate: “Right. Grudge.”
Henry: “Holo-data transfer. Virtual sim chambers.”
Will: “Death by force field.”
Kate: “Protein shakes that taste like diapers.”
Henry: “I know. Awesome, right?”
Ranna: “Are you certain that you can remove it safely?”
Helen: “Well, I’ve never encountered either of these creatures before, so…no. Let’s get started.”
Gotta love Helen’s can-do attitude.
