This The 100 review contains spoilers.
The 100 Season 4 Episode 6
"We Will Rise" brings back a narrative that the show has put aside for a while, directly comparing the lifestyles of Grounders and Arkadians. So much of the first two seasons were spent teasing out that while the 100 was horrified by these mysterious new people, life on the Ark was nasty, brutish, and short, too. It's nice to come back to that, particularly now that the tables have turned and we have the Ark in power over a loan prisoner in Elias.
Along a similar theme, several characters discuss throughout whether there can really be unity among the various clans (am I sensing a new Unity Day, and more outtakes of poor Bob Morley trying to say it?)
Clarke and Nyla are together, but Nyla's not looking for anything more and clearly understands that Clarke is still hurting for Lexa. Clarke says she only wants Nyla there to get the Nightblood cure, but I don't think Nyla is buying it. I'm glad the show is giving Clarke and the fans their space to properly grieve for Lexa and the importance of that relationship, while once again reaffirming that Lexa was not a one-off.
Blood must have blood?
There are a few important take aways here. First, I love Monty's continued trajectory as a leader and moral compass. I loved that Monty told Jaha that his son Wells would be ashamed of him, and recalled when the 100 (wrongfully) strung up Murphy for Wells' death. This is likely the first time Jaha has ever heard the story, and it clearly affects him. I hope Monty gets a spotlight moment soon where he gets to be the one to really make the full save, because so far he comes in early (in both this episode and Tinder Box) and the someone else takes over for him and gets the big moment.
Second, Jaha essentially protects the mob from itself by releasing Elias. As Nyla remarks, the Arkadians are no better than the Grounders. When Miller brings up that they floated people for similar crimes on the Ark it rang true, and is a reminder of how much Arkadia conforms to Clarke's moral compass, rather than the actual laws of the Ark. It's getting harder to see Jasper as innocent in all of this, though, as he plies the angry mob with moonshine in the bar, which was luckily untouched in the blast.
Finally, it seems that Octavia has reached a turning point, but one that sends her off on her own. She still hasn't forgiven her brother, which seems fair. And my god, that line delivery when she says "Octavia is dead. She died when you killed Lincoln," and "why do you think you're still alive?" was so intense and brutal. They did a great job hear keeping me guessing from scene to scene how Octavia would shake out on killing Elias or not, enabling the mob or not. In the end, I think Kane getting through to her was the right choice, especially with the setting and the visual of Lincoln.
Raven's Controlled Crash
Much like the spaceship, Raven is intentionally crashing her body, pushing the limits with her ALIE programming that Abby told her may well kill her. With Abby out of sight we didn't learn any more about how her own ALIE programming is affecting her, but I'm sure that other shoe will be dropping soon as we head into the back half of the season.
Luna shows her empathetic side, seeing past Murphy's tough guy defense and understanding his regret about causing the injury that led to her disability. Similarly, Luna helps Raven learn how to calm down when her ALIE programming gets the best of her. I'm really enjoying this trio working together – Luna's calm energy and no BS attitude make her the perfect buffer for Raven and Murphy's strained relationship.
I enjoyed learning more about both the life of young Nightbloods and Luna's life before she created the community on the boat, and I hope this continues. Perhaps the most interesting characters on this show have been those who transcend their group, like Lincoln, Octavia, Luna, Emori, Lexa, and Clarke. While I do think Luna's rubbing off on both Murphy and Raven, I don't think we've ever heard Murphy more clearly articulate his ethos than when he said, "I think peace is overrated. It's the fighters that survive."
Like all of our plotlines this week, this episode ends worse off than it started: with Raven seizing on the ground, foaming at the mouth after learning that it doesn't matter that she made the simulated controlled crash work.
Mad Max: The 100
Clarke, Bellamy, Roan and some flunkies need to deliver the last remaining hydrazine to Raven and an unseen Abby. But really, this entire plot turns out to be a pretense for the showrunners to finally shoot a Mad Max: Fury Road homage. All that was missing is Roan screaming "witness me!" when he jumped from the rover to the truck – his decorative scarring is even similar. The Grounder costumes are already very reminiscent of the original Mad Max movies (as almost all post-apocalyptic costumes are) but the chase ratcheted it up, and there's no way that jump was anything other than a loving homage.
Aside from delightful inter-genre love, this plot also served to illuminate ramifications of Roan's actions in Tinder Box, and gave everyone a chance to muse about leadership. The Azgeda deserters are apparently burning Trikru villages as they go, which Bellamy rightly criticizes. He's right, but he also isn't the best person to talk about killing innocent people, as Roan readily points out. This continues the narratives about Grounder vs. Arkadia culture, and whether they can all really unite. As Roan readily admits, everyone only cares about their own people, except maybe Clarke, something Nyla discussed earlier as well. But that doesn't mean he's sold on her ability to unite the remaining peoples of earth. After all, he wonders, "What happens when you've turned us all into Nightbloods? Do we just keep on killing each other?"
Finally, if we're going to talk about homages, I can't let this one go. When it was just calling Octavia SkaiRippa I thought it might be a coincidence. And while I may still be weepy from the finale, there's no denying that the Grounder playing possum in the road was pulling a Damon. In my head cannon at least, the creators of The 100 were saying their own goodbye to that CW institution that is The Vampire Diaries.
The upshot of this story is that all their effort is for naught, because they're short a barrel of hydrazine. Well, this is The 100. We knew it wouldn't be easy.
When Jasper is telling you to cheer up, you're screwed.
Jasper is quoting Dr. Seuss – did he read that in Mt. Weather? Was it saved on the original Ark in space?
Have we ever seen Kane and Clarke this affectionate before?
Is Jaha's coin from the doomsday cult?
Of course Raven failed the simulator 42 times. The answer is always 42.
Good to know that Bluetooth survivors the apocalypse
"What is she doing?" Bellamy: "Being Clarke."
Azgeda is making no effort to conceal their presence in the back of that truck. Trikru closes the hatch later on. Get it together, guys.
"The sword doesn't care what you meant, it just cuts." - Octavia
Source: www.bing.com
