Ugh.

Alright, fine. To steal a quote from The Walking Dead,[1] let’s fuck this dog.

Last week, I predicted that Reach would fall, Kwan Ha would show back up, and at least one member of Silver Team would die. I was wrong about…all of those. Expectations subverted? Let’s go through the episode from the beginning.

Silver Team’s standoff from the end of last episode continues (albeit in a different location, for some reason), but is quickly defused by the convenient arrival of Captain Keyes, who’s feeling just a little guilty about the whole kidnapping-children-and-turning-them-into-super-soldiers thing.

Kai books it outside and boards Halsey’s shuttle (there’s a cool shot of her running down the tarmac that emphasizes the physical differences between Spartans and other humans) in order to confront the good doctor.

Then the show hits us with yet another instance of a Spartan taking their helmet off when they should really consider keeping it on. At least the creepy assistant didn’t knock her out when he bonked Kai on the (unprotected) head. She murdilates him with a table (Kai Smash!) but Halsey ejects from the ship in an escape pod. There’s a quick moment after the ship crashes where the show tries to make the audience worry that Kai died in the ensuing explosion, but this ain’t Game of Thrones, and anyone who’s even half-paying attention won’t be particularly worried.

Halsey, of course, pulls another fast one on the UNSC command and somehow swaps herself for an identically dressed “flash clone” who is captured in her stead. Miranda’s borderline-smug attitude before the ruse is discovered was well-earned, and it would have been satisfying to see her be able to dunk on her mom for once, but the show had other ideas. Halsey has the longest win streak since the patriarchy.[2]

Given that she’s, like, super wanted right now, it was a little odd to see Halsey chilling on a balcony (presumably still on Reach) late in the episode, all while using her real name. Of course, given how unsuccessful Admiral Parangosky et al. have been at stymying her schemes, she could probably geotag herself talking shit on Space Twitter and still not get caught.

The Spartans of Silver Team got a few fun moments this week (for example, casually discussing how they definitely would have shot each other in the standoff). Unfortunately, the main effect these interactions had was to make me think of how much more fun the show would have been if it had dialed in the focus on these characters as opposed to spreading itself too thin over extraneous plotlines.

It’s the season finale, so there had to be a big action scene of some sort, right? Well, there was, but getting there was…pretty dumb. Makee had previously told Chief (perhaps during a post-coital snuggle? I can’t remember and can’t be arsed to look it up) about a star system where the Covenant were holding the MacGuffins – sorry, the artifacts – that serve as a map to the titular Halo ring. For some reason, everyone is 1) convinced that the Halo will help humanity win the war, and 2) extremely willing to trust John’s assertion that the information Makee gave him was accurate…almost immediately after she murdered at least one Marine during her escape back to the Covenant.[3]

Silver Team makes a space voyage through some sort of gravitational field that lasts longer than Peter hitting his knee on that one episode of Family Guy, (it’s just less enjoyable, somehow). Finally, we’re treated to this show’s third (just the third? Really?) fight between humanity and the Covenant.

This scene was pretty good. Not, like, outstanding good, but good, especially for a TV show (even one with an exorbitant budget).[4]  If the show continues to use first-person POV camera angles during every shootout with the Covenant, I’ll start complaining, but it was done well here. The camera transitions in-and-out of Chief’s point of view were especially well executed, and none of it made me nauseous! There were some fun nods to the games here, from Riz getting stuck with a plasma grenade (never underestimate a determined Grunt) to Chief brawling with gravity hammer-wielding Brutes. Of course, there is some dumb shit thrown into the mix for good measure. John goes into a narratively-required dream state when Makee touches the artifact, taking him out of the fight for some time; even more annoyingly, none of the Spartans makes even the slightest effort to take out the Prophets at the ritual site during the battle. Even if the UNSC doesn’t know who the Covenant’s leaders are, you’d think that the guys presiding over the entire ceremony from their bejeweled, hovering thrones are kind of important.

Also, Makee dies (Kai shoots her to get Chief out of his artifact-induced hallucination). Charlie Murphy (insert Chappelle’s Show joke here) is a fine actress, and had some chemistry with Pablo Schriever’s Chief, but her storyline didn’t really seem like it was going anywhere. Clipping extraneous plot threads (cough, cough – Kwan Ha – cough, cough) is a good way to focus the series back in on its strongest points: Silver Team and John’s developing relationship with Cortana.

Speaking of Cortana: Jen Taylor’s voice work is still chef’s-kiss-level good, and it was nice to see John say something to her besides “shut up.” If I was being picky, I might say that their relationship developed from “mildly adversarial” to “trusting” a bit on the quick side…but, fuck it, I’d rather see them team up than have Chief crabbing at Cortana all the time when she’s trying to be helpful. We might have to wait a while for the partnership to continue, though – sure, there’s a second season confirmed, but Cortana’s currently in charge of John’s body, and John is…well, it’s unclear where he is. I’m sure he’ll be back sometime in the next season; I just don’t know if I’ll be watching the show when it gets there. Especially if we’re confronted with more of the fun vacuum that is the Madrigal plotline.

Rating: 6/10 (+1/-2)

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[1] The comic series, that is (TWD on television is…not good).

[2] Not saying these are good win streaks, just that they exist. Don’t get your knickers twisted.

[3] The air defenses on Reach are abysmal. Even if the artifact knocked out every surface-to-air gun on the planet, you’d think there would still be some sort of military spaceships on the planet occupied by the United Nations SPACE Command.

[4] The internet tells me the budget was between $90 and $200 million, which…leaves a lot of wiggle room. That’s a minimum $10mil an episode, discounting advertising costs (which might have been substantial, but still).