To the Meadows is a new music festival that has been gaining popularity, and now the lineup is now finalized, with a ton of big names, including Fall Out Boy, The Chainsmokers, and many more. The festival is being held in upstate New York, and tickets went on sale this week. It is going to be a crazy weekend, so be sure to check out the lineup, and get to the Meadows early to avoid the crowds.
Last week I had the chance to head to the beautiful To the Meadows festival in North Carolina. Two things struck me about the festival: it was a beautiful, well organized event, and it was the first time I had ever attended a music festival. Granted I am a bit of a music fan, but I had never been to a large festival before. Therefore I was super excited to go and experience all that it had to offer. I also loved the fact that the festival was in a campground, and I loved camping and festivals and all around was a positive experience.
What a week! With one of the biggest movie releases of the year, To the Meadows, coming out, what better way to celebrate than with a podcast dedicated to the world we made. Thank you to everyone who joined, and we hope you enjoyed it!
In episode 3, Terri attempts to assist Clara find her place at The Meadows while the adults and kids work on their trust problems. Marissa and Hanna trace a cocaine shipment, while Leo helps Sandy work through her problems with Clara by guiding her through her new faith. Sonia’s inquiry into Hanna’s mayhem at the Passway plant is overseen by Carmichael.
Recap
While listening to a news broadcast on the incident that Hanna created at Passway Pharmaceuticals in Belgium, Carmichael observes the trainees in the exercise yard. Passway denies any culpability for the deaths of two individuals. Police believe the real Monica Gastner, the young lady whose identity Hanna stole to get into the trial, is in the facility, and have taken her into prison.
Louis Dumont, the Director of Passway Pharmaceuticals, has forwarded Monica’s paperwork to Carmichael. Monica has a history of anxiety and despair, but no violent past. The cops have been interrogating individuals at Passway all night. Dumont claims that he has kept them out of the area where Carmichael’s drug cargo for The Meadows is housed, ensuring that it is safe. Carmichael doesn’t want to take any risks, so he tells Dumont to expedite the cargo and handle it himself.
Sonia is contacted by Carmichael, who requests that she go to Belgium to examine the issue.
Marissa and Hanna are safe and sound at a quiet motel. Marissa phones into work to see how the new employee, Sonia, is doing as Hannah enjoys some fresh air. She learns that Sonia is also unable to attend today’s meeting. While tending to Hanna’s IV wounds, Marissa asks her to tell her about her misadventure at Passway, emphasizing that Hanna could have died if Marissa hadn’t arrived with a getaway vehicle when she did. Hanna explains the metal medicine pill to Marissa Clara. Marissa recognizes the importance right away. Clara is in The Meadows, Hanna informs Marissa. Marissa admits that she is aware of the institution, but she is unsure of its location.
Hanna claims she learned a narcotics cargo is on its way to the facility. She had an excellent look at the guy typing the message on the computer, and if they could identify him, they could use him to track out The Meadows and Clara. Marissa advises her to quit up trying to save Clara since she is now out of reach. However, Hanna’s departure for Canada is still scheduled for today. Marissa doesn’t want to miss out on the chance to ensure Hanna’s safety.
Hanna claims that if they forsake Clara, she would attempt to flee Utrax once again. Hanna will believe it is her responsibility if Utrax kills her. Marissa tells her that it isn’t her fault, and that if she attempts to assist Clara, Utrax will find out she is still alive. Then Marissa’s whole strategy to keep her safe will be thwarted.
And if something bad happens to Hanna, Marissa will blame herself.
Hanna knows how to deal with guilt. Marissa tricked Clara into being kidnapped by Utrax by claiming to be her mother, she claims. Clara was given hope, only for it to be taken away again. Marissa justifies her actions by stating that she did it to rescue Hanna. Hanna responds that she didn’t request it. She insists that Utrax will murder Clara in the end, and she proposes that she and Marissa work together to save her.
Carmichael meets with Leo and Terri to discuss Clara’s continued refusal to cooperate. The other trainees, Leo believes, can be persuaded to welcome her back into the pack. Terri isn’t ready to give up on convincing her that The Meadows is the right place for her. Before he “makes the call,” Carmichael allows them two days to bring Clara around.
Hanna looks around the outside of Passway, hoping to see the executive who works with Carmichael for some reason. Marissa instructs her to stay outside on the lookout and call if she sees him. When Marissa gets off the phone, her document forger comes with a new Canadian passport for Clara, which will cost her twice as much as the original since it was a rush job.
Terri is attempting to learn Clara better so that she can remove her individuality. She is currently in a paneled sitting area instead of a jail. Terri hasn’t yet fully integrated into The Meadows, so she doesn’t really see the implications of her position, but Clara does. Terri still believes she is being helpful and kind to these girls, rather than brainwashing them into being whatever the business says them they are, in addition to being deadly spies and assassins.
When Terri walks in, Clara warns her right away that she isn’t like the others and that she will flunk all of the tests they have prepared for her. Terri wonders how Clara knows what the other people are thinking.
Terri must have missed the bit about these young ladies spending every waking minute together from infancy. Of course, they’re all supposedly different individuals today than they were the last time Clara saw them, so the Meadows staff believes Clara is the one who doesn’t recognize her sisters.
Terri assures Clara that she may ask questions if she wants to. Clara is right in reminding her that they are in The Meadows, and Terri should refrain from asking too many questions. Clara then inquires as to why Terri slept in the same cell as her. Terri’s seeming to care about her doesn’t sit well with her, particularly after Marissa claimed to be her mother.
Terri: “I know how it feels to be the odd man out in any situation.”
“Do you have a mother?” Clara inquires.
Terri is one of them.
Clara: “Then don’t act like you and I are the same person. We’re nowhere near each other. So, how could you possible comprehend this? ”
Marissa uses a geolocation software on her computer to contact her coworker and frenemy Sonia. She puts up a front of false friendliness and apologizes for their bad start, proposing they go out for coffee to make amends. Sonia acts receptive as she walks inside the nearest police station to the Passway facility, but she declines the coffee date until some unspecified point in the future. Marissa knows Sonia’s whereabouts and can predict her task by the time they hang up.
Hanna sees Louis Dumont, a Passway executive, make plans with the security officers at the entrance to depart in an hour with a special cargo. He expresses his desire for them to keep his leaving a secret. Because Marissa is unlikely to arrive in time to assist, Hanna steals a security card from a nearby employee and enters the Passway lobby, where she introduces Dumont as the company’s Director of Innovation. She sends Marissa the information, who urges her to wait, but that is clearly not going to happen. Before anybody notices Hanna, she enters the elevator.
She exits the parking garage and discovers that she has no mobile service. Hanna steals the keys to a vehicle parked near Dumont’s (his keys aren’t on the rack) while a police officer interrogates the attendant. She then sits and waits.
Sandy returns to her room to discover a young Bible ready for her. She begins by reading a chapter in which women are urged to be subservient and attractive to males. Leo walks into her room a few seconds later.
At the very least, he knocks first, but it doesn’t alter the fact that these young ladies are being observed very carefully. He had to be monitoring her every move via the security cameras in order to schedule his arrival to the second.
When Leo sees the marks Clara put on Sandy’s face, he curses. Sandy dismisses his worry about her looks, but it’s obvious that she’s still enraged when she inquires about Clara’s whereabouts. She expresses her displeasure with Clara rejoining the rest of the trainees. Leo says he agrees with her.
Sandy inquires about the Bible, which Leo explains was given by her parents since she enjoyed reading it as a child.
“I don’t recall that,” Sandy says, his voice steely.
“I attended to Sunday School for years, but I can hardly remember a word they taught us,” Leo says, beaming and pleasant as he gaslights her.
This is unsurprising.
When Sonia interviews Monica Gastner at the police station, she poses as an INL investigator investigating into the illicit prescription drug trade. Monica is really fed up with being falsely accused of everything now that she’s given her side of the story. She clarifies that she was taken by a girl who offered her money and stole her clothing and permission paperwork.
Sonia contacts Carmichael to tell him that the female was young and unremarkable, but powerful, according to Monica. While on the phone, Carmichael keeps an eye on Clara on his monitoring screens. She’s massaging the area on her arm where a fresh medicine capsule has been inserted. “She cut the old one out,” Leo says. Carmichael wonders whether she received any assistance from a powerful friend who may still be alive. He looks through the archives to see what the old med pill looked like and verifies that it has Passway’s name.
While driving to Passway, Marissa dials Hanna’s phone, but Hanna is still in the parking garage with no mobile service.
Sonia displays a picture grid on her computer to Monica. Monica quickly recognizes Hanna as the thief of her identity. Carmichael contacts Marissa to see whether Hanna has contacted her. Marissa lies and claims she is in Paris and that she believed Hanna was dead since he told her so. He says he’s no longer sure, and she should let him know if Hanna shows up.
Dumont enters the storage area where Utrax’s medications are kept. Their primary cargo has already been loaded into a truck, but he has to pick up the next level dosages that will transform the trainees into insane killers. Because there are police and Passway workers in the corridor who should not be aware of the additional cargo, he activates the fire alarm to quickly empty the building and then picks up the package once the hallway is clear. Hanna hides under the dashboard of her vehicle until the garage is empty, then waits for Dumont. It just takes a few minutes. She joins him as he exits the garage.
The medication study was not kept a secret, so I’m not clear why Carmichael’s delivery is. They stated that the trainees’ dosage will be higher, implying that this is an unlawful side transaction that isn’t even being disguised as a drug study. But it’s strange that Dumont informed the security officers about his secret delivery in that instance. Maybe Passway doesn’t want liability problems from the stronger version to become public knowledge, and Utrax is still trying to keep everything about their program under wraps.
Terri is sitting outside, trying to think out how to assist Clara, when Leo comes across her. Clara seems to want to kill herself rather than accept her position at The Meadows, she tells him, since she can’t get beyond the thought of her departed mother. Clara has never met her mother, so Leo is shocked that she has such strong emotions. He’s not sure what it is that she can’t let go of. Terri understands that Clara is curious about her mother’s feelings towards her.
Sandy watches Clara go outdoors, accompanied by two armed guards, from the library window. Helen is reading The Catcher in the Rye, which Jules thinks is a phallocentric piece of nonsense. Helen tells her how much she enjoyed it just a week ago. Helen, Jules scoffs, is concerned about what occurred last week.
If there was any doubt about who the pack’s alphas are, this episode clears it up. Sandy is the Queen Bee, and she is unquestionably the one who must reintegrate Clara into the social group—it is believed that if she forgives Clara, the others would follow. Jules, on the other hand, is the arbitrator of social standards. She seems to be a rebel on the outside, but she’s really just establishing the pecking order by defining the boundaries of the rest of the pack’s strength, tolerance, and compliance levels. Who will fight back against her, and how hard will they fight?
Sandy sits down with them and inquires as to whether or not they believe in God. Jules clearly views the Biblical God as a patriarchal instrument. He’s just another guy, and she’d rather be with a woman. Helen and Sandy are aware that she is coming out to them. She admits that she’s always been drawn to women, but Helen isn’t her type, and she considers Sandy to be her sister. Sandy considers Jules to be a sister as well. Sandy is told by Jules that she can’t possibly compete with God as a lover.
Dumont pulls over to a restaurant to meet a contact, allowing Hanna an opportunity to check her messages. She enters the restaurant after she learns that Utrax is aware of her existence. On her way in, she phones Marissa and tells her the address. Sonia locates Hanna using face recognition software and then traffic cameras to locate the vehicle she’s driving.
When Hanna enters the restaurant, she overhears Dumont on the phone, organizing a pickup for the next day. When the vehicle he’s meeting drives into the parking lot, he returns outside with Hanna to greet it.
Sonia is told by Carmichael to “take” Hanna. She searches for Hanna in the restaurant parking lot after retrieving an unique supersoldier rifle from her trunk. Because there’s an additional clip and medication tube in the pistol case, and Sonia doesn’t take either, it’s unclear if her goal is to murder or tranquilize Hanna.
When it comes to taking down supersoldiers, one should never be overconfident. Or, for that matter, anybody else on the program. I’ve lost track of how many times this season someone has been informed they’re dead when they aren’t. It was also a custom in S1.
Hanna discovers Dumont in the back of the vehicle, giving up the bag of narcotics to the driver. While eavesdropping on their discussion, she tapes a portion of it. Dumont instructs the driver on how to go to The Meadows. The location of the facility seems to be carefully concealed.
Dumont spots her lurking in the back of a vehicle and approaches her to interrogate her. Sonia notices her but is unable to fire due to Dumont’s proximity. Marissa comes to a halt and assesses the situation. She starts with Sonia, following her into a storage area where she attempts to hide for a while. Marissa is chatting as she turns the corner, and as soon as she sees Sonia, she shoots her in the head. Because her pistol has a silencer, no one hears the shooting. She shuts the storage room door behind her.
Sonia reached for her weapon, which she had to take from her backpack. Marissa is still the stealth top of her class since she already has her weapon drawn.
Hanna’s right to remain in the restaurant parking lot and drive a beautiful vehicle is still being questioned by Dumont and the truck driver. They’re fortunate she doesn’t murder them for that reason alone. Marissa sprints up the stairs and squeals to a halt. She leaps from the vehicle, screaming at Hanna over the alleged fight Hanna, her “daughter,” had with her father. Hanna immediately recognizes Marissa’s impersonation of her enraged mother and joins in. She gets into the vehicle with Marissa and drives away. She informs them that the vehicle is heading to The Meadows and that they must follow it. Marissa does a U-turn.
Terri hands Clara a letter that she claims her mother wrote. She informs Clara that Utrax had planned to give it to her before her first assignment, but they’ve decided to give it to her now instead. Clara inquires as to whether Terri has read the letter. Terri claims that she didn’t believe it was her business, and that she knows what it says since she wrote it. Clara is encouraged to read it, but she is given the freedom to do so.
Clara’s mother hopes she could retain her, according to the letter, which is kind and warm. It’s precisely what someone who has never met a lost loved one would want from them—as long as they don’t want any helpful information, such as where the loved one could be located or other particular. The letter may be a template that every trainee uses when they have questions about their mother.
When Clara finishes reading the letter, she sobs. Terri wraps her arm around her and tells her that she understands how much the younger lady misses her mother. She inquires as to what Clara want to say to her mother. Clara sobs as she wonders why her mother didn’t want her.
Terri informs Clara that she was correct in her assessment of the two of them. The other 30 trainees, on the other hand, have gone through similar experiences to Clara and will not abandon her. Clara inquires as to whether or not the other young ladies will forgive her. Terri assures her that there is always a place at The Meadows reserved especially for her. She’ll feel right at home here.
Marissa inquires of Hanna, as they follow the drug cargo truck, why she feels such a great desire to protect Clara, despite the fact that they have only known each other for a short time. Hanna says that she could sense that something in them was the same while they were in the forest together. It was the first time she had ever felt anything like it. Clara drew her in as if she were a member of her family, a bond that transcended the length of time they’d spent together.
Hanna and Marissa debate changing the music on the radio, as if to highlight their developing mother-daughter bond. They decide that Marissa’s music is appropriate for her age group, while Hanna prefers younger music. Hanna compliments Marissa on her appearance for her age, a compliment that clearly indicates Marissa is beyond her adolescent years.
It also recalls Erik’s compliment to Marissa in Season 1 while he was keeping her captive. He informed her that she was aging gracefully and that some ladies became stronger as they got older. Before Erik deceived her to assist Hanna’s mother, Marissa cared about him. Throughout the season, Hanna performs a slight Joel Kinnaman/Erik impersonation, similar to how even adult children may seem to be their parents for a brief period. If nothing else, Marissa would be attracted to her because of this sense of familiarity.
Terri uses the control room monitors to check in on Clara. Clara had been standing alone for half an hour, watching the rest of the trainees run, according to Leo. She wants to be a part of them, but she’s not sure how. It’s now Leo’s time to assist the trainees in honing their social abilities.
When Leo knocks on the door, Sandy is reading a chapter on forgiveness in her new Bible in her bedroom. When he sees the Bible in her hands, he expresses his admiration for her commitment to her parents’ beliefs. Sandy inquires about Clara, and Leo informs her that they’re still debating what to do with her. She says precisely what Leo expected her to say when she wants to meet Clara before making a final choice.
The staff is pushing Sandy to be the pack’s conventional, people-pleasing conformist who, both via modeling and intervention, teaches others how to act correctly when they’re in question. Sandy has a natural aversion to leaving her room or even looking out the window until an official announcement is made, as we witnessed at the conclusion of Season 1 when she refused to leave her room or even glance out the window until an official statement was made. But she’s also flexible and clever, which enables her to seem honest and genuine in her new character while simultaneously stepping outside of it just enough to catch up on subtle social signals like Leo’s implicit rather than explicit directions. She, like Hanna, is already functioning on several levels at the same time, but she isn’t quite as advanced.
Marissa makes sure Hanna knows that this has to be a surgical extraction with little fighting so they don’t be caught while they wait to follow the heroin cargo onto a boat. Hanna inquires about life in Canada. It’s a naturally gorgeous wilderness, according to Marissa, that Hanna and Clara will both enjoy. She won’t be allowed to go, however, since it would bring Utrax straight to them. Hanna is perplexed as to why Marissa is willing to assist since it means they will be apart. Clara’s new Canadian passport is next examined.
Carmichael gives Marissa a call. She informs Hanna it’s her ex-boyfriend, then exits the vehicle to speak with her. Carmichael believes Hanna murdered Sonia and then fled. Marissa is to track her down and bring her in.
Hanna examines her belongings while Marissa is on the phone and discovers the card Carmichael handed her. She investigates the phone logs in the vehicle and finds that Marissa has been in contact with him. Hanna fears the worst and flees, seeking the parking lot for another hiding spot, remembering Erik’s lesson that Marissa always lies.
She hides in the back of a truck trailer, which has loose canvas on the sides. Marissa realizes she’s gone missing and goes on the hunt for her, soon determining where she is. Hanna assaults Marissa after she enters the trailer, and the two struggle. Marissa is perplexed and doesn’t want to harm Hanna, so she isn’t as brutal as she usually is, but Hanna is a tough foe. Marissa is placed in a sleeper hold by Hanna until she passes out. “You deceived me. “You’re constantly lying.” She drives away from Marissa in the truck trailer and continues to pursue the drug cargo in her vehicle.
I’m not sure whether Dover, England is simply the ferry port or if it’s also the location of The Meadows, but we see Hanna on the boat watching the driver, and suddenly we’re there.
Clara apologizes to Sandy, who is waiting for her in the cafeteria, for assaulting her. She claims she was mistaken about The Meadows. Sandy agrees that it seems like home and advises Clara that she has to learn more about her biological family. She then returns Clara to her dorm room, which has been completely redecorated in her given identity of Clemency Jones. Sandy helps her choose an attire and tells her, “They’re giving you an opportunity.” Clemency asks Sandy whether the others will welcome her as she goes through Clemency’s scrapbook. If they don’t, Sandy says they’ll have to deal with her. Clemency puts on her new attire.
Hanna follows the truck to another parking lot, where the driver unloads the illegal cargo for The Meadows and passes it over to a vehicle driver. She follows the vehicle to The Meadows, but comes to a halt when she sees the facility’s first sign. The drug vehicle continues on its way, but Hanna leaps over the fence and walks in. To keep her and Clara’s Canadian passports secure while she fetches Clara, she conceals them in the crook of a tree on the grounds’ edge.
Then she dashes to the schoolyard’s brick wall, where she begins listening for guards. She effortlessly dispatches them one or two at a time as she comes across them, seizing their weapons for her own use as she goes. Surveillance camera video is intercut with normal footage, implying that someone within the institution is aware that they are being attacked. Either they’re allowing her to continue to see how far she can push the guards alone, or the school isn’t all that well secured this far within the boundary, despite the fact that it seems to be highly guarded. It’s possible they misjudged both the trainees and Hanna, and didn’t understand how many guards they’d need in these locations to prevent the worst-case situation.
If a single recalcitrant Utrax escapee who was taught with a personal touch and has a tendency to go in hot can’t be stopped, imagine what would happen if the majority of the trainees chose to flee?
Hanna makes it inside the inner courtyard, where many trainees, including Sandy, Jules, and Clemency, are pleasantly talking while strolling around the gardens. Hanna is taken aback by this. She witnessed Sophie’s depiction of a regular existence last season and has been riffing on it ever since in her efforts to pass as a normal person in public.
The Utrax trainees, on the other hand, were in a camp that was basically a jail lab. At The Meadows, she expected to rescue Clara from that. She’s now seeing young ladies her age who seem to be friends and engaged in enjoyable, age-appropriate activities. It’s the family/pack she craves, just like Clara, but she’s unsure whether she can trust them or if they’ll welcome her. She comes to a halt and stares, unsure whether she should help Clara or allow Clara help her.
She’s most upset because Clara appears to have forgotten about her so fast. The remainder of the gang moves around a corner and out of view. When Clemency looks back, she notices Hanna standing there, staring at her. She comes to a halt as well, perplexed. Hanna is surrounded by guards who are pointing weapons at her before any of them can act. She gives up. Clemency turns and goes away from her companions without saying anything.
Commentary
And with Marissa comatose in the back of a truck, Hanna kidnapped and alone with her greatest foes, and Clara indoctrinated and back in the Utrax fold, or at least acting like she’s one of them, the usual streaming show’s three-episode introduction storyline comes to a close. Sonia is no longer alive, but all of the other eager criminals have arrived and are ready to use Hanna and Clara, while Marissa has no clue where they are.
Hanna was struck in the one area of her life where she is most vulnerable: her desire for affection and connection. She doesn’t need a big family like the rest of the trainees, but she does require at least one other person. She grew raised with a father that valued her and taught her how to collaborate with others. Whether the partner is another parent, a mentor, a friend, or a lover, she is still most at ease working and living in this manner. Based on S1, I believe she enjoys having a friend/lover of a similar age as well as an older handler/mentor.
Marissa is a mother who would go to any length to protect her children, but she has trouble expressing warmth and staying to one side, making it difficult for others to trust her. These are the dangers of being a spy while still attempting to maintain a few genuine connections.
Leo seems to be terrifyingly excellent at his job, which leads me to worry what sort of brainwashing he’s done in the past. Terri is really attempting to reach out to the trainees, as opposed to manipulating them into their positions with a wink and a nod, like Leo does. It’s generally ideal for the trainees to have both kinds of personalities to turn to with their difficulties, so that various personalities and problems may benefit from their varied approaches, similar to having a mother and father. However, the whole setup makes my skin crawl.
How many batches of designer kids did it take to produce minds so flexible that they don’t need to develop personalities until late adolescence, and even then, they’ll accept their creators’ templates, transforming them into archetypes rather than individuals?
This is not typical adolescent behavior.
Clara at The Meadows: Indoctrination Camp, Indoctrination Camp, Indoctrination Camp, Indoctrination Camp, Indoctrin
Hanna’s remorse about leaving Clara behind is reasonable, given that she initially took Clara out of a life that was typical for her at the conclusion of Season 1, but Clara was already thinking differently from the other trainees. That’s why she chose to accompany Hanna (plus she missed a dose of her meds). She was going to act on that difference sooner or later, and Hanna is probably correct in thinking she will. Hanna, on the other hand, demonstrated to Clara how to pursue her own desires while remaining alive and one step ahead of Utrax.
Utrax, on the other hand, was always going to act on Clara’s flaws sooner or later. We’ve seen how little Utrax regards “flawed” products: for no apparent reason, they murdered hundreds of Hanna’s newborn DNA siblings. The matching pair was no longer complete without Hanna. Because of Erik, their secret was jeopardized. But it was obvious that Hanna’s wolf DNA was all they’d hoped for.
Instead of beginning again with a fresh batch, why not take the initial set of small babies into hiding? Or was it Marissa’s punishment for losing control of Erik that she had to toss the remainder of the experimental babies into the incinerator? Whatever the motivation for slaughtering scores of newborn girls, it demonstrates that Utrax and its sponsors see these young women as commodities rather than human beings with rights. That mentality persisted throughout their childhoods, when they were given names rather than numbers and medication regimes rather than personalities. It hasn’t altered now that they’ve reached adulthood and are being compelled to adopt personas as well as a new medication regimen, which will reportedly contain psychedelic murder boosters.
The Adventures of Clara: Hansel and Gretel, Utrax, and Dehumanization
The dehumanization of Hanna, Clara, the other trainees, their birth moms, Erik, Marissa, the Utrax troops, and others, as well as the causes and consequences of such dehumanization, is one of the series’ major themes. People often inquire as to how Clara can miss her mother since she has never met her and has never known one. Clara is a human person, and human beings have an inherent need for moms and parents who nurture them.
Clara understands she needs her mother since Hanna gave her back her actual name at the conclusion of season one, informed her about her mother, and then taught her what family is in between seasons. Clara saw Erik’s parenting skills in action. Even if it was only for a short time, it was enough to reconnect her with the profound longing she’d always had.
Erik’s treatment of Hanna as if she were his own daughter is the polar opposite of Clara and her mother. Characters often point out that Erik was not Hanna’s biological father, despite the fact that he sacrificed everything for her and her mother, dedicated his life to her in a manner that few parents ever do, and ultimately died for her. Other than donating a kidney to her, what else could he have done to show he was her father?
Erik’s treatment of Hanna as if she were his own daughter is the polar opposite of Clara and her mother. Characters often point out that Erik was not Hanna’s biological father, despite the fact that he sacrificed everything for her and her mother, dedicated his life to her in a manner that few parents ever do, and ultimately died for her. Other than donating a kidney to her, what else could he have done to show he was her father?
Sandy and Jules haven’t had Hanna and Erik in their lives to serve as obvious role models, but the Meadows staff is starting to engage them in mentorship relationships to help them achieve Utrax’s objectives by leveraging their natural need to connect with a parent figure. Rather than a genuine connection, this is a manipulation of the parental tie. Rather of learning how to meet their own emotional needs, the trainees are taught to utilize emotions as a weapon. Utrax continues to deny that they are human beings with feelings, perhaps with the intention of drugging them until they are murdered when the business no longer needs them.
Hanna, the program, continues to present stories based on fairytale themes, as it did in Season 1. Hanna serves as Clara’s benign fairy godmother this season, while Marissa serves as Hanna’s fairy godmother. Leo serves as Sandy and Jules’ mentor/godfather, although he has a villainous edge to him since his allegiance is to Utrax rather than the trainees. His assistance is first and foremost for his employer, and then for the trainees.
Terri, like Clara, is a wild card, having been recruited and presumably trained without receiving a full debriefing on the nature of the program she was about to join. She’s also recently completed her own CIA training, so she’s on a similar path to the students in terms of self-discovery. Terri was mistaken when she said they don’t have anything in common. They are both more emotionally sensitive than the average Meadows trainee or employee, which distinguishes them.
Emotional sensitivity is a required skill for Terri’s job, but most of the people who have it, like Leo, have sociopathically separated their own emotions from their observations of others, just as the trainees do (except for Sandy, who wants to believe but is being teased out of her naivety by Jules). Terri isn’t a psychopath in the least. Through the events she experiences this season and how she utilizes them to assist the trainees, she discovers who she is as a CIA agent and what her limits are. Her sensitivity enabled her to comprehend Clara’s needs in this episode, but it also forced her to see The Meadows’ emotional toll on her young charge.
Carmichael is here to remind us that the trainers are proprietary goods, not individuals, according to Utrax and its workers. He is the Big Bad, Cruella de Vil, the wicked step-parent who fails to respect the children entrusted to his care. Two days isn’t a lot of time to repair wetware (the programming in Clara’s brain that they rely on for her compliance), which the business has spent 17+ years developing and is only installed in one of 31 prototypes.
Because of Carmichael’s lack of patience and inventiveness, I believe this is one of Utrax’s numerous supersoldier trials. Otherwise, rather of destroying the unsuccessful models, they’d reprogram, reassign, or sell them to recoup part of their investment. The only reason to totally delete one is if they have enough decent models on the market and don’t want their supersoldier image to be tarnished by a few bad models. Otherwise, we’re seeing a textbook case of government contractor waste and ineptitude.
Carmichael plays the Witch in Hansel and Gretel this season, while The Meadows plays the tempting home full with goodies. The Witch intends to entice the kids inside, catch them, devour some of them, and enslave the rest. Utrax is the ultimate foe, an evil, callous parental/magical authority who used Erik as Huntsman and Marisa as Witch to create/save the children, but then forced Marissa to throw most of the first batch into the fire when Hanna’s mother broke the fairytale’s rules and demanded her daughter back, as well as persuading Erik to break his covenant with Marissa as original witch when he saved Hanna.
A spell was broken when Johanna defied fairy tale expectations and proved to be a loving mother rather than a neglected one. Marissa was no longer bound by the position of Witch/Snow Queen, and she was free to evolve and become more complicated. Erik was no longer the Huntsman, and he was able to focus on being a caring parent. The cynicism faded from their faces, but Erik’s was quicker since he was already warm-blooded. Marissa’s icy cold heart took a little longer to thaw. Terri, Marissa, Hanna, and Clara play a more active, complicated role this season than many of their fairytale counterparts. They aren’t waiting for a prince or any other man to come to their rescue. Hansel and Gretel is one of the rare fairytales in which the girl, by her own wits and efforts, rescues both herself and the boy from imminent death.
Marissa and Her Utrax Children Marissa and Her Utrax Children Marissa and Her Utrax
I’m not sure whether Marissa is just inquiring about Hanna’s experience or if she’s attempting to find out anything about herself when she questions her about her immediate sense of connection to Clara. Hanna’s attraction to the other Utrax trainees and sense of connection with them is understandable. They are the only individuals on the planet that have a genetic resemblance to her and possess her heightened powers. Utrax’s use of wolf DNA indicates that he intended the trainees to feel a connection with one another that their supervisors might use to form bonded units. That’s presumably why we see trainees break up into the same groups so often, despite the instructors’ best efforts to change them up more.
The trainees’ wolf DNA would also make them more respectful of authority and hierarchy. The advantages of that feature are apparent for a company looking to create its own class of enslaved supersoldiers and spies that don’t represent a danger to their owners.
Erik may have loved Hanna as if she were his own child, but he nurtured her in isolation, exactly like the other trainees, to be a soldier-spy. Hanna was in a homeschool version, while the others were in an upscale corporate school version. None of them had conventional childhoods, and they all have significant gaps in their experiences that must be filled before they can operate normally in society. Last season, Hanna did a lot of that job, but not all of it. She’s mourning the death of her sole family, and she’s searching for someone to replace the void. Simultaneously, the trainees’ medication levels are being lowered, and they’re attempting to figure out how to have meaningful connections with people, much like Hanna did last season.
Marissa has also struggled to form meaningful connections and maintain her bond with the Utrax kids. She decided not to have children of her own, which was speculated to be partially due to the anguish she had after murdering Hanna’s brothers previous season. That trauma also made it impossible for her to murder anybody, even in the line of duty, which might be dangerous for a soldier-spy.
Marissa uses her brains to get past this problem. When she kills, it’s usually for personal reasons like self-defense, to protect Hanna, or because of her grudges towards Erik (which led to Lucas’ murder) and Sawyer in Season 1, rather than an impulsive act in the heat of combat. In this episode, she murders Sonia without hesitation in order to protect Hanna, which has been a long time coming. When Sonia’s instructions changed and she became a danger to Hanna, Marissa’s methods altered as well.
If Marissa and Erik hadn’t persuaded their moms to postpone their abortions and instead hand the children over to the corporation to be experimented on, the first Utrax babies would not have been born. In some ways, Marissa and Erik were their adoptive parents, thus their parental emotions are understandable. In Season 1, we saw Erik and Marissa, as happy surrogate parents, witnessing Hanna’s birth. Erik worked out his remorse over his actions while working for Utrax by raising and then dying for Hanna, ultimately requesting to be buried next to Hanna’s mother, Johanna, like Jean Val Jean did in Les Miserables.
Marissa has picked up where Erik left off, in a beautiful gender switch from how parenting duties are usually shown in the media. For the first time, the father nurtured the kid and then disappeared, leaving a knowledgeable and capable stepmother figure to educate the teenager in adult things. We already know she’s a double agent working with an outside group against Utrax since she had them search her flat for Utrax’s bugs.
Along the process, Marissa is also mending herself. Whatever her background, she was clearly wounded by the time she embarked on the first Utrax expedition, much like Erik. The shard of ice in her heart is slowly thawing as she interacts with Erik, Hanna, Clara, and the other trainees, and she realizes how much work with the Utrax children Erik left undone. She no longer wants to be the wicked Witch or the Snow Queen. She’s prepared to serve as a guide, guardian, good witch, and fairy godmother.
Amazon Prime provided the images for this article.
This weekend the Tribes crew attended the To The Meadows Music Festival in rural Ohio. The last time they’d been to the festival was in 2009, when the event was held in the Northeast, but this year’s festival was held in the middle of nowhere. It’s a small festival held on private property, which is easily accessible via private air, train, or bus service. The entire event is free to attend, with the exception of camping overnight.. Read more about did hanna kill marissa and let us know what you think.
