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“The Returned” recap (1.10): End Times

Previously on The Returned, Helen seduced her way to finding a stash of dynamite (and into our hearts). Rowan said goodbye to Simon for (maybe) the last time. Peter and Camille decided to make a memorial service for dead teenagers all about them, and Peter announced that he was a Returned. Oh, also, Camille was the worst-but you probably already knew that.

29 Years Ago

A couple of boys are camping out in the woods. It’s Peter and his friend Rich on the lam after robbing and murdering Victor and his mother. Peter is feeling really guilty about what they did, while Rich is mostly just happy to have gotten away with it. Rich is not looking too hot, actually-he’s going through withdrawals and his eyes are as red-rimmed as Helena’s on Orphan Black. Peter has had about enough of this shit, so he’s leaving to go hike up to Canada. Rich is like, “Nah, bro, we were supposed to be like Sal and Dean! Also, I’m afraid you’re going to tattletale my whereabouts to the cops.” So he pulls a gun on Peter.

Peter’s like, “Dude, I haven’t finished On The Road yet, but I’m pretty sure Dean never pulls a fucking gun on Sal! Be cool, man.” Then Peter hits his friend with his backpack, and they wrassle around on the ground with a loaded gun because they are very smart guys. Of course the gun goes off, and Peter is shot and killed. Rich may be a robber and a murderer, but the man has some manners, so he apologizes to Peter’s corpse and leaves him a copy of On The Road.

Present Day

Peter is thumbing through his old, probably bloodstained, Kerouac novel, and pulls out a snapshot of himself and Rich. According to the note on the back of the photo, Peter’s real name is Andrew. He tosses the book into his satchel just as Cop Tommy comes strolling up to the door, chest puffed out. Tommy really doesn’t like Returned people, mostly on account of that time he watched one make sweet love to his fiancée, so he decides to arrest Peter for some charges he’ll probably make up later. The Caldwell cops should get together with the Rosewood cops and share best practices.

Over at the Dog Star, Jack is begrudgingly preparing for Rowan and Tommy’s wedding reception, grumbling about how Tony booked it months ago without telling him. Tony also bashed his own head in and then shot himself, Jack, so IDK maybe just roll with it? Lucy tells Jack that she started hearing voices again, that the dead victims of the flood are telling her that something bad is going to happen again. Jack, hilariously, is like, “Listen, I know we have actual risen dead people walking around town, but do you honestly think anyone is going to believe that you hear voices?” Sure, okay, Jack.

Anyway, if you were livetweeting and/or are just generally nonobservant (like me), you may have missed the most important part of that scene. It’s this:

Across town, Rowan is getting ready for her wedding. Her mouth says that everything is awesome, but her eyes say that everything is awful. She tells the pastor that she doesn’t know why she’s crying, but she just feels like something terrible is going to happen. Probably the terrible thing she’s sensing is something grand, like, hey, everyone is going to die today! But it could also be that she’s getting ready to marry an emotionally abusive douchebag. Hard to say.

Elsewhere, in the woods, a beat up truck comes cruising into town. Inside the truck is… (THIS IS NOT A DRILL) Joanne Kelly. You guys. I wish I could’ve recorded my reaction to this scene, because it was intense. If you don’t know who Joanne Kelly is, she played Myka Bering on Warehouse 13. Myka Bering is the #1 fictional love of my life (Spencer Hastings is #2), so, yeah, you could say it was a good surprise.

Anyway, Joanne Kelly rides into town listening to rock music, just as cool as can be. She stops at a gas station and stretches (not at all relevant to the plot-I just wanted you to know it happened), before asking an attendant for some info about the town. She wonders if there have been any electrical disturbances, and the attendant is like, “Now that you mention it, yes! Super weird things have been happening.” Joanne Kelly nods sagely and asks if he knows where she can find the Winship family. Finally! Joanne Kelly is on the scene to get down to business and solve some shit. She’s gonna snag, bag and tag-oh wait. Wrong show.

Meanwhile, Helen is driving around with an unsecured bag of old, and probably unstable, dynamite. As you do. Her dead husband, George, appears in the backseat and apologizes for that time he put her in a mental institution, because now he realizes she was right all along. The town is for sure fucked. Helen’s like, “Bygones, Georgie. I’m going to handle business around here, scout’s honor.” George disappears.

Claire goes to visit Peter, who is still being held in the jail, but hasn’t been charged with anything yet because Tommy is too busy getting married to make up any evidence. Claire wants to know who Peter really is, and Peter tells her that his name was Andrew. He lies to her about how he died, probably because “flood” is an easier/cleaner explanation than “my buddy and I robbed and murdered some people, but I felt guilty and wanted to leave, so my buddy shot me.”

Claire is angry that Peter kept this a secret even while he knew that Camille was struggling with the same thing. She thinks that Peter used Camille, and he’s a coward, so she leaves. Time out for a second: if Peter really is Returned (which I didn’t think he was at first), does that mean the Returned can grow/age? Why hasn’t Victor aged? I’m so confused.

Over at the Winship house, some of Lena’s friends drop by because, OMG they were so worried about Lena and so happy to hear she got out of the hospital. LOL yeah right. They want to see Camille, because they heard she’s back from the dead, and you don’t get to see that everyday. Lena tries to play the part of the protective sister and asks them to leave, but Camille hears them talking and says she wants to hang out. Of course she does.

At the pond, the girls meet up with some other friends. Honestly, I really did think that Ben/Hunter was just one character that I kept messing up the name on, but I guess they are two people! White guy blindness strikes again! Anyway, Hunter apologizes for revealing Camille’s zombie nature on Facebook and Ben apologizes for being “weird” that night Camille dropped to touch his wiener. Everyone is friends again, yay!

Meanwhile, at the hospital, Nikki is alive! Thank you, television gods. I assume you heard our collective prayer (aka yelling about how we can’t take another dead lesbian character). Nikki has a broken wrist and a concussion, but she should be just fine. Julie thanks the doctor and gives Nikki a loving caress before storming down the hall to collect Victor.

In the car, Julie wants to know who else Victor has hurt. He turns the radio on and doesn’t answer, because he’s a little son of a bitch. Julie is over it, so she yells at him about how he can’t do that to people, especially not people that she loves. She snaps a little, but honestly I feel like it’s way past due. Victor makes the music come back on with his mind, because there are no depths to how terrifying creepy children can be.

Back at the swimming hole, Camille is the life of the party, surrounded by her friends (UGH CAMILLE), while Lena looks on from afar. Ben comes to sit down next to her. Or Hunter. No, I’m pretty sure it’s Ben. He’s like, “Camille looks like she’s having fun, huh? So do you still think we killed her because we lost our virginity that time?” Lena’s like, “Ehh, I’m mostly over that. I think.” Ben takes that to mean they can do P-in-V again soon, but Lena lets him know that she’s met someone new. He’s a serial killer, yes, but he’s really just misunderstood and he’s got the kindest eyes.

Over on the other side of the stream/pond/whatever, one of the girls busts out a bag of shrooms. Camille doesn’t know what it is and this bitch has the audacity to say, “What? You mean you’ve never shroomed?” NO, SHE’S NEVER SHROOMED. BECAUSE SHE’S LITERALLY BEEN DEAD FOR FOUR YEARS. I swear, fucking teenagers can make you feel bad about anything. And while we’re at it, have you ever shroomed girl? Put them in a peanut butter sandwich, or something, for the love of god!

Momma bear Lena comes over and yells at their friends for giving her sister drugs. They’re like, “Take a chill pill, we were Camille’s age when we first shroomed. Shrooming is just so cool.” Camille agrees and tells Lena to stop ruining her fun. I think you guys all know how I feel about this situation. (#teamlena)

Back at the Winship house, Claire opens her front door to find Joanne Kelly wearing a white tank top and a black leather jacket, the queer lady uniform. I really feel like Claire doesn’t deserve such a blessing, but that’s life I guess. Joanne Kelly is actually Sarah Koenig Cara Pine, a journalist doing some research for her podcast. She wants to know about Camille, because she read some things online, but Claire insists that her daughter is still totally dead. Claire then shuts the door in Joanne Kelly’s face. Unforgivable, Claire.

Rowan and Tommy are at the church getting married. So, that’s happening still, huh? Their relationship is pretty gross, IMHO.

Anyway, your favorite, most lovable, potentially insane harbinger of death, Helen, is still driving around with dynamite. She sees Simon along the side of the road, and decides she should definitely pick him up on her way to blow shit up. She tells him to get out of town, but then their collective Returned energy makes the radio go wonky and pops one of the tires. They skid to a stop right by the edge of a cliff, and Helen opens up the trunk to get out a tire iron. Simon, obviously, notices the overflowing bag of dynamite, so Helen fucking clocks him in the head. Poor Simon! He’s already died twice!

Julie, meanwhile, has decided the only way to deal with Victor is to try to exorcise some demons, so she takes him to the house he died in. That’s pretty fucking metal, Julie- I dig it. Victor goes over to the closet he was murdered in, and we see a flash of his dead body. Julie gets real really fast, telling Victor that his mom isn’t coming back and that the fairy he believes Julie is doesn’t actually exist. She tells him that she tried to be his fairy, and she loves him, but she can’t do it.

Victor doesn’t want to hear that, so he does what he usually does when he is distressed- he creates a traumatic vision for the person who is upsetting him. In Julie’s case, it’s the man in the hoodie who attacked her years ago. Julie is able to fight the vision, telling Victor that he saved her life, but now he has to let her go. So… he does. Victor and the vision disappear.

Back at the swimming hole, everyone except the twins are tripping balls while The Velvet Underground plays in the background. Camille is super pouty about not being high – drugs and alcohol don’t seem to affect the Returned. Hunter (I think) has a crazy look in his eye as he brings a knife over to talk to Camille. He tells her that she’s not high because she’s not human, she probably doesn’t even bleed. To illustrate his point, he cuts her arm with his knife. (What a Dawn Summers move, am I right?)

Camille freaks out and runs away, even though literally everyone else is on her side and worried about her arm. She apparently runs for a long time, because now it’s night. Finally, Ben finds her wandering around in the woods. She whines about not feeling normal and Ben tries to make her feel better, which she interprets as “Let’s make out.” Ben is still not 100% on board with dead person hook ups, so he pulls away. Camille sounds way younger than 16 when she argues that “he kissed her first in the eighth grade.” Yikes.

Camille wants to know why he hooked up with Lena and not her, and Ben’s like, “Uhh, I’m’a be honest: Your sister was DTF and you were not. So.” Camille’s like, “Well, Lena doesn’t love you, and now I’m ready to F!” They start making out. I’m extremely uncomfortable with this storyline. Lena is still looking for her sister, when she starts to “feel” them having sex. I’m even more uncomfortable. Lena also thinks she sees Adam in the woods, but I honestly don’t even know what’s real anymore.

Back at the hospital, Nikki is signing her discharge papers when Julie gets back from banishing Victor to the nether-realm (or wherever). She tells Nikki that it’s all over and then smooches her right there in the hospital. I know this show has a penchant for killing people, but, you guys, it looks like the lesbians survived (this finale, anyway)!

Oh, looks like Victor isn’t in the netherrealm-he’s just walking down a street. A nice lady pulls over, worried about him. She asks where his parents are, and, when he doesn’t answer, she invites him into her car. Oh lady, you’ve made a huge mistake. They leave town and let’s all hope that’s the last we’ll see of Victor. Sorry, lady, no takebacks.

At the Dog Star, Tommy and Rowan have their first married dance to a cover of “Wild World” by Cat Stevens. Weird. Jack and Lucy start dancing just as Claire walks in. She sees them and then turns around and leaves in a huff. Hey Claire, not sure you get to be mad about this considering you’ve been banging Peter for five years? As Jack watches Claire drive away the power goes out at the Dog Star.

Helen has made it to the dam! She gets into the “authorized area” really, really easily, and has just begun to set up the dynamite when the power goes out for her, too. Luckily, she has a flashlight. Phew, crisis averted.

At the jail, which still has electricity thanks to their handy power generator, Peter is visited by Cara Pine. She tells him that she’s a journalist who originally came to town looking for Camille, but heard that Peter might also be a dead person to interview. Peter’s like, “No comment, toots,” but Cara pushes the topic. She tells him that this isn’t the first time people have been reported as rising from the dead, but, in every other case, those towns were wiped off the face of the Earth and everyone who lived there died. I know I’m not supposed to be turned on by this convo, but, you know, what are you going to do?

Back in the woods, Camille is laying on the ground panting in post-coital bliss, but it turns out that she sexed Ben all the way to death. Damn. You are a monster, Camille. She calls out to Lena, hoping her sister can help her. Oh, now you’re not too good for your sister’s help?

Helen is still in the dam with her dynamite, and now she’s ready to light this bitch up. She’s, like, remarkably bad at lighting a match, though, and it takes her about 50 tries to strike one properly. Just when she does, there’s a gust of wind and her match goes out. Poor crazy Helen just can’t catch a break today.

Meanwhile at the Dog Star, Lucy starts hearing more voices when Rowan comes by to offer help lighting candles. She acts as a conduit, telling Rowan that “he’ll be here soon and you have to listen to him.” Rowan is like, “Uh, who now?” And Lucy tells her it’s the man whose baby she’s carrying. Oh snap. Simon’s her baby daddy, again. (Aside: we’ve now seen three different outcomes for Returned sex: dead guy, conception, and no side effects. I have no idea why! ?»\_(Òâä)_/?» )

Speaking of baby daddies, Simon is finally up and about after being smacked in the head by Helen. He’s still up on that cliff, though, and he has a bird’s eye view of the town… which is now being flooded by water from the dam (again!).

Wait, JK! There’s a flash of light and, suddenly, the water is gone. Simon starts sprinting down to the town, I’m assuming he’s going to try and save Rowan or prevent the flood from happening in the first place. The end. Seriously-that’s how it ends. Talk about a cliffhanger, huh?

What did you guys think of this season of The Returned? Here’s hoping it gets picked up for Season 2. I think Cara Pine needs to stick around and do some serious investigating. In the meantime, you can find me on twitter @jennalykes and we can talk about The Returned‘s religious overtones or how bad the last season of Warehouse 13 was.

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