TV Review: Caprica 1.11 – “Retribution”

Episode: Caprica 1.11 – “Retribution”
Original Air Date: October 12, 2010

Screencaps from eyescubed.

The second half of the first season of Caprica continues to develop the characters and events that give birth to the Cylons and the world of Battlestar Galactica. Shifts within the STO (Soldiers of The One) organization, Daniel and Amanda Graystone’s trials and tribulations, events unfolding in the virtual world of New Cap City, and the story of the Adamas continue to intertwine to shape the future of the Twelve Colonies.

Episode 1.11, “Retribution,” follows up with Clarice Willow’s return from Gemenon, Daniel Graystone’s alliance with the Adamas to try and regain control of his company, and Amanda Graystone’s recovery from her suicide attempt. The episode opens with Lacy and three other STO members attempting to bomb the spaceport on Caprica. Lacy is clearly nervous and freezes when a security guard approaches her, forcing Pann to shoot him; Lacy, Pann, and Hippolyta abandon the mission and jump into a waiting car Keon is driving. They berate Lacy for messing up and are about to detonate the two bombs that were set when Lacy reveals she didn’t even set her device, and still has it. It is thrown out the window, nothing is detonated, and after arguing Lacy makes them stop the car and gets out and runs off into the rainy night.

At the Graystone residence on the same rainy night, Sam Adama brings a man to Daniel. The man, Cornell, is a board member for Daniel’s company. There is an upcoming vote relative to the company, and they threaten to blackmail Cornell with his history of drugs and hiring prostitutes in an attempt to gain his vote. He refuses, despite Daniel’s wondering what his wife and children would think of him if his secrets come out. Daniel is looking more and more sketchy IMHO, with longer slicked back hair and a beard. Starting to look the part of the gangster he’s becoming, perhaps?!

Now we visit Amanda, still in Clarice’s cabin, who is thinking about her ordeal. We see a flashback to right after her jump — she is in the hospital, and wakes up to hear Clarice outside her room. Amanda calls to Clarice and she comes in, saying Daniel is on his way. Amanda asks Clarice to tell Daniel she doesn’t want to see him.

Back at Daniel’s, he and the Adamas are looking through profiles of the board members to see what skeletons in their closets could be exploited. Daniel starts saying how these people are his friends and he knows them well, and the Adamas remind him that these people also sold him out to Vergis. Daniel is seeming to second-guess everything he’s doing — he knows what he’s doing is wrong, but he doesn’t care. Watching him slide downhill is sad on one hand, but on the other hand, he could choose to do differently and is making his bed and will have to lie in it.

That night, Amanda dreams about Zoe; they are arguing and Amanda asks Zoe why everything has to be so unpleasant. Zoe answers that maybe it’s because she hates her, and adds “but don’t worry — I’ll be dead soon and then we’ll both be happy.” She’s obviously feeling guilty on a number of levels about Zoe and this is how the guilt is manifesting itself right now. Amanda wakes with a start, upset, and gets up to get a drink. She hears Clarice mumbling to herself, and finds her in bed with her holoband on. Amanda hears Clarice say “Zoe” in her mumblings, which she thinks is curious, but she doesn’t wake her up or stay very long, and leaves the room.

There is a brief scene of Clarice in New Cap City (on her holoband, when Amanda sees her) speaking with an unseen person with a scary voice. Clarice is insisting her kids are loyal to her and wouldn’t betray her, but the voice tells her that the kids tried to bomb the spaceport to kill her coming back from Gemenon. She removes the holoband and considers this.

People start to die. Cornell, the board member who Daniel threatened to blackmail, commits suicide. Clarice pays a visit to Pann, who’s in the bath in his apartment, and he begs her forgiveness, saying he was confused. She says she forgives him, then says it’s God he should worry about, and knocks his TV into his bath, electrocuting and killing him. Clarice then meets Hippolyta coming home and confronts her. Hippolyta apologizes and says they didn’t mean anything by it, runs, and runs (literally) into Clarice’s henchman, who kills her.

Lacy meets with Barnabas, who confronts her regarding their failed bombing attempt, and tells him it was complicated and she couldn’t plant the bomb. Barnabas says it’s not like Pann and Hippolyta to miss a meeting, and asks if Lacy knows anything about it. He accuses her of being Clarice’s mole, grabs her & forces her to promise she’s loyal.

Daniel has a flashback to Amanda being in the hospital after Cornell’s wife chases his car down screaming and crying that he’s a murderer (another example of his degrading morality — this woman is hysterically crying and yelling that he’s a murderer and he must know something, asking what will she tell her children, and Daniel just tells his driver to keep driving). Amanda asked him if he really had two men killed to get the MCP (the chip Vergis was developing to use for the Cylons). Daniel says he had no way of knowing that would happen and that it isn’t fair, and asks as an analogy if he blames her for Zoe. That obviously upsets Amanda greatly and is at least part of what triggers her guilt.

After the murders of Pann and Hippolyta, the GDD (Global Defense Department) is involved in the investigation, as is Agent Duram, who had a hand in the investigation of the MAGLEV bombing Zoe was involved in. Duram notices that Pann and Hippolyta went to the same school as Zoe Graystone and Ben Stark, thinks maybe it’s not a coincidence, and decides to talk to the headmistress of the school, Clarice Willow. While Duram is waiting for Clarice in his car, there is an odd little scene where he’s talking to his wife and misbehaving son on the phone, and I’m not sure why that was in there, if there was a reason at all. Duram confronts Clarice, asking if she knew the students were monotheists and terrorists. She asks what the point of his question is, and says no when he presses her but doesn’t sound surprised. He then asks her if she’s ever attended a monad (monotheistic) church, and she responds that she’s the headmistress of the Athena academy, visibly affronted by the question. He pushes the question again, and she says no and storms off.

Our last scene with Daniel this episode is with Cyrus, who has brought him the remains of the U87 (Cylon) that Vergis thought was melted down. Cyrus asks how Amanda is, and Daniel says she’s fine — he hesitates, then says physically she’s fine, but is blaming herself for a lot of what happened and it’s a shame. This makes me wonder if he’s trying to feed her the guilt, especially after seeing what he said to her in the hospital room after her suicide attempt.

Meanwhile, Duram is told that Clarice’s lawyer has demanded she be left alone, and he’s told to drop her as part of the investigation. He’s convinced she has something to do with it, and approaches Amanda to speak with her, since knows she and Clarice are close. He tells her he thinks Clarice is a monotheist and a terrorist and pointed out that her students blew up the train. Amanda pointedly says she knows that, but he says he thinks Clarice pulled Zoe into the STO and brainwashed her. Duram tells Amanda Clarice lived on Gemenon as a child during the time the STO was training recruits; also, there was a conclave meeting on Gemenon the week they had confirmation that Clarice was offworld. Amanda gets upset, and Duram tells her he wants her to be a confidential informant. If Clarice is really a lynchpin of the STO, having an insider feeding them information would be invaluable in taking them down. Amanda doesn’t respond to Duram and leaves, with her mind spinning.

Amanda returns to the cabin and sits thinking about Clarice and what Duram told her. She remembers comments Clarice has made to her in the past, about Zoe and Zoe’s avatar, and remembers how she mentioned Zoe while she was on the holoband the previous night. Clarice comes home and Amanda asks her about the holoband — Clarice says it’s her way of relaxing when she can’t sleep. Amanda asks her who she is “in there,” and Clarice says it depends on her mood. Amanda now goes to her and Daniel’s house, retrieves a gun from a safe and loads it. Apparently she has realized Duram may be right about Clarice.

Back at Barnabas’s hideout, Lacy and Keon are talking with Barnabas. Lacy says they’re all on the same side and should talk to Mother and Clarice. Barnabas gets all crazy and starts ranting about killing Clarice. At this point, Keon decides he’s had enough and says he’s leaving. Lacy and Barnabas try to dissuade him (for different reasons), and although he hesitates, he says Lacy is right and Barnabas is insane, turns to leave, and Barnabas shoots him. At that very moment, Clarice and her henchman (I forget his name, so he’s “Henchman”) come in. Henchman grabs Lacy and Clarice, with a gun to Barnabas, cuffs him to something, and sets a bomb. They have a few words, then they leave with Lacy, detonating the bomb once they’re safely out. Lacy asks if Clarice is going to kill her, and Clarice replies that she hopes not.

For the final scene of the episode, Amanda returns to Clarice’s cabin after getting the gun from her home. She goes in and finds Clarice distraught over the murders of two of her students (Pann and Hippolyta). Clarice says they got in with a bad crowd, and Amanda says she knows all about that, while reaching into her bag for the gun. At that point, Clarice says she feels that Amanda is the only person she can talk to. Amanda hesitates for a split second, and slowly takes her hand out of her bag, and says “tell me everything.”

Amanda has realized she can gather information from Clarice, for what exact reason I’m not quite sure. I don’t know if she will use the information personally maybe to plan to blackmail Clarice, or if she’ll tell the GDD. Also, Clarice is smart and may realize that Amanda is wise to her secrets and purposely feed her misinformation. We will see. This was a good, albeit slow episode, but set up some good plot points.

Rating: 4 / 5 Stars