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Let’s Talk About ‘Bird Patrol’:
- The Sisterhood of Dada has built a giant birdcage in a clearing, and has produced flyers for an event happening that night.
- Larry barfs up a large … worm, larva? A Sisterhood flyer also appears in his room.
- Vic has decided to get the synthetic skin surgery, saying his mom would have wanted this for him. And his tech is all nano, so removal is just a matter of code. Piece of cake.
- Jane is furious CLiff sold her records AND her Cher workout tapes. She coughs up a cloth version of the flyer, and the Sisterhood symbol appears on Cliff’s T-shirt. Jane changes into Flit and transports Cliff to his daughter’s house in Florida.
- The episode flashes back to 1949 and unlocks the mystery of Laura DeMille.
- Kay is angry that someone stole her bike … the one she stole … and says she’s never going Up Top again. Jane smells some rats from the Underground having hand in this.
- Laura sees Larry and his new friend and decides that it must be a space parasite from the Negative Nebula, the only other strange place Larry has been aside from the Afterlife and Costco.
- Clara leaves Cliff in charge of the baby so she and her wife can have a little alone time, and he almost burns down the house and contemplates using her credit card to gamble and talk to Ginger.
- Larry tries to leave his space parasite in the forest to fend for itself — Laura told him to burn it — but his father instincts won’t let him leave it to die.
- The Sisterhood is at work on … a fog horn.
- Jane confronts the others in the Underground, reminding them that they are supposed to be protecting Kay but Dr. Harrison asks her who is protecting them?
- The fog horn sounds and the truth about Laura DeMille, the Bureau of Normalcy and the Sisterhood of Dada is revealed.
This week’s episode of Doom Patrol was a very important turning point for the season’s main storyline because everything about Laura DeMille is finally revealed. It all starts as the Sisterhood of Dada build a giant bird cage and print out flyers with their symbol announcing an event for that night.
In the past, it’s now 1949 and Laura DeMille has become quite a different person after her years with the Bureau. Instead of protecting the young meta-humans that come into her office, she’s now just marking them all as weapons, such as Wally Sage, who can turn 2D drawings into 3D objects. Laura asks if he can do that with artillery and he gets a ‘Weapon’ classification. Rita is a bit shocked and disappointed with this new Laura and she invites her to join the group that evening since she hasn’t been with them in a while. But Laura says she has a higher calling now and calls out Bindy, who arrived from some time somewhere and then gave up on her own mission once she found safety with her own little coterie. Malcolm isn’t surprised Laura turned down the invitation and wonders if she even has a soul anymore. Bindy reminds him that she saved all of their souls so maybe it’s time to return the favor. The two dance a little jig in the hallway but are interrupted by a squad of military police, and one catches them holding hands.
In the present, the Sisterhood is also building a giant horn, a fog horn actually, and Laura is desperately trying to make a point with Larry that they need to get out of the house. He’s preoccupied with his space parasite, so she storms out but ends up coming back in through another door. She tries again and hears whispering, but every time she leaves, she enters again. She decides to slide her bag out and it doesn’t return so she jumps through the door, and slides across the floor from the opposite door … followed by her bag.
Back in 1949, the Bureau has set a new recruitment record, and she quickly corrects Wilhelm Hodges that she set a new recruitment record for metas, but they are in a meta-human arms race and she’s accused of protecting her friends. She insists that she does her job with integrity, and those in question we unsuited for war because they are pacifists. Hodges says they are an untapped resource … and so is she, saying ‘friend’ is another word for ‘opportunity’ and don’t think the big eye in the sky isn’t watching. He takes his leave and Laura has a little tantrum but she finds the invitation Bindy had left her earlier.
Meanwhile, Bindy and Malcolm are trying to write a new performance piece, a bit of frivolity where she plays him and he plays her, complete with rubber masks. Sachiko tells them the world doesn’t need their frivolity, it needs an enema. It’s time to embrace their power and commit to their destiny. Bindy says that is too dangerous. They why are they, Sachiko asks. Bindy says to make the world a better place, and Lloyd just chuckles at her. He says they have all just sat by while atrocities were committed in the world, and all they did was collect a paycheck. He says there’s a word for what they are — complicit. Shelley says if that isn’t motivation enough then she doesn’t know what is. The Eternal Flagellation will be a big middle finger to the Bureau, and they’d be forcing Laura to choose a side. And if that’s a hard choice for her to make, then she’s already lost.
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Back in the present, the fog horn starts blasting. All of the ‘team’ are in different places. Jane is trying to deal with Kay’s tantrum and fog rolls into the house. Vic is about to undergo the operation to have synthetic skin replacement for his tech, Cliff is cybersexing with Ginger, and Laura is trying to seal the doors and windows of the manor … until Larry walks in and doesn’t close the front door. The fog envelopes them all.
Back to 1949, Laura does shoe up at the party and the Sisterhood tells her they are going ahead with the Eternal Flagellation and they start doing their dance. Laura chuckles uncomfortably. While in the present, the team materializes in a room together and Cliff, Larry, Vic and Jane start dancing while Laura watches. But as they dance she begins to think that the room looks familiar, she just can’t put her finger on it. The scene switches back to 1949 and we can see it’s the same room as in the present, except the one in the present is now very dilapidated. I 1949 Laura says she’s proud of them all, and they all managed to stick together even when things got tough, no matter how far away she drifted, they kept her tethered. She says she’ll never forget us. In the present, Laura is now holding one of the Bureau’s electric rifles. In the past the Bureau troops crash the party, and Laura tells them there is no need for force, they won’t fight back because they’re pacifists. Hodges enters and tells his men to put the group on their knees. In the present, the four also drop to their knees. In the past, Hodges congratulates Laura for a job well done and welcomes the group to the Bureau’s Meta Weapons Division. Shelley says they will never fight for him, and as the scene flashes between past and present, Laura is regretfully assigning them all a ‘Weapon’ designation. Jane asks Laura what’s going on and wants to know if this is a flashback. In the past, Bindy tells Laura they were family, but Laura says her country needs her now so down on your knees. One of the officers is Wally Sage, and he looks totally out of his element as he yells at Bindy to kneel. Malcolm, who went invisible when the police entered now reappears and tells them to stop. Present Laura can see him too, still wearing the rubber mask. But Wally panics and shoots Malcolm full of electricity, killing him, destroying the birdcage in his chest and killing the canary inside as well. Bindy takes the heart-shaped paper clip he made for her and blobs out, rolling out of the room. Present day Laura, now having remembered everything, approaches who she thinks is Malcolm but when the mask comes off it’s Rita. She says ‘she’s ready’ and they are all transported to the clearing.
Inside the giant birdcage is a giant egg, and a creature hatches from it that is basically a large nose and mouth with wings. Rita says it’s Malcolm, and Laura killed him and now she must set him free. Laura says she didn’t kill anyone and had a damn good reason for everything she did. Rita reminds Laura that she told her the Sisterhood was evil, but it was actually she who was the evil one. Laura says she’s not evil, but Shelley says she did all of this and they suffered for seventy years doing unspeakable things in service of a cause they abhor because of her. Laura says she is wrong, that the whole world was crumbling around them and all she cared about was them, but she made an oath to the Bureau. This is her chance to atone. Laura says she atoned that day by making useful agents of them. Having had enough, Rita goes to open the cage but Shelley tries to stop her, saying it has to be Laura. Too late. Rita opens the cage and the one creature turns into hundreds of smaller creatures flying toward Laura. But she can change into a bird and does, flying off with the other bird creatures following. Cliff asks if that was it, was that the Eternal Flagellation? Jane gets pooped on. Sachiko says this is just the prologue to the reckoning. Cliff says that sounds bad, but is it? Lloyd says, ‘Only if you are.’ Rita says it’s for the best and she and the Sisterhood vanish. Then the flying creatures dive back down and one hits Larry in the chest, making him disappear. Then Vic, Cliff and Jane follow.
New episodes of Doom Patrol drop Thursdays on HBO Max.
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