My friends, it is a glorious day, for Krystal has returned to us, in all her beglittered glory.

I. CAN’T. EVEN.

See, Krystal has a vlog (a vlog! I haven’t heard the word vlog in ages) with her gal pal Bree, and it’s the most gloriously ridiculous thing I’ve ever seen. My face hurt from smiling during this whole intro. They’re here to expose the lies of “Big Cosmetics” while also helping you get that effortless party look. It’s unreal. But things take a turn when they try to take the bendy straws they were using as curlers in Bree’s hair out, and chunks of hair come out with them.

And yet still edited the entire video together.

Krystal takes the case to Art and Scott because they’ve helped her before. They have these adorable dumbfounded expressions on their faces because they have no idea why exactly it is she thinks she needs the help of a police detective and a scientist, so she explains it, annoyed they don’t get it: Bree has been poisoned by Big Cosmetics. OBVI.

“You can tell we’re serious because we’re wearing hats.”

Meanwhile, at Mrs. S’s house, Frontenac comes to pick up Kira but she’s sick, according to Sarah. He goes upstairs to check on her, and Kira puts on a good show about not wanting to miss a chance to hang out with Auntie Rachel, but then she hurls on his shoes. It’s pretty funny, to be perfectly honest.

Across a mysterious amount of water, Cosima is still in the cage in PT’s basement. Mud comes down to bring her food, but won’t let Cosima out. She’s wearing a bell to punish herself, since the hunter and Janis (who I accidentally called Yannis last week, sorry!) are dead because of her. Cosima tries to break through the cult’s hold on her by helping Mud connect to who she was before, asking where she’s from, who she left behind.

Let’s just process a few feelings together, then we’ll be connected forever.

But it doesn’t work; Mud says she’s from Seattle, but she insists no one cares about her. Cosima then tries to reason with her by explaining that Revival is a lie, that PT is a monster, evidenced by the fact that he wants to create thousands of experimental children from another child’s eggs. Her niece’s eggs. Cosima reminds her of Janis, another experimental child, and she almost has Mud on her side, but she loses her tenuous grip on the girl by going a step too far, saying, “Let me out so I can warn my family.” Mud doesn’t feel like she has a family, and considers the people on Revival a replacement of sorts, so this snaps her back into the cult mind and she leaves Cosima in the cage.

Back at the house, it’s revealed that Kira did a little hustling this morning, and actually isn’t sick at all. She just had a little ipecac. Sarah is confused, but Mrs. S says Delphine risked a lot to come here and warn them that it wasn’t safe to let Kira go back to DYAD because they know about LIN28A and that they should listen to the badass blonde bisexual. Delphine’s next stop is to meet up with Felix and Adele in Geneva; and I hope we also meet up with them soon because it’s hard to be nearing the end of this series with so little Felix. Anyway, Sarah asks Mrs. S if Delphine was also her source for finding Coady, but Mrs. S says her sources are plentiful.

Nothing to remind you Sarah is bisexual quite like her inquiring after Delphine while her hair looks like this.

Art calls Sarah and says they might have a lead in this whole Neolution shitshow, and to make a weird situation weirder, the lead is coming from Krystal. Krystal and Bree update Sarah on the whole Big Cosmetics theory but when they’re done Sarah looks to Art like she needs a translator. This pisses Krystal off and she says one of my favorite Krystal lines to date, specifically since it’s about Sarah, “Is she necessary? She’s so rude.” Is she necessary! Sarah! I love it. Krystal is a damn gift.

One reason they think they were poisoned is because they were working with an ethical cosmetics tycoon named Leonard Sipp to expose some lies, though it’s clear Krystal wants to take a Sipp of him, if you know what I mean. Unfortunately, they haven’t talked in a minute because he ghosted her.

Back at the DYAD, Frontenac tells Rachel that Kira is sick, and even though they wanted to start on PT’s plan today, he thought it would be suspicious if he forcibly removed a sick kid from her home. Rachel accepts this information but it’s becoming increasingly clear that the meditation she’s doing almost constantly now is barely working. I think Rachel is a rubber band at its breaking point. Girl’s gonna snap.

At the Revival mansion, Susan tells PT she wants Cosima’s help with the science, but PT would prefer she stay in her cage. She wore a suit to dinner, Susan. Lesbians can be very dangerous. Mud interrupts their conversation with the machine she hooks PT up to, and Susan thinks he’s getting dialysis, but he insists he’s fine. Susan reminds him that the myth of PT Westmoreland is crucial to keeping this whole operation running, but he reminds her that the whole reason they built this myth is because even though she was a brilliant scientist, he was a rich white cis straight man so he held all the power. While he says this, Susan “My New Hero” Duncan literally responds, “That’s how the patriarchy works.” She’s like, stop mansplaining your own privilege and my own oppression to me and get to your damn POINT. Anyway his point is that he bought the help of smart women to hold up his façade, and one of those women was Virginia Coady.

My Nana makes this same face when they’re out of Raisinets at the movie theater.

The three scientists face off, and Susan is all, “Sorry not sorry I disapprove of genocide” and stands her ground like a boss.

Mrs. S, back at the house, is telling Sarah how Krystal might be onto something, and even mentions a fact that I believe to be true but don’t WANT to believe to be true: cosmetics gets more research dollars than cancer research, so of course Neolution scientists would want to get in on that. Sarah mocks Krystal and her baby voice, which gives her an idea; what if she cloneswapped to have a chat with Mister Sipp to get more info?

Sarah at her lightest makes my whole heart glow.

She asks Art to have Krystal set up the meeting.

Sarah goes in to check on Kira, who informs her she has a new code name: she wants to call the island Wonderland. Which is appropriate with all the rabbit hole metaphors already going on. Kira is ready to hustle Rachel more, but Sarah says she’s done her part for the day, and makes her daughter laugh by putting on a blonde wig and mimicking Krystal again.

In Wonderland, Coady goes to PT’s basement to visit Cosima and check out the facilities. She calls Cosima “Susan’s beautiful baseline” but Cosima isn’t a huge fan of being boiled down to her DNA. She’s so much more than 324B21, she’s so much more than Leda. Coady tells her that right now Cosima is looking at this as an attack on her family, but if she just tries a little, she can think of it as her family being part of this grand design, part of the future. There’s a new delivery system out there and Coady wants her help to develop it. But Cosima isn’t blinded by science anymore; she wants no part of this Mad Hatter’s tea party.

Even though she IS dressed for a party.

Back in her greenhouse room, Susan is complaining that Westmoreland is going senile and can’t believe he brought Coady back into it, wishing she had killed her while she had the chance. Ira doesn’t feel so hostile, and wants to meet the woman who had a hand in creating him and his brothers. He’s basically like SHE’S MY REAL MOM so Susan slaps him, causing him to glitch a little. She apologizes but says it’s for the best he doesn’t get involved with those two. Ira offers instead to pretend to get close to her to learn what they’re up to; a sort of compromise.

At the comic book store, Scott is going to test Bree for poison, and Krystal gets her friend to distract him while she scurries out because she might be ditzy and oblivious but she’s not dumb.

The people of Revival are mourning the loss of the hunter, their faith in this fountain of youth shaken. Behind them, Aisha is being carried out of the medical trailer as Coady goes in. Ira follows her in there and finds her taking blood from a little kid. Coady has little nostalgia for the man standing in front of her who shares the face of other men she called her sons. She remembers Susan taking him when he was four, how he screamed. But she’s cold in her recounting. He asks if any of his brothers are left but in lieu of answering she gives him a glitch test, that he doesn’t exactly pass.

Back on the mainland, Sarah is dressed and ready to meet with Len Sipp, but Krystal already has surveillance equipment set up and is ready to go. Sarah tries to protest, but Sipp is already here and she’s already answering the door.

“Knock Knock” Who’s there? “Doctor.” Doctor Who? “Did you hear, the new Doctor is a woman.”

Almost as soon as he’s inside, she starts kissing on him and getting distracted, seeming to forget (or, more likely, not caring) that Sarah and Art are watching and listening from a car outside. Fun fact, Leonard Sipp is played by Tatiana Maslany’s real life partner, Tom Cullen. Embarrassing fact, when I first realized this, I wondered if it was weird for Tatiana to be sitting in a car watching someone else make out with her boyfriend. Then I basically made an Ann Perkins-style face at the non-existant camera on my own self. Krystal is just such a departure from a) all the other clones and b) Tatiana herself that I simply forgot. It will never stop being amazing, I will never stop forgetting she plays all the clones, but it will never stop being embarrassed considering I’ve been not only watching but writing about this show for four years.

Tatiana as Sarah as Krystal watching Tatiana as Krystal make out with Tatiana’s real partner as Leonard Sipp.

At Sarah’s insistence, Krystal pauses the make-out to interrogate Sipp. First she asks why he ghosted her, and when he just laughs, she starts to get annoyed. He says he had to put work first, closing a huge deal, and has been partying for days. When he stops their next make-out to take a phone call, despite Sarah telling her to ease into it, Krystal flat-out asks him about making a deal with DYAD.

Krystal is many things, but subtle isn’t one of them.

Krystal is appalled because they test on bunnies (and humans but whatever) but he doesn’t have anything to say for himself, he just takes his phone call.

While all this is going on, Scott finds out that Bree wasn’t poisoned, she’s just having a reaction to something. Bree confesses that she nicked some lotion from Sipp the last time they were partying together, so Scott tells Art and Sarah.

When Sipp comes back from his call, Krystal says she wants to work together to expose the truth about Big Cosmetics, and thought he wanted that too, but he’s flippant about her blog and mentions a dress she was wearing, and Krystal realizes with sudden certainty that he doesn’t care about her plans and theories at all. She storms into the bathroom, which is when Sarah tells her about the cream to look for.

Out at her vanity in the living room, Sipp finds the cream first, and confronts Krystal about it. But she’s gone full rogue now and when he calls her stupid she kicks him square in the balls then tackles him and it’s amazing.

TOPPLE THE PATRIARCHY

He confesses that the cream was testing a dermal delivery system that works on the cellular level, but that this particular batch had the side effect of hair loss. Pissed, Krystal rubs the cream all over his beard, then kicks him out. Never count out a clone.

On Revival, Ira tells Susan what he saw Coady doing and Susan realizes PT is harvesting the blood of healthy kids which is creepy and weird and like something out of Repo! The Genetic Opera. Ira wants to get the hell out of dodge but Susan needs to stop the madness.

Ira also mentions something Coady brought up, that Susan maybe could have cured Ira of his glitching, but Susan says Cosima is probably the only one who could come up with that cure. Also, they could use Cosima and her relationship with Mud, too, so maybe they should focus on getting Cosima out of the cage.
In a very sad turn of events, little Aisha dies. Everyone is devastated and confused; she was getting better. Between this and the things Cosima has been saying, plus all the stuff with Janis, Mud’s eyes are being opened, and she’s not loving what she’s seeing. She’s very visibly shaken and overwhelmed. She goes downstairs to see Cosima (who is trying to break the wire of her cage with her tiny hands, it’s very cute) and she starts in on the family question again.

She gave it the ol’ Alex Danvers try, though.

Ira comes down too and explains about the kids and the blood draining and Mud finally has her breakdown. She was a junkie (her word) and she stole from her parents and she OD’d, possibly purposefully, and ended up in a coma. She woke up on Revival and felt saved. Cosima asks if she’s here by choice, because Cosima sure isn’t, but Mud doesn’t even know anymore.

PT calls Rachel because he knows Kira isn’t at DYAD, which annoys Rachel to no end, his all-knowingness. She goes to the comfort of her familiarly elegant windows as he passive aggressively tells her to get Kira to DYAD as soon as possible, an implied “or else” punctuating his statement.

“O Windows, my Windows, you are the only ones who have not forsaken me.”

With Mud’s help telling them when PT’s treatments are, Susan comes in while Mud his hooking him up and Mud lets her “help” while actually Susan injects his IV with something untoward. But while she’s finishing up inserting the IV into his arm, PT tells Mud that she’s been a “great comfort” to him, calls her “my child,” and tells her to forgive herself. Which is exactly what Mud needed to hear, this lost, broken girl with no family. It was exactly how to manipulate her into remaining loyal, whether that was his intention or not.

HE’S PROBABLY THE ONE WHO GAVE YOU THE NAME ‘MUD’ THOUGH

While that’s going on upstairs, downstairs Ira is letting Cosima out of her cage, but also glitching all the while. He’s going to go find Susan and go to the boathouse, she’s going to go secure Charlotte and the cure and meet him there. Ira gives Cosima a folder as a “just in case” and when she opens it to look inside, she looks absolutely floored.

“THEY’RE RENEWING THE L WORD?!”

Rachel, having little to no choice, goes to fetch Kira from Mrs. S’s even though it’s late, claiming it’s a sleep study. S tries to tell Rachel how many ways to Sunday she will kick her little arse if she hurts Kira, but Kira says everything’s fine and she’ll go with her aunt. On her way out though, she tells Mrs. S to tell her mum that she’ll keep writing a story, because every day she’s hustling.

When Cosima leaves the med tent, her cure clutched close to her chest, a man attacks her, accusing her of making them her lab rats. She tries to explain that she’s not part of it, that she’s on their side, that all she wants is to take her little sister and leave. (Side note, my heart grows three sizes when Cosima calls Charlotte her sister and so it exploded by the end of this episode.) Knowing this was the “just in case” Ira warned her about, she shows the man her folder, which contains proof that PT is a liar. The proof is a photo of PT and Susan Duncan, looking the same age at the same time, meaning unless he aged twice as fast in the past few decades as he had the “first hundred years” of his life, his hair is big because it’s full of secrets.

With this, they let Cosima take Charlotte and go, and start spreading the truth of Revival, the myth the cult was founded on starting to crumble around them, causing a riot.

Inside, Coady comes in just before PT bites it, interrupting Susan’s grand plan. How is her timing so impeccable, you ask? I’ll tell you. Mud. That one last promise of family made her second-guess her agreement with Ira and Susan, and she told Coady the plan. Mud! Sweet baby angel! You’ve ruined everything.

At the boathouse, Charlotte is nervous, but Cosima assures her that life vests are the bulletproof vests of the sea, so she is a safe fictional lesbian for now. Plus she grew up on boats and knows what she’s doing. Charlotte comments that it doesn’t seem like Ira and Susan are coming, and after a few minutes, Cosima has to agree, and so they head out into the night.

I was going to put lyrics to “I’m on a Boat” here but this shot is too beautiful I think.

Ira goes to get Susan to bring her to the boathouse, but even if Cosima hadn’t left yet, he’d be too late. PT and Coady turned Susan’s plan against her, and hooked her up to her own weaponized IV. Susan Duncan is dead, this time for real.

PT stands by his window and watches his lies burn to the ground, his loyal following dissolving, his cult disbanding. Mud goes outside into this chaos, dumbfounded, and finds the photo evidence. Her eyes are fully open now, there’s no turning away from it anymore. She realizes the truth, and at the same time, she realizes her mistake.

We were rooting for you! We were all rooting for you!

Is there any show more consistently stressful than this one? Is anyone going to be alive by the time those final credits roll? Only four more episodes left, with next week promising the return of at least Donnie and possibly Alison and definitely Helena.

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