This week on a very special episode of 12 Monkeys…
“The Cassandra Complex” or Episode 3 for those keeping count was my favorite episode of 12 Monkeys so far. It did not spoon feed us, but I felt a little less confused and over stimulated by the end. Typically, I feel like I am on information overload. By the third episode, the pacing of the information (i.e. time travel rules, character basic histories, the history of the in-show universe) seemed to find itself and work out timing kinks. Instead of feeling overloaded, I was able to become absorbed by the thriller/mystery portion of the plot. I actually felt shocked back into reality when the end credits started to roll!
Once again, a smart choice was made in naming the episode. The Cassandra Complex, or the Cassandra Metaphor, refers to valid warnings being ignored. It originates in Greek mythology. Cassandra, the daughter of Priam, the King of Troy, was given the gift of prophecy by Apollo. When she rebuffed his advances, Apollo placed a curse upon her. She would keep the gift of prophecy, but no one would listen to her warnings.
Cassandra (Amanda Schull) is questioned about Jennifer Goines who was kidnapped from the mental hospital the same day that she signed Cole out. Cassandra manages to get more information from the poor man’s Scully that is questioning her and finds out that there was a survivor from the Goines lab massacre. As chance would have it, Cassandra remembered the doctor, Henri (Lyriq Bent). Cassandra had worked with the Center for Disease Control and Prevention when an unknown virus struck Haiti in 2014. During a quarantine, pain medicines and antibiotics were stolen by a local gang desperate to save make a profit and maybe save themselves. As a local doctor, Henri knew of a place where he could quickly obtain replacements. The detective revealed that he was shot that day and never returned with the medicine.
Once Cole (Aaron Stanford) finds out about Henri, he is certain the doctor can tell him the location of the Goines’ “Night Lab” — the secret lab where the virus started. Cole wants to travel back to Haiti to question Henri, but Jones and the other scientists in charge of the mission, are not sure exactly where to send him. Should they send him to Haiti to question Henri or to 1987 where Leland Goines had encountered Cole ranting about The Army of the 12 Monkeys? Haiti won out, but it presented two dangers. Jones warned that Cole would encounter temporal and electromagnetic anomalies due to solar flare activity. He also had to steer clear of Cassandra. In Cassandra’s timeline, working in Haiti was after Cole kidnapped her, but before she met him in the hotel two years after the kidnapping when he stumbled in after splintering and narrowly escaping death. If Cassandra from the past encountered Cole, she may never go to the hotel to meet him and would not be there to save his life from the gunshot wound. Cole seems to be drawn to Cassandra like a magnet.
Cole manages to speak to Henri, after a near miss encounter with Cassandra (!) and finds out the Henri does not know the location of the Night Lab, but says that it was a burn lab, equipped with special equipment that emitted powerful UVs that would destroy the lab if the wrong virus got out. If Cole can trace the equipment he will be led to the lab. Then, in a calculated move, Cole shot Henri. Perhaps he knew the Pallid Man (Tom Noonan) would extract the same information from Henri and then kill him anyway. Maybe it was always Cole who shot Henri to keep him from being captured by the Army of the 12 Monkeys, tortured, and shot. Although he is supposed to be our “hero,” it is still hard to trust Cole.
Cole did encounter the Pallid Man in Haiti. In addition to being incredibly creepy and evil, he seems to have some sort of super human strength. Cole did get a few jabs in and even cut his cheek. Even though I have trouble trusting Cole, the writers have already successfully created a kinship between the audience and Cole. All during the struggle, I was rooting for him.
Characters deal with adversity in different ways. Sometimes, they become stoic and strong, building a wall between them and everyone else. Cassandra, however, let her kidnapping completely take over her life. Cole and his story of a global pandemic so impacted her life that she panicked and thought it was starting in Haiti. She wanted everyone on alert and if anyone left the quarantine, she wanted them to be shot. Instead of dealing with the kidnapping and processing Cole’s warnings, she became a workaholic. By drowning herself in her work, she could avoid life and also strive to locate the virus and contain it before it spread.
A subplot is developing in the 2043 scenes. Outside of the facility, Ramse (Kirk Acevedo) has found a knife and later encounters a woman (Romina D’Ugo) from his and Cole’s past. She is seeking shelter, but Ramse tries to blow her off. He does not want endanger the shelter and “three squares” he and Cole have been getting. Hopefully, we will find out more about their past in the next episode. It is also interesting to get a glimpse at the social and political ideas of the survivors and scavengers. Some stick to the woods and live a rogue lifestyle, banding together to live and struggle from day to day. Meanwhile the survivors have formed towns and seem to be a more accepted lifestyle.
Keep an eye out for funnies in this episode from both Cassandra and Jones (Barbara Sukowa). The zingers are far and few between, but they cut some of the seriousness down and are worth the wait.