Episode Title: “Single Strand”
Story: Cameron Porsandeh
Teleplay: Javier Grillo-Marxuach
Director: Duane Clark
Previously on “Helix”
The myopic premise of ‘Helix’ has started to show the wear on its treads very early on this season. Partly because “the virus” has been portrayed in media to the point of gross overuse. When I think of great works that made the premise work, I rarely thinking of a motion medium. I think of Jeff Lemire’s Sweet Tooth comic series, Stephen King’s The Stand, and I think of Justin Cronin’s The Passage. All three of those stories are exceptionally well written, and they display a characteristic that ‘Helix’ and many of Syfy’s other shows lack: emotional involvement.
As day four begins, the claustrophobia of location makes it feel like it’s still day one. It’s clear now that ‘Helix’ will have a steady time lapse protocol, similar to a show like “24.” Now that level R is sealed off, the infected have come to the realization that they’re most likely stuck down there forever. Dr. Julia Walker (Kyra Zagorsky) is the only one that doesn’t buy it, and she’s wrong. Even in her current state, she tries to be the voice of reason, which leads to her banishment… to the hallway! That sounds a bit more intimidating in my head, with that booming omniscient voice. In her haste, she does find someone else down there with her in a creepy looking gas mask that stepped right out of World War II. She remains there, largely forgotten for the rest of the episode.
Dr. Sarah Jordan’s (Jordan Hayes) story this week is also largely forgotten. She finally comes to the realization that her test for the virus has a false positive. Her biggest development comes when the an infected patient she’s trying to keep from ending up in level R exposes that she has a tumor. Sarah’s character to this point seems completely unnecessary; her traits are composed of amateurism, inexperience, and a tumor. Yes, Arnold, it really is a tumor. But again, that lack of emotional involvement renders her story meaningless.
The infected somehow have a plan to cut off the oxygen supply in the complex. Amazingly, there is a subplot device… I mean, a control that shuts off the clean oxygen control for the whole facility, introducing large amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. When this is done, the entire cast ignores the urgency of the matter; starving people of oxygen tends to be a really big problem! In two hours, CO2 poisoning sets in and in six, there is this irreversible thing called death that happens.
Dr. Hiroshi Hatake (Hiroyuki Sanda) and Daniel (Meegwun Fairbrother) the burly security guard confront the infected and convince them to turn the oxygen back on. Hatake follows this up with a useless gesture and shoots all three of the scientists. The scene is designed to unleash the maximum amount of impact. However, it’s a lost cause considering he could have just shot them in the first place. It feels more and more like the writers don’t know how to tell an emotional story, so they’re forced to create situations to trick the audience into making them feel emotions built on false pretenses. It proves to be largely amateur.
Television at its worse shows the audience that it knows entirely too much, but forces you to be ignorant of that fact. In the case of ‘Helix,’ it’s because of the shows deliberately slow pace. Scenes where Major Sergio Balleseros (Mark Ghanimé) and Dr. Hatake discuss the makings of the virus, or in this weeks installment, the motivations of the military to be in the arctic in the first place, beg an explanation. Why would you show your audience this if you were only going to backtrack a few scenes later with the same character.
Balleseros doesn’t entirely come out and say it, but it’s obvious that the Army would have an interest in weaponizing the virus. When Balleseros later appears in scenes with Dr. Doreen Boyle (Catherine Lemieux), as she reveals information that is already know to the audience, the scenes become a figurative form of waterboarding. At least give us something new that we can go on! It gives me the feeling that the shows creators are actively testing the intelligence levels of its audience to make obvious observations.
Dr. Boyle’s death isn’t entirely unwanted. Lemieux’s acting has been all over the place since episode one. At first, her reserved manner was something to look forward to in the first two episodes. In these last couple, it’s like she suddenly figured out that she looks a little like Melissa McCarthy, and the character could benefit from sporadic tics. When you’re a CDC scientist working to combat a serious virus, it has a tendency to diffuse the seriousness of the problem. Her death was a desired outcome; it had to happen for the sake of Hitaki’s purposes, but it also had to happen for the sanity of the viewer to remain intact.
Dr. Alan Farragut (Billy Campbell) provides the only emotional development in this episode. Great art, whether it’s a painting, novel, or in this case, a television show, provides a path for its intended audience find a way in. Emotion has always created the widest berth for entry, and so far, ‘Helix’ has failed to provide that key element. “Single Strand” redeems itself a little when Alan chooses to use SODRA on his brother, Dr. Peter Farragut (Neil Napier).
Alan is as weak a character as any on the show, but he seems to be able to balance the role between CDC scientist and concerned human better than any other character. When the anti-virus works, Peter comes to, a little delusional, but the scenes he shares with Alan are great. Where they ruin it is when the anti-virus eventually fails, Peter flat lines, but Alan decides that hooking him up to a ventilator is a good idea. He’s a doctor, he knows this is just prolonging the inevitable.
‘Helix’ could be a great show; I want to like it, but it lacks faith in itself. It follows the road it does because the word Syfy appears in the lower left hand corner of every episode. What the Pilot did get right was presenting the real world dangers of infection. It wasn’t the actual virus that did this, instead it was the story Dr. Alan Farragut told about a Cholera outbreak to new CDC agents. A virus is scary enough without tacking terms like “living virus” and visuals like black blood to them. When realism is removed, you’ve lost all sense of what danger is and what it can be. ‘Helix’ is lost on me, and I have a feeling I’m not the only one.
