Colony recap: A Brave New World

If Colony began in the middle of the action, with lines already drawn and barriers already solidified, then the second episode was a reminder of just how important loyalty and trust are in this brave, new world. Case in point: Will’s friend Carlos (Jacob Vargas), who is ambushed and attacked thanks to helping Will steal fuel cells in the premiere. His wife and son manage to hide in their trailer, but Carlos is taken away. Katie, meanwhile, comes back from “walking the dog” (code word for secret Resistance things, but the dog is actually cute) and tells Bram he’s not going back to school for awhile. She tells him a little bit about his dad’s new gig but basically says they need to put on a face for his younger sister…and that things are about to get complicated, which is probably an understatement. Katie goes to wake up a sleeping Will, who apparently got home really late but looks adorable with bed-head. Will tells Katie they sent him to security headquarters and had him doing boring paperwork, but today, his real job begins. Today, he’s going to meet “the team.” As for his sudden absence at work due to his new job? They’ve explained it by saying he’s gotten promoted as the new driver for the head of sanitation.

Will’s in for a bit of a surprise when he meets “the team”: One, he’s not in charge like he’s expected he’ll be; and two, his boss Phyllis (the always-reliable Kathy Baker) isn’t here to bargain with him. The job of the collaborators is to keep the peace, and the first step in that journey is finding a man named Andrew Hynes (Craig Henningsen) — otherwise known as the guy who planted the IED in the truck that blew up and got Will in trouble in the first place. What else do we take away from this meeting? The badge Will is given is important. Like, super important.

Will gets teamed up with a man named Beau (Carl Weathers), who starts their partnership off on the right foot by offering him his choice of weapon from a stash of firearms. (Always thinking, Will also grabs a six-pack of soda.) But Will really is always thinking, and he’s got a motive: He uses the soda for bribery when they go find the apartment where Andrew’s girlfriend lives because “when you’re scared, you go back to what you know — especially when what you know is your hot girlfriend.” Life advice from Will Bowman, ladies and gentleman. Teresa tells Will she broke up with Andrew a month ago, but Will manages to flush him out, chasing after him when he tries to escape. When Will eventually captures him, the drones appear, though they don’t do anything more than hover before flying away.

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After getting back to headquarters, Will is surprised to find a rightfully angry Carlos in lock-up. Will’s guilt causes him to cave, admitting everything about his true identity, but that only makes things worse, even though Will promises he’ll get Carlos out. He brings his case to Phyllis, who makes it clear that she’ll help him, though something tells me that we shouldn’t take everything she says at face value. He comes home worried and anxious after not being able to find Carlos’ family, but there’s at least some good news waiting: Carlos’ family is hiding out at the Bowman’s residence. They need to be hidden better, though — new IDs, protection, the works. Will uses his new car and his new badge to get them help from their connections, where he tells Katie about Phyllis. His master plan? Work his way up the food chain, find Geronimo, and then get Charlie back. Yep, totally doable.

NEXT: Katie’s got a new job, too

While Will is off bribing people with luxuries, Katie takes a trip to the bar she used to run. The Yonk hasn’t been open for quite awhile (as evidenced by the box she takes out that’s filled with photographs, including a baseball from Charlie), and she’s interrupted by Broussard, who mentions over complimentary whiskey that he needs her to get information from Will about Andrew. When Katie meets up with her other Resistance friends later on, she learns two other important nuggets of information: They have contact with Geronimo, and the reason the Resistance wants Andrew so badly is that he used to be affiliated with them before he splintered off. In other words, he knows too much, and that’s something the Resistance can’t deal with, given that they’re close to executing an operation that might give them a chance to end the Occupation for good.

Will returns to the Department of Homeland Security to find that all the prisoners have been moved to the Factory. He freaks out, but Phyllis is unconcerned — decisions will always be made by people higher up on the food chain — doesn’t Will know that by now? She does, at least, let him in on the fact that the buses haven’t left yet, which gives Will a chance to say goodbye to his friend. It doesn’t matter that Will managed to take care of Carlos’ wife and kid because, as Carlos reminds Will, thanks to him, his family no longer has a father. This plays into one of the strongest scenes of the episode, when a dejected and guilt-ridden Will returns home for another late-night chat with Katie. If I wasn’t sold on the chemistry between Holloway and Callies before (and make no mistake, I was), this scene would have done it for me. In the same way Lost’s best moments came about because of its characters and relationships, Colony’s strongest moments are when it becomes a family show rather than an alien-invasion show, and I look forward to seeing more of these dynamics play out.

Their moment is interrupted by Will getting a call alerting him that their suspect broke out, and Katie stealthily picks up on the information being relayed to her husband. When Will leaves, she runs to a pay phone and tells Broussard what she overheard: Andrew’s being taken “where hacienda meets the wall.” Will arrives at the designated spot along with Beau and finds that Andrew (along with others) have already been taken care of. Beau is confused, but Will finds the message in blood written on the wall — Geronimo — and realizes they must have had a leak. Obviously, Will doesn’t know yet that his loving wife is the leak that’s putting his own operation in danger, but as Katie says, “We live in a moment where we do what we have to do for the people we love.”

Loyalty and trust, indeed.

Bacon Bits:

• While we’re still not sure what the real purpose of the Factory is, we certainly start to get an idea — from the stripping of the clothes to the being ushered into tight spaces with bright lights and blaring sirens, the place seems very akin to a concentration camp. (I’m assuming that when Snyder brought Will up to the roof to watch “the light show” last week, this is what they were watching.) The whole scene is rightfully chilling, a reminder that even though this is a sci-fi show, most of its human elements are very, very real.
• We learn a little bit more about Katie’s sister Maddie (her husband was in New York for work when the arrival happened; she stayed behind with her son) when she reacquaints herself with an old friend, George (Brian White), at a fancy party where Maddie is working as a server. George invites her back to his (very nice) house in the canyon and despite a clearly successful night, it seems like the two are going to have to try the Romeo and Juliet route if they want to continue seeing each other. (She doesn’t live in the green zone, and there are unwritten rules about that.) When the season began, I was concerned about the show setting up Maddie as a throwaway character, so I’m pleasantly surprised to see that she seems to be getting her own story that will play out over the course of the season.
• Will Bowman apparently sleeps the way I do.
• “Your daddy was just jealous of my motorcycle. And my hair.” “We’re all jealous of your hair.”