Mark Watches ‘Alias’: S05E10 – S.O.S.

In the tenth episode of the fifth season of Alias, I can’t do this. THIS SHOW IS SO MUCH. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Alias.

Trigger Warning: For nonconsensual drugging, body horror, tension/horror around pregnancy. 

HELP I MADE A JOKE AND IT BECAME REAL.

Grace

Seriously, the video for this episode is great solely because I thought I was being witty as hell by joking that Tom was breaking into WITSEC to finally find a story for his character. I DID NOT REALIZE THAT WAS ACTUALLY GOING TO HAPPEN. I admit that I still think it’s a problem that we’ve gone so long before getting any details about his life prior to APO. Even if that was because it was all part of a secret identity, the show could have lied to us, too. Just… anything? Any detail whatsoever? So is the reveal that his name is really Peter and that he worked for another organization the detail that Arvin and Jack said they’d have to work around? Maybe? I don’t fucking know, y’all. WHO IS THE CARDINAL. Why isn’t Peter/Tom all that upset about his wife dying? WHAT IS HAPPENING.

Inside Job

I think that when Alias is all said and done, when I finally watch the last minutes of the series finale, I’ll still come back to one thing as one of my favorite aspects of the show: Jack Bristow escalating things way too far and in ways in which he can never come back from. Let me remind you that twice in one season, he killed people and then immediately revived them in order to satisfy some endgame. TWICE IN ONE SEASON!!! Yet in “S.O.S.,” Jack somehow tops himself by:

  • Calling a meeting with the top 7 people within the CIA who have Alpha Black clearance.
  • Placing a device on the door to prevent it from being opened.
  • IMMEDIATELY TELLING ALL SEVEN PEOPLE THAT THE MEETING IS FAKE AND HE DID IT TO CONFRONT THEM ABOUT WHICH OF THEM IS PROPHET FIVE.
  • (Seriously, he wastes no time.) 
  • When they don’t identify themselves, he has Marshall call them. 
  • When one man’s phone rings
  • he
  • shoots
  • him
  • IMMEDIATELY
  • WITH NO WARNING OR CHANCE TO FESS UP
  • JUST STRAIGHT-UP SHOOTS HIM
  • And when he doesn’t give up Sydney’s location, he shoots him again.
  • Then he bashes his nose in.
  • HE IS IN LANGLEY’S HQ THE WHOLE TIME, MIND YOU.
  • He does all of this in front of multiple witnesses, knowing that he’ll be arrested or fired or a million other negative things, and he 
  • does
  • not
  • care
  • at
  • all

Jack Bristow, y’all.

Freighter

Can anyone in a J.J. Abrams project have, like, a normal pregnancy? Is that possible? I can’t even get pregnant, and this shit stresses me out. I felt so much dire urgency and terror in all these scenes, and I know it’s partially because these people were taking advantage of Sydney at her most vulnerable. It enraged me! Y’all, her doctor was the worst part. That pissed me off more than anything, because you’re supposed to be able to trust your medical professional with your body, and THAT DOCTOR VIOLATED THAT. That doesn’t mean the rest of these people are off the hook; they’re just as terrible.

And for what? I admit that I was surprised by the twist at the end of “S.O.S.” I fully expected that Prophet Five was going to take Sydney’s child and move them to that creepy nursery. (Ostensibly in a new location, of course.) They just wanted to protect Sydney and the child? That’s… not comforting, actually. It’s the opposite. See, they still have some interest in that child, and maybe they’re just stalling for later. They need that child to be born. WHICH MEANS WHAT??? What does that lead to? WHY ARE PROPHET FIVE SO OBSESSED WITH SYDNEY. 

Oh, I’m so worried. 

The video for “S.O.S.” can be downloaded here for $0.99. 

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About Mark Oshiro

Perpetually unprepared since '09.
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