Reverie – The Black Mandala

By starrymag | July 24, 2018

By: Jessica Wolff

 

Paul Hammond (Sendhil Ramamurthy) leads Mara Kint (Sarah Shahi) through a forest Reverie. He stands on a tree stump and leans off it without falling. Mara asks how he’s doing it, and Paul explains that he’s been working on being able to defy gravity in Reverie for weeks. She reminds him that he said flying wasn’t possible, and he explains that the reality of the real world holds people back in the Reverie.

 

Paul tells her that he needs to remember that none of this is real, and asks Mara to help remind him. Mara reminds him that none of this is real as he manages to levitate in the air. Paul is excited, but crashes back to the ground when looking down at the ground. Mara helps him up, and they laugh about it.

 

Paul exits the Reverie, but the room starts flickering, and a strange looking door appears in front of Mara. Mara opens the door and finds herself in a deserted warehouse and the door disappears behind her. Someone calls out for help, and Paul realizes that Mara never exited the Reverie. Mara finds Ehmet Alwald (Ben J. Pierce) handcuffed to a chair in a cell.

 

Speaking through a slot on the door, she identifes herself and Ehmet asks for her help to get out of there. Mara fails to open the door, and Ehmet asks where he is, explaining that he was blindfolded and taken there. She asks if he’s ever heard of Reverie, and explains that none of this is real. Ehmet doesn’t believe her, and tells her that the military demanded information on an air base attack.

 

Mara promises to help him and tells him to say “Exodus,” to leave. However, nothing happens when Ehmet says it and he accuses her of lying. Mara tries to leave the program, but nothing happens. The Reverie starts glitching, and Mara promises Ehmet she’ll return. Mara goes back to the door room and exits the Reverie. Paul asks where she was, and Mara replies that she doesn’t know.

 

Mara tells Paul, Alexis Barrett (Jessica Lu), and Charlie Ventana (Dennis Haysbert) what happened, and insists that Ehmet was not just an avatar. She explains that Ehmet was being interrogated, and Charlie asks how Mara ended up in this Reverie. Alexis and Paul explain that it’s a rare occurrence where two Reveries are crossed. Mara asks them if they can find the Reverie again and send her directly into it. Paul mentions that they would have to figure out the other user, and Mara asks Dylan (Kai Scott) to search for Ehmet.

 

Dylan tells her that Ehmet is a very common name in Turkey, and Paul suggests narrowing down the search by searching for people named Ehmet who are considered missing. Charlie is hesitant about looking into this case, but Mara tells him she promised she would return. Mara identifies the picture of Ehmet on a missing poster, and Dylan explains that he was a Syrian refugee detained at the airport. Dylan tells Mara that the missing poster was created by Ehmet’s brother, Kareem Alwad (Deniz Akdeniz), and Paul and Alexis identify the IP address of the Reverie as one owned by the military.

 

Monica Shaw (Kathryn Morris) questions how they learned of the program, and explains there’s a pilot program to interrogate people using Reverie. Alexis tells her that Reverie wasn’t designed for that, but Charlie suggests that the military can rough up suspects in Reverie without any consequences. Monica insists the program is supervised, but Alexis argues that they can hurt someone if they don’t know what they’re doing. Monica replies that they have a tight window to interrogate suspects, and argues that there’s nothing they can do due to their signed contract. Charlie reminds Monica that she claimed to want to use Reverie to help treat PTSD, but Monica tells him that she doesn’t run the defense department.

 

Mara gets a call from Chris Condera (Sam Jaeger), who asks to talk later. Paul tells Mara that the military altered the Reverie code, and Alexis enters ranting about Monica. Alexis declares that she’s in on helping Ehmet and takes control of Paul’s desk. Mara shows Paul that an airbase was attacked months ago by radicalized Syrian refugees, and that Ehmet is believed to be a suspect. Paul asks Mara if she’s sure they’re helping someone who deserves it, but Mara believes in Ehmet’s innocence and asks Paul to figure out where Ehmet is being held.

 

Alexis tells Mara that she’s figured a way in and out of the Reverie with something known as the Black Mandala. She warns Mara that the military’s altered code will bring surprises, and Mara attempts and fails to enter the program. Mara asks what’s going on, and Paul realizes that more than two users can’t be in the Reverie at the same time. In the Reverie, Ehmet calls out to Mara as the door opens, but Drew Sullivan (Mac Brandt) steps inside and asks who Mara is.

 

Mara meets with Kareem, and reports that Ehmet is not physically hurt. She tells him that she’s committed to rescuing Ehmet, and comments on their English. Kareem tells her their father studied at the University of Michigan, but he was killed during their escape from Syria. Mara tells him that Ehmet is suspected of terrorism, but Kareem tells her Ehmet is terrified of violence and that they were running away from terrorists.

 

Paul calls Mara and tells her that the Reverie is open when she returns. He explains that the voice commands won’t work and the only way to exit is through the mandala. Alexis warns her to be careful and Mara goes back into the Reverie. Mara calls out to Ehmet and breaks through the door with a tool. Once she frees his handcuffs, Ehmet picks up the tool and holds it in defense. He tells her that Sullivan told him she was lying, but Mara continues to emphasize that none of this is real. Ehmet runs and Mara chases him through the warehouse.

 

Monica and Sullivan arrive at Onira Tech and tell Charlie they need to talk about Mara. Sullivan tells the group that a rogue user has inserted herself into the program, but Paul and Alexis play dumb. He warns them that obstructing the investigation will link them with the terrorist plot, but Charlie argues that Ehmet is just a boy. Sullivan threatens to press charges against them if they don’t tell him where Mara is, and Paul suggests Mara went to the aquarium. Alexis chastises Sullivan for destroying Ehmet’s mind with her program. Monica warns them that she can’t protect them, and Charlie has Monica confirm that this is about the terrorist attack.

 

Paul compliments Alexis for standing up to Sullivan, and Alexis shows him that she also hacked Sullivan’s phone. In the Reverie, Mara searches for Ehmet and finds him huddling in a supply closet. Mara promises she won’t hurt him, and Ehmet admits he doesn’t know what to believe. She assures him that she’s real and uses details from her conversation with Kareem to get him to trust her. Mara comments that Kareem reminds her of someone that she’s open up to and asks him to put his trust in her. Ehmet agrees and they walk back to the Mandala. However, they find two guards in front of it when they return.

 

Kareem tells Charlie that there’s no way that Ehmet could be involved in the terrorist attack, as they were in a refugee camp at the time. Charlie asks if there’s any proof they were there, and Kareem mentions that there were some journalists there taking photographs of the camp. Charlie asks Paul and Alexis to use Dylan to help find evidence of Ehmet and Kareem being at the camp, and Paul reports that Mara hasn’t left the Reverie yet.

 

In the Reverie, Ehmet asks if the guards can hurt them, and Mara admits it’s possible. Mara suggests that they find a way to separate the guards and take them out individually, but Ehmet suggests that he should just go back to his cell and be the terrorist they want him to be. Ehmet explains that he was detained like a criminal despite having never done anything criminal in his life and that they didn’t listen to him. He recounts his escape from Syria, and Mara tells him that his father fought for him to escape and wouldn’t want him to stay there.

 

Mara and Ehmet grab some supplies from the closet and Mara lures a guard into Ehmet’s cell with a flashlight before knocking him out and locking him in. They find the path to the mandala clear, but a glitch creates a wide gap in the floor. The other guard shoots at them and Mara pushes them into a room where Ehmet sees that Mara has been shot in the abdomen. Ehmet asks what’s happening, and Mara guesses they built a safeguard to prevent them from leaving. Mara insists that the wound isn’t real, and the guard knocks on the door.

 

Dylan’s search finds no results, and Paul reports that Mara is stressed in the Reverie. Charlie asks Kareem to figure out another way to clear Ehmet’s name, reminding him his life is at stake. Kareem mentions a journalist that was filming the camp, and that he and Ehmet tried to get into the background of her shots. Charlie asks Anne Fox (Georgia Dolenz) if she remembers Ehmet and Kareem, but she doesn’t. He asks her to look in her footage for them, but Fox tells her that there’s too much footage and Charlie introduces Fox to Dylan.

 

Ehmet determines that the guard is still out there, and asks why Mara can’t stop the bleeding. Mara hypothesizes that it’s the difference between what she knows and what she believes. Ehmet asks what happens if she dies in here, and Mara doesn’t want to find out. Mara believes that the guard is there for her and hypothesizes that Ehmet can’t get hurt. She turns herself in to the guard and distracts him long enough for Ehmet to sneak up and push him into the gap.

 

Ehmet gets a long wooden plank from the supply closet and puts it over the gap. Mara is too weak to cross on her own, and Ehmet reluctantly puts her on his back. She talks him through the crossing, having him repeat that none of it is real. They cross the pit, and Mara tells him that touching the mandala will bring them back to the real world. Ehmet is scared of seeing Sullivan again, but Mara tells him to be strong for Kareem and his father and promises to come back for him.

 

They both touch the mandala, and Paul welcomes Mara back. He tells her they’ve found Ehmet’s location, and she is relieved. Mara tries to sit up and realizes that there’s a bruise where she was shot in the Reverie. She asks if this has happened before, but Paul tells her it hasn’t. Charlie and Alexis go to Sullivan and show him footage of Ehmet and Kareem in the background that proves Ehmet’s innocence. Charlie asks Sullivan how torturing an innocent teenager will look, but Sullivan tells them they’re wasting his time. Monica comes over and tells Sullivan that she’s passed on the footage to his superiors and they are now questioning using the program.

 

Mara and Ehmet reunite at Onira Tech, and Ehmet thanks her for saving his life. She insists they saved each other, and compliments his strength. Ehmet reunites with Kareem, and Monica tells Charlie that they’re suspending the program. Charlie presents his theory that Monica crossed the Reveries on purpose to make Mara aware of the program and work to shut it down, but Monica denies it. Mara tells Chris about her day, believing that being part of the team has been good for her and that things are changing. She tells him that she’s ready for whatever comes and they make out on the couch.