Zoo – Cradles and Graves

By: Patience Kapfer

After Abigail (Athena Karkanis) went on a rampage last week, we jump into this week’s episode hoping that all of our beloved characters aren’t dead or at the very least that Clementine (Gracie Dzienny) can save them. With Clementine just emerging from the tank, she is obviously confused and anxious, especially realizing she is completely alone with her father nowhere to be found. She goes to the door and attempts to push it open, but of course it’s stuck thus impeding her abilities to get to her father and friends. Meanwhile, in IADG headquarters in Colorado, Dariela (Alyssa Diaz) tries to no avail to get through to anyone on the plane as more beacons fire up all over the world.

Finally, Clementine manages to push the door open only to be met with Jackson’s (James Wolk) unresponsive body on the ground. Hoping to save him, Clementine hurries to the lab to find anyone else who can help her, but instead finds Abe (Nonso Anozie) lying in a pool of his own blood. Then, to her utmost horror, she finds Jamie (Kristen Connolly), Max (Robin Thomas) and her father (Billy Burke) all with gunshot wounds. She calls for outside help and while waiting for them to arrive she hears another voice on the plane shouting for help – it’s Sam (Delon de Metz). Grateful to have Sam back in her life and to not be alone during such a traumatic situation, Clementine rushes back to Jamie’s side. An almost incoherent Jamie murmurs that Abigail is responsible for all of the bloodshed on the plane. Just as Clementine finally gets in contact with Dariela, the paramedics arrive at the plane and Sam hurries to let them on board. Right in the nick of time Dariela warns them that the air is contaminated with hybrid spores and they cannot under any circumstances open the door. Sadly, at that very instant, the paramedic meets a gruesome end.

In an innovative effort to save her friends, Clementine removes the fluid from the stasis tank and brings it back to use to heal them. She tells Sam that the fluid was able to save Mitch in the past and also save her and the baby so it will at least keep them alive until help can arrive. The solution needs to go into their lungs in order to speed up their recovery. Thankfully for Clementine’s quick thinking, everyone’s wounds are no longer extremely life threatening and now they can devise a concrete plan to keep the spores from getting inside the plane and dealing with the beacons. And since there is never a calm moment, it is precisely then that Clem’s water breaks. But even going into labor isn’t going to stop Clementine from helping her friends keep the plane safe; at 2cm dilated she takes Sam to help find a way to keep the spores from getting inside the plane before help can arrive.

The fluid from the stasis tank can only help so much and Abe’s second chest wound becomes too much for him to bear. Mitch and Max work to patch up Abe and Mitch is rightfully irritated that Abe injected Clementine with hybrid serum without at least telling him first. After saving Abe, Max looks at Mitch’s gunshot wound and asks about the other scars that Mitch obtained from the island and as Mr. Duncan. This elicits another bonding session that brings the father and son even closer; they’ve made so much progress from the beginning of this season when Mitch couldn’t even hear the word “grandpa.”

Unfortunately, the group finds out that Jamie didn’t switch Mitch back from Mr. Duncan when she originally had the chance and instead was using him to kill Abigail since no one else would do it. Not only is Mitch positively furious with Jamie, but so is Jackson. He locks her in a cell so, as he puts it, “she will be the first to know when the spores get in.” Mitch later goes to Jamie’s cell where she tries to explain why she didn’t turn him back to Mitch right away. He then asks her if she thinks he’s mad that she almost got Clem and everyone else killed, to which he responds that he’s “not mad because he’s not anything to her anymore.” He further explains that she was once the person he thought he could trust, but now she’s the darkness.

Jackson contacts Dariela and tells her there must be a way to turn the beacon off, to somehow disconnect its power source. She connects him to a live feed of the beacon in Tokyo; it’s huge and it’s impossible to get even a few feet from the beacon. Jackson directs them to cut the cable providing the beacon with power, but this causes a massive explosion that makes them lose not only the video feed, but the entire city of Tokyo! After losing Tokyo, Jackson feels like there is nothing else he can do and he’s failed to help save the world and make things right again. He calls Tessa (Hilary Jardine) to tell her that he couldn’t stop Abigail and that the beacons are all going off and the hybrids are set to attack. He then asks Tessa to find Abigail and put a stop to this once and for all since the team that was supposed to come help them just blew up in Tokyo. Tessa goes to the IAGD headquarters and calls Jackson to look at the code again as an Oz, instead of simply as Jackson – there must be something he didn’t notice before that could help them with the beacons.

Clementine finally goes completely into labor and Sam talks to her about the night they met to keep her calm, while Mitch and Max also do their best to keep her heartbeat under control. By the time Abe comes to help, Clementine is convinced there is something wrong. Abe fears there could be a blood clot pressing down on the baby so they need to force labor, but that is also dangerous for Clementine and the baby.

Max leaves Clementine, Abe and Mitch to go change the filter to keep the spores out of the plane, but we know this will expose him to the deadly spores. While Max changes the filter Clementine gives birth to her son and Max can hear the baby cry in the distance as his toximeter turns red-oh no, oh no. With a changed filter they are finally able to power the plane back on and perform an ultrasound to determine that the blood clot has passed and Clementine is safe. They realize that Max has been missing for far too long and Mitch goes to find him, by the time he gets to his father he has collapsed, but is still alive. Max tells Mitch to tell the baby he says hello, but Mitch is insistent that Max will tell the baby himself. Mitch places the baby in Max’s arms, and with tears in his eyes he dies while holding his great grandson (Zoo, you really hit me in the feels this week). In the final scene Mitch tells Jamie that Clementine had the baby that is going to save the whole world and forgives her for what she did.