CONTINUUM Bangs Our Heads Together

Episode 110 “End Time”

It’s the season finale, which means everything gets amped up.

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

This is the episode that answers some questions, while at the same time setting up new ones. Especially for Kiera Cameron, who’s starting to realize that there’s more going on than she thought, and that gets back to the underlying question of the whole season: who’s right?

Kiera, ostensibly, is our heroine — on the side of the law, with a fierce desire to do what’s right, to deliver justice and make the bad guys pay. But if you look at the system she serves, you have to wonder if she’s not on the wrong side of this. That maybe — just maybe — Libr8 has it right and is justified in their questioning of the government in 2077.

Granted, their methods are wrong. That’s a completely separate issue, and one that plays better in 2012, because here Kiera’s just a cop on a mission to stop bad guys from killing innocents. At its base level, this is Kiera against terrorists. No doubt about it, they’re terrorists. Despite their values or goals or stated belief structure, they’re killing people. If they were “right” in the sense that they’re the ones who have the better way of doing things, then why not use the opportunity to change the system from the inside using the knowledge they have from the future? The easy answer is that there’d be no drama that way, and we’d have a boring show.

But there’s still that grey area that allows us to wonder just who we should be rooting for.

And then there’s the underlying question of whether or not this whole thing has been planned out from the very start — the time travel, the inclusion of Kiera, the landing so close to Alec 2012, the timing just before Julian launched Theseus. All of it seems to be one of these Battlestar Galactica memes — “all this has happened, and will happen again” — like the future history of 2077 is already a tampered time stream.

Because Libr8 is influential on Julian, who’s influential on Libr8. It’s one of these “chicken or egg” causality loops that can give you a headache if you think about it too much. Kagame has conversations in 2012 that are reminiscent of conversations he had in 2077 — only on the opposite side of things. Something he mentions to Alec 2012 after taking him prisoner. Kagame makes the case that this whole thing was Alec‘s idea — Alec 2077, that is. And since we still don’t know what was in that message he sent to himself, we have to wonder just how true this is. Was the time travel Alec’s brainchild? The idea to go back to the past to create Theseus?

Or is Alec 2077 making all of this happen because he knows it already has and has to play out this way? If that’s the case, then how does Kiera fit in?

Because all she wants to do is stop the bad guys and get home. Only she’s got to be wondering if she’s making changes in the present that are big enough to have repercussions on the future — her present. Will it be the same? A topic of conversation between her and Jason, someone who also claims to be from 2077. But how did he get here? He says he’s been here for years, waiting for 2012 to roll around. He’s clearly got issues, and his “time travel device” looks like a TARDIS console made from lawn chairs. Heart-breaking for Kiera, and Rachel Nichols plays the scene beautifully as she realizes Jason’s machine won’t work, and he’s crazy.

Or is he? Because he clearly knows about the future. And it stands to reason that for the one super-important time travel event to happen without a hitch, the equipment would have been tested a few times, right? Which means how many other people from 2077 may have been sent back to various points in time?

Kagame is an idealist, certainly, but he’s also a pragmatist, and we see that with the errand he gives Sonya — taking money to his mother just as he’s born. Which is something he doesn’t share with the others, and that has Travis feeling a bit paranoid. Because big Travis doesn’t like being left out, because he’s had a taste of being In Charge, and he would still like to be in the leadership role, despite how he may feel about Kagame. And Sonya keeping secrets from him? Not cool.

Of course, the biggest secret she’s keeping comes to bite him in the neck, doesn’t it? With Kagame going off to make the Ultimate Sacrifice, someone has to take over the 2012-era Libr8 cell, and Travis is too much of a loose cannon. He’s demonstrated that already, with his murder of Kellog’s grandmother in defiance of Kagame’s orders. And don’t actually see Sonya shoot Travis in the head, so it’s possible he’s in the waiting room with Agent Coulson… Nah. He’s dead. Pretty sure of it.

Meanwhile, Kiera has another federal snoop poking around her “Section 6” credentials, and just as things seem to be going from bad to worse in that department, there’s this whole bombing situation to deal with. 2077 history has a massive bomb going off, killing thousands and beginning the Theseus movement. Julian is bait, of course, and Kiera has to figure out which building to scramble while at the same time try to figure out just how to get this new agent off her back.

And let’s not forget, Kiera told Carlos a little too much when she thought he was dying after being gut-shot. Yes, he was almost in a coma. Yes, he was one foot in the grave and about to tip over (great recuperative powers, though!), and we know he was half-delirious. But he’s a top shelf detective, and that’s got to count for something, right? Just how good is his memory? How much will Kiera’s confession come into play when Carlos has had a chance to sit down and really think about it in the opening moments of season two?

Of course, they get it wrong and the building goes down. Kagame, dressed as a cop, makes it into the building and Kiera can’t stop him in time. So history repeats itself, and Kiera is left to wonder if she can’t make any kind of difference in this time, then what good is it for her to be here?

Fortunately, the mysterious “Mr. Escher” is just a phone call away, and he’s managed to pull the federales off her scent for a while. He’s her supervisor at Section 6? Wha-huh? A new question, and a new mysterious figure to play into the second season, which will begin just after Alec 2012 telling Kiera he knows why she got sent back.

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