‘The 100’ season 4, episode 1 review: Clarke feels “science is their only hope” to save earth
We are back with “The 100” season 4 and the last time we saw our group they were facing certain death. A.L.I.E. has been stopped and everyone is freed from the City of Light, but the consequences of this are that in 6 months time everyone on earth will be dead from nuclear explosions. The real question is… was A.L.I.E. telling Clarke the truth?
Bellamy doesn’t seem to think so, and with that he tells Clarke that they should sit on this information until they figure out if it’s real and if it is real have a plan in place to stop it before scaring everyone. Bellamy hasn’t always been such a caring person, but he’s really grown over the past few seasons and has turned into a character that is ready to lead people with a plan in hand. They do however share this plan with Abby, Indra (she survived!), Octavia and Kane.
Now that the City of Light is done, Polis is in ruins and everyone wants to take ownership to be the new leader (mostly Ice Nation), and with Roan mostly dead (not completely dead, but he’s pretty close), Echo is the one to spill blood first and take ownership for Ice Nation. Although the world is going to melt down in a mere 6 months, the unrest between the grounders and everyone else has to take a front seat to that right now. They were all there for what happened with the City of Light, and while they may not know that the earth will soon be at an end, none of these events changed them or their perspective on working together. Clearly Clarke (and Skaikru) are still the enemy.
Echo being in charge is a bad situation to say the least so Clarke comes up with a plan to fake surrender to her as a way to distract her and find a way to save Roan since her healer is doing nothing outside of waving his hands over Roan’s body. Jaha carries the body of the “fake Ontari” wrapped in a shroud to where the king is trying to be saved by Echo’s healer, but really Octavia is inside. Echo leaves the room to meet with Skaikru for this “surrender” talk and once she’s gone Octavia jumps out and kills everyone in the room. This gives Abby and Clarke a chance to get the bullet out of Roan and save his life. This plan collapses quite quickly but before Echo can kill Clarke, Roan is revived and stops her.
Clarke is given an opportunity to talk to Roan about the radiation that’s coming to kill them and tells him that she’s trying to come up with a plan. She gives him the Flame back (as much as it hurts her since it’s the last piece of Lexa she has) and tells him to start looking for a new commander, but we have to wonder if this tech even does anything anymore? Roan says he’s going to honor Lexa’s coalition so Skaikru is saved… but not everyone is happy with this. This gives them some time to get ahead of this, or at least that’s what she thinks. What she doesn’t know is that there is a portion of earth already being killed by radiation.
Back in Arkadia Jasper is still depressed over losing the love of his life two seasons ago and decides he’s going to steal a gun and kill himself. He has written Monty a goodbye letter and is ready to pull the trigger, but Monty finds him before he does the deed and brings him to talk to Raven. She has figured out that there is going to be a nuclear meltdown – so we suspect that A.L.I.E. was telling the truth after all. Jasper is happy to hear that he doesn’t have to kill himself since the earth will do it for him.
We weren’t that crazy about the “City of Light” story last season, so we are happy to be moving away from it, but the one thing this show hasn’t moved away from is just how dark it is… and we love them for it. There is nothing else on television like “The 100” let alone a show that’s on The CW which typically has more light hearted shows. “The 100” is dark, violent and at times feels incredibly hopeless, but we are so drawn to these characters and their pain. One last thing: We don’t want to get too political here since we are a television site and not a politics news source, but hearing Clarke say “Science is our only hope” was empowering and we hope that this is the direction the show is going in this season. Great way to start to the new season. Episode grade: B+
What did you think of “The 100” season 4 premiere and do you think they will find a way to stop the world from ending? Leave us a comment in the box below. If you want to know what’s coming up on the next new episode of “The 100” then head on over to the link here and check out our preview. (Photo: CW)