Absentia season 2 finale review: This ain’t wonderland
Yet, it’s almost too easy to generalize and just proclaim that Alice is some diabolical super-villain. Instead, you can just argue that she was desperate. She has been working with Dr. Oduwale for quite some time … but how diabolical is she, really? Well, through flashbacks within this episode it was clear that she was very much aware of Emily and her history without Nick telling her anything. Through some of these flashbacks we saw that she got closer to Nick as a means of ensuring Flynn’s safety as he underwent some of the blood tests. We do think that she developed some real feelings for Nick over time and viewed him and Flynn as her family.
So really, the story of Alice Durand is complicated. She was naive to think that the doctor was operating for the good of the world and she never should’ve gone along with a plan that was so secret and so dangerous. Anytime someone is wanting to keep things this secret, it’s never for a good reason. Alice worked with Oduwale on most of the experiments and when it looked like he was going to talk, she killed him — and we firmly believe that she did that as a means of protecting herself. It didn’t have anything to do with her trying to save Flynn in that moment since the damage was done. She just wanted to go back to her old life and pretend it never happened.
Yet, in spite of everything that happened and what she was responsible for, Emily was still willing to let her go. The caveat? That if she did this, Alice had to run and could never see Flynn again. This was Emily recognizing that she’d had her fair share of second chances and was willing to not see Alice solely as a function of some bad decisions she made. It’s too bad for Emily that there was a new person in charge of the Boston FBI office in Julianne Gunnarsen, who arrived and shot Alice in the back. We don’t think there is a conspiracy here — she probably just arrived, saw the gun in Alice’s hand, and killed her thinking that she was saving Emily’s life.
Now, Flynn’s traumatic life is now even more painful, and this messed up world has found a way to suddenly get even cloudier. Emily visited Nick and Flynn (who Alice abandoned in the middle of a camping trip) to inform them of what happened.
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CarterMatt Verdict
Was the Alice twist a little too out of left field? Maybe so, but we understand the idea of delivering the sheer shock value of her being involved from the start. We do wish that there were maybe another couple of episodes so we could have lived in this world a little longer where she was so deeply entrenched in the story. Also, it would have been interesting to get more of a reaction from Jack to some of this given his recent relationship with her.
This aside, there’s no denying the effectiveness of the season 2 finale as a means of giving viewers a LOT to talk about — this was an intense end to a season perhaps even more twisted than the first. It’s also an interesting emotional cliffhanger since after all of this, we’re very much curious what Emily, Nick, and Flynn’s life is going to look like entering season 3. Emily said she doesn’t want to look backwards when it comes to her life with Nick and we believe that — but odds are the family dynamic is going to enter a new phase looking ahead.
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What did you think about the Absentia season 2 finale overall? Be sure to share right now in the comments. (Photo: Sony.)