Welcome to Wayward Pines... where paradise is home.
Here's what we know:
- It's the year 4028. All of civilization has been wiped out, save for this small group of cryogenically preserved survivors, nestled away safely (they thought) in Wayward Pines, Idaho.
- Wayward Pines is surrounded by an electric fence, which keeps genetically mutated homosapiens (called "Abbies") out of the city. And... as of last week... The Fence no longer has any power. The Abbies are coming.
- Dr. David Pilcher's mad scientist experiment saved (he says) at least a couple hundred people from the man-made destruction that ravaged the globe in the years surrounding 2014. Our current group of citizens are not Pilcher's first attempt at salvation. A previous test group was told The Truth from the get-go. They went crazy and went extinct, whether by their own doing or that of the human-hating Abbies. The time has come, it seems, for another purge of humanity. Pilcher has powered down the city as an effectual "reset button."
- Ethan Burke, the story's protagonist and the town's most recent mayor, has known The Truth for a while now and is leading the charge against Pilcher and his closest associates. Burke wound up in Wayward Pines by "accident," but has come to realize that his search to find his two missing colleagues has much more grave and expansive significance than he ever could have imagined.
- Ethan's wife, Theresa, recently discovered - with the help of the increasingly neutral Nurse Pam - stumbled across the secrets buried beneath Plot 33, which contained video journals of people from all across the world, documenting the ruin that lies outside of The Fence. Once by one, Theresa and Ethan's former co-worker Kate have been showing The Truth to citizens of Wayward Pines, convincing them of the reality that they had been ignoring for so long.
- Pilcher has tried to convince Ethan that reckoning (publicly executing) Kate, as the leader of the ongoing insurrection that I call "the Bomb Squad," would put an end to the chaos and bring peace and harmony back to the community, but Ethan isn't quite sold on that idea.
- Mrs. Fisher and the brainwashed student body of Wayward Academy have sided with the establishment and they want to bring justice to those who seek to do the community harm.
- But now, with many of Wayward Pines' citizens having turned against Pilcher for holding them prisoners, it seems the time has come for another reckoning. While some stand firmly with The Rules that turned this troubled city into a thriving, miniature metropolis, a majority of the populous has their proverbial finger pointed straight at their self-proclaimed savior - Dr. David Pilcher, himself...
***
Abbies. That's how the series finale begins. Herds of Abbies running toward The Fence. But, as the camera pans backwards, we see something else making its way toward Earth's final stronghold. Are those... torches?? And Pilcher is watching on a surveillance camera as they approach the perimeter... Hashtag Wayward Pines.
Ethan warns the crowd that had gathered for Kate's mock reckoning that they can't stick around on Main Street. It's not safe. They've got to get to the bunker at Plot 33 - and fast! From the sounds of it, they've got less than 20 minutes before... whatever it is out there... makes it to The Fence.
Power is restored first at the hospital. Looks like they had a generator. Unfortunately, Amy is still alive. (Is she the worst character of the series? I vote yes.) Theresa goes to grab Ben, but he refuses to leave Amy's side. A doctor advises that Amy is too weak to be up and moving quite yet. The power cuts back off and the doctor heads back to start up the generator again.
Jason Higgins, the leader of the Class One Trio, awakens in a jail cell. Apparently, he was not killed in last week's shootout at the Sheriff's office. That could mean bad news for Sheriff Burke and company. Ethan and a handful of others, including Kate and members of the Bomb Squad, collect all the firearms from the office, and they've got a few bombs, too. Jason tells the Bomb Squad that Pilcher had prophesied of a Day of Reckoning, where the weak would be filtered out from the First Generation, but, wisely, Kate ignores the little imprisoned brat and heads out to the streets.
Back at the Complex, Pilcher embraces Pam, happy to see his sister in this time of trial. He says they need to discuss preparations for the Awakening of Group C. Pam asks her deranged brother to turn the power back on and spare the lives of the citizens out in the streets, but Pilcher says it's too late. Pam says there will always be mistakes, but that there is still time to fix this situation. Pam says "the great experiment" is working, but that the power has to come back on to end the conflict. Then Pilcher has his sister detained by security guards. The entire Complex is now under house arrest and being ushered downstairs to containment.
Meanwhile, the doctor reaches the hospital generator and attempts to start it back up. I use the word "attempts" because it's not working. And "not working" means... WIOEFWOPEFH@#HOLYCRAP!! There's the episode's first casualty. RIP, Doc. Murdered by an Abbie. They're here! (*Bray Wyatt voice*) And we're headed to a commercial.
"Oh, my living... freak." Those were my actual words as we got back into the action. The Abbies, those naked parkour visionaries, are out in force on Main Street. RUN FOR YOUR LIVES, PEOPLE!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!! Exploding cars, cannibalism (essentially), Assassin's Creed-style takedowns, you name it - it's all-out bedlam in the once-peaceful streets of Wayward Pines! I mean, it's like the Red Wings just lost the Stanley Cup or something. Like, what is going on??
BIG BILL SIGHTING! Theresa's pervy boss (AKA Friar Tuck, if you know what I mean...) is trying to sneak his way out of the realty office, which means we all know what's coming... It's only a matter of time. There it is! RIP Big Bill. BUT NO! Not former lesbian receptionist Arlene!! Thankfully, Kate blasts an Abbie to high heck with her semi-automatic. That was a close one. But now Kate's gun is jammed and she's got to run, defenseless, to the Toy Store, where she dead-bolts herself into the back room. At least if she dies there, nobody will see it on camera, am-I-right??
Down in the Complex basement, Pam tries to talk some sense into Pilcher's people, but it ain't working. Remember that little chat they had a couple episodes back about tightening up The Rules and beefing up security? Uh-huh. Boom. Taser to the neck. Looks like the volunteers are about to get put down for the long, cold nap that is death by cryo tube... Later in the episode, we see that Pam is the first one shown being put into a cryo tube, like a super-expensive, metal coffin. Pilcher watches as she's put to death and turns his back with nary a word once the dirty deed is done.
More members of Class One have come to break the Trio out of jail. Jason Higgins, who is basically a walking liability at this point, reminds his classmates that Pilcher entrusted them with the future of Wayward Pines. They've got to make it to "The Ark." Everything depends on it.
Kate's chilling in the Clean Room at the Toy Store and it's way too dang quiet. Oh gosh. Any second now... But it remains quiet. Kate steadies her breathing... *#R(QYHFIUEWHFHOLYCRAP!! An Abbie just dropped through the freaking ceiling! AHHHHHMOMMY!!! Then Kate hacks it to death with an axe of some sort. Oh my. ... Oh, and RIP Tim, the Bomb Squad guy that looked like Gay Josh from "Survivor" a couple seasons ago. RIP, dude... RIP. But, as he's dying, he motions with all the life left in him, to his backpack, lying precariously in the middle of the road. Bet that baby's got a bomb in it! Kate picks it up and takes off like the sneakiest shoplifter ever.
Theresa, Ben and Amy all loudly "shhhhh!" each other in the halls of the hospital as they struggle to evade the Abbies who so mercilessly are stalking them. Theresa scuffles with one until her husband saves the day and blasts it to the afterlife with his shotgun. #FamiliesAreForever
The Burkes, Amy, Kate and many other citizens have made it safely to the bunker at Plot 33. But wait! Who the heck let stupid Mrs. Fisher in?? They shoulda left her out there to rot. Ethan demands that Mrs. Fisher tell them where the underground tunnels lead, but Fishy is all hush-hush about it. Pilcher will rescue them, she naively asserts. Ben, no longer blinded by hypnotherapy of any kind, yells at his former schoolmaster, and she finally blurts out that a western tunnel leads to an elevator that will take them to The Complex. Ethan makes a quick game plan and Kate bandages up Theresa. This scene right here shows us how far Theresa and Kate have come. As you may recall, they weren't really on the best of terms at the beginning of the series.
Ethan teaches Ben how to shoot a gun, as any good dad should, and Ben apologizes for riling up the First Generation at the hospital in last week's episode. It's time to get a move on. Everybody's headed to the tunnel - except for Mrs. Fisher. She says she needs to stay behind to, allegedly, let in any other survivors who make it to the bunker. (Bull!!) She tells her husband that she made a promise to protect the First Generation and she needs to keep it. So help me, if she lets in the Abbies... Shortly thereafter, the citizens reach the elevator. Ethan and Kate are going to go ahead to make sure everything is safe. They'll have to make the trip in groups.
We jump over to Wayward Academy, as Jason Higgins and Class One enter the room where Ben and two other students were taught The Truth. Jason finds a secret button, which opens a secret door to what, I assume, is "The Ark." The lights switch on and Jason verbally explains for the viewing audience at home that Pilcher left the First Generation everything they would ever need.
Ethan and Kate take out a couple guards, scattering the security guards, but, as things start to get crazy at The Complex, one of the guards demands that Pam be woken up from her cryo-burial... The way is clear and Ethan lets Theresa know via walkie-talkie that they're good to send others up the shaft. But wait! There's a pounding noise on the bunker door and Mrs. Fisher watches helplessly as that sucker gets ripped from the hinges. Who - or what - could it be?? Amy heads up the elevator and Ben stays behind. Heck, after all, he now knows how to take the safety off his firearm, so he's gonna stick around and give it a whirl.
Uh... RIP Mrs. Fisher, I assume, because there are a ton of Abbies bookin' it down the west tunnel. Maybe hypnotherapy doesn't do much on mutants?
When Ethan finds out that Ben didn't make it up the elevator, he is a man on a mission. He takes Tim's bag of pipe bombs and is headed back down the shaft, whereupon we see Ben firing his gun like a madman - with reckless abandon, you might say. Surprisingly, he hits a couple Abbies in the process. But apparently he didn't learn how to reload. It doesn't matter! Because Pops is here to save the day! He mows down those Abbies like a middle schooler playing "Call of Duty" without parental consent and ushers the survivors to the elevator. Going up!
Not so fast! The Abbies start climbing up the shaft in a way that would make Nathan Drake proud. The elevator stops half-way to the destination and Ben makes the bold decision to climb up on top of the car and find a way out. He sees a ladder and a door that might be their clearest path to safety. Everybody out!! Ethan smooches Theresa, which may or may not be an indication that either or both of them will not make it out alive, and everybody starts climbing the ladder... Everybody except for Ethan, who's staying behind to, uh, fight those Abbies like a bad-a**, I guess. Yeah, dude!! Blaze of glory!!
The climbers make their way up to the room where the other survivors have been waiting and, on the other hand, Pilcher watches Ethan assemble the pipe bombs. Pilcher taunts him over the surveillance system, but Kate busts into Pilcher's office and demands, at gunpoint, that he turn the power back on. (Thought: What good would turning the power on now even do? The Abbies have already breached the perimeter and killed like 90 percent of the people in the town!) Pilcher continues to heckle Ethan over the speaker, saying that Wayward Pines was never about freedom - it was about the preservation of mankind. "Enlightenment is coming," he says. "My ideas will live on long after I'm gone." Pilcher dares Kate to kill him and... BANG! But... it wasn't Kate that shot! It was... FREAKING NURSE PAM! PILCHER'S OWN SISTER!
RIP Dr. David Pilcher, the mastermind behind the Wayward Pines experiment.
Meanwhile, Ethan is sitting in the corner of the elevator with pipe bombs strewn in front of him as the Abbies rip their way through the bottom of the car. With six Abbie arms prying through the elevator, Sheriff Ethan Burke thinks back on the happy memories of his family and presses the detonator, blowing the elevator - and the Abbies - back down the shaft. Did.............. But............ Ben pokes his head back down the shaft and calls for his father, but there is no response. What there is, however, is a big piece of metal headed right for Master Burke's noggin. It knocks him unconscious. I giggled a little bit... out of surprise... and sadness... What is this madness?? We're headed to our last commercial break.
Kate finds Pam in a concrete room in The Complex. She tells the nurse that Ben is still unconscious, and that she wants to help stabilize the conditions at Wayward Pines. Of course, if she's going to help out, she's going to need more information. And Pam smiles, for once. Pam leads Kate down to the cryo tubes - "the rest of the population." Kate is skeptical, noting the widespread tradition of dishonesty in Wayward Pines. Moving forward, there will be "no more lies, no more surveillance, no more reckonings," Pam asserts. Pam believes that success is possible, but they'll have to work together. Literally, they'll have to. This is the last of humanity.
Security guards are shown cleaning up Pilcher's office as the camera focuses on a shot of Pam and Kate on a TV screen, standing among the tubes.
Ben wakes up in a hospital. Amy, looking less bloody and noticeably older, informs him that he is in "Wayward Pines, of course." Amy, who is now a graduated nurse at the hospital, tells Ben that he has been unconscious for three years and four months. She also tells him the chilling news that he was put back into cryo-suspension, along with all of the other adults. She tried to get him out sooner, but "they" wouldn't allow it - and they're listening to this conversation, too. "They" are still mad at Ethan Burke. "They blame him for the savior's death. They think you're like him." Amy told "them" that she could fix Ben - that he is not like his father - but Ben demands his clothes and storms out of the room, despite his former girlfriend's tears.
Ben slowly strolls down Main Street, all cleaned up and renovated, as if nothing had ever happened. There's a new sheriff in town. It's Jason Higgins - and he has an ice cream cone in his hand. The merry-go-round is up and running and all seems to have been restored. There's a new addition to the town, though, which is a statue of Dr. David Pilcher, the Wayward Pines visionary and founder.
All Benjamin Burke can do it scratch his head in shock... and the camera pans back to show several dead bodies, strung up around the city with signs on their necks.
"DO NOT TRY TO LEAVE"
The First Generation has taken over.
***
Wow. It's going to take some time to digest that. I'm shocked. I did not see that stuff coming. I was positive that Ethan would survive. But one thing I love about this 10-episode format is that it truly allowed M. Night Shyamalan, Chad Hodge and company to have a lot of freedom with the plot. I loved tuning in every week because, with a set number of shows, every episode counted. Their decisions to kill off major characters with little to no warning was thrilling and unpredictable and the wild twists throughout the series quickly made "Wayward Pines" the show of the summer - and possibly one of my favorites of all time.
***
What would one of these recaps be without a few final Wayward Lines? There were a couple good ones tonight and I figure they're worth mentioning:
- Nurse Pam: "David is not a savior. He's not a god. He is just a man - and he's made a mistake."
- Kate to Theresa: "Sometimes, people surprise you."
- Pilcher: "They're going to get up the shaft, Ethan, and they're going to kill everyone."
- Kate to Pam: "You and I have never said one true thing to each other."
And how about a couple Wayward Signs, while we're at it?:
- Survival is success
- Wayward Pines is the future
Finally, here's tonight's obituary section. It's a big one. You can't deny that the show went out with a bang.
RIP Wayward Pines Doctor (real doctor not actually pictured)
Episode 10
RIP Big Bill
Episodes 5-10
RIP Tim Bell
Episodes 1-10
RIP Most of Group B
Episodes 1-10
RIP Dr. David Pilcher
Episodes 1-10
RIP Mrs. Megan Fisher (allegedly)
Episodes 4-10
RIP Lots of Abbies
Episodes 3-10
RIP Sheriff Ethan Burke
Episodes 1-10
Well, this is your last chance to let me know what you think! I know some of you out there actually watched this show. Was it worth your time? Did you have a favorite scene? A favorite character? A favorite twist? Hit me up in the comments.
Oh yeah, one last thing:
