In this recap and commentary of this week’s episode of The 100, “Demons,” we discuss The Delinquents’ development with Emerson, ALIE 2.0, and Ontari being tempted by ALIE and Jaha.
The Delinquents
The beginning of the episode starts with Miller telling ghost stories to Harper and Bryan (much to his dismay). After Miller tells the story, he walks outside and gets captured by a disguised stranger. Bryan and Harper soon follow. Starting off the episode with such amazing horror genre vibes, makes the episode, which is already pretty horrifying, even scarier.
After this, we see the rest of the delinquents in the rover, trying to get in contact with Miller, Bryan, and Harper. When they don’t get an answer, they start to get really worried. However, after they don’t get an answer, the delinquents talk about the chip, and Raven tells them about ALIE’s plans and how the AI works. Then, Clarke reminds everyone that they need to find Luna.
When they arrive at Arkadia, it’s completely deserted, and it’s extremely chilling. With no one there, the delinquents think that perhaps Miller, Bryan, and Harper have been chipped. Walking through the courtyard area, Octavia sees a puddle of blood from where Lincoln was shot. Somehow, Octavia is able to keep herself together because she’s so incredibly strong.
While the delinquents don’t know exactly why Arkadia is so empty, Raven suggests that, because everyone in Arkadia was chipped, Jaha and ALIE moved on to find new followers for their weird, City of Light cult.
Everyone splits up, and Jasper and Octavia go together to look for something that could help them. When they get to a room, presumably Lincoln’s, Octavia finds Lincoln’s jacket and smells it and starts crying. Jasper tries to comfort her by saying that “it’s okay to fall apart,” but Octavia shuts him down. Octavia has so much sadness, grief, and anger inside of her, and she doesn’t know how to deal with it. After Jasper leaves the room, Octavia finds Lincoln’s drawing journal, and it has a map inside that, possibly, might help them find Luna.
Octavia leaves the room, but discovers that someone has drugged Jasper. Suddenly, someone in Grounder clothing finds Octavia and chokes her until she passes out.
In the next scene, Bellamy makes his way to the armory, and tells everyone that they need to meet him there.
In the hangar, Raven, Sinclair, and Clarke try to figure out how exactly the AI works. Raven tells Clarke that Lexa wasn’t an AI, which is an extremely important point. To say that Lexa wasn’t the chip is making sure that her character isn’t diminished to just a piece of technology.
Raven tries to pick Clarke’s mind about a phrase that could possibly mean something to Lexa. Clarke tries “Jus drein jus doun,” but it doesn’t work. So, after that, Sinclair comes in clutch and speaks a phrase in latin that activates the AI. Raven is drawn to the AI, but Clarke and Sinclair stop her. Clarke reminds them that when anyone who’s not a nightblood takes the flame, the chip kills them.
After this, Clarke and Monty walk to the armory to go meet Bellamy. Monty worries about what will happen to his mom if they shut down the City of Light. However, an incredibly creepy music box playing equally creepy music at the end of the hallway interrupts them. When they pick up the music player, they find the name “Aaron” on the bottom.
As soon as Clarke picks up the music player, the person in Grounder clothing drops some red smoke in the hallway that knocks Monty and (kind of) Clarke unconscious. Before the mysterious guy, who later, we find out is Emerson, gets to Clarke, she gets up and runs out of the building.
Outside, Bellamy is waiting for Clarke to meet him. When he sees Clarke running and coughing, he starts walking towards her and catches her in his arms. Clarke tells him that Emerson has found them in Arkadia.
Bellamy and Clarke go back inside the buildings, trying to think of a plan to rescue everyone. Clarke tells Bellamy that everything that’s happened is her fault because she didn’t kill Emerson when she was given the chance in Polis.
Pretty soon after, Bellamy and Clarke radio Raven and Sinclair and tell them to lockdown the hangar bay. The music starts ramping up, and the hangar goes completely dark. Emerson gets to Sinclair, and he tries to defend himself unsuccessfully. Then, Emerson tries to basically beat Raven to death with something that looked like a pipe. Raven escapes and gets inside the Rover, and, before she’s able to drive out of the hangar, she sees Sinclair on the ground, bleeding out. Despite Sinclair telling Raven to stay in the Rover, she gets out and tries to help him. Emerson shows up behind her, and Sinclair dies watching Raven being taken away. This scene was absolutely heartbreaking to watch. There was a lot of crying while watching it.
When Clarke and Bellamy get into the hangar, they see Sinclair on the ground, dead. While Clarke doesn’t explicitly say it, we can see in her eyes that she’s 100% blaming herself for what’s happened. Clarke grabs Bellamy’s radio from his pocket and tells Emerson that they need to talk. Emerson tells her that he doesn’t “need to do anything.” We can obviously tell that Emerson wants revenge for what happened in Mount Weather.
Clarke tries to make a quid pro quo agreement by saying that she’ll trade her own life for her friends. Bellamy, predictably, looks incredibly concerned and devastated that Clarke would even think that this is a decent idea.
After she finishes talking to Emerson, Bellamy tells her, “You’re out of your mind if you think I’m going to let you do this alone.” Both Bellamy and Clarke have tried to individually shoulder the blame for so long, so for Bellamy to say this is monumental. He knows that they need each other to survive. What I love about this scene is that Clarke is finally facing her mistakes, which is incredible writing and character development.
Clarke and Bellamy try to figure out some kind of plan in order to save their friends. They don’t have much, but Bellamy suggests a distract and kill plan. Before they leave, Clarke looks at the chip, presumably formulating a plan.
After this, Clarke and Bellamy walk to meet Emerson. Clarke tells Emerson that she’s here to sacrifice herself, but Emerson, who knows Bellamy is there, tells Bellamy “to show himself.”
Emerson makes Bellamy go into the airlock in order to save Octavia from being hurt. When he walks into the airlock, Clarke looks absolutely devastated. Emerson tells Clarke to get on her knees, and basically holds Clarke completely responsible for what happened at Mount Weather.
So, instead of doing what he promised, Emerson turns off the airlock and shuts off the air supply. He grabs Clarke and holds her against the door, making her watch as her friends begin to choke to death. Then, Clarke somehow gets herself free and starts to fight back, only to lead to Emerson choking her. Yet again, he picks her head up and makes her watch her friends suffocating.
Then, Clarke sticks the AI on Emerson, and he starts seizing and bleeding out of several orifices on his body. This scene is incredibly graphic, but somehow fitting. For someone so willing to result to violent means to get revenge, he himself died violently.
Clarke finally opens the door, everyone is alive (thank god).
After they’re all okay, Bellamy carries Lincoln’s body out of Arkadia, and puts him on the ground. This scene is so hard to watch because Octavia is sobbing, and we can feel how much pain she’s in. Her emotions are so incredibly raw.
This next scene is so emotional and well done. They set up a funeral pyre for Sinclair and Lincoln. Raven, who was closest to Sinclair, says, “May we meet again.” Octavia, on the other hand, says, “Your fight is over,” for Lincoln.
The last scene with the delinquents, Monty, Raven, Miller, Harper, and Bryan decide to stay at Arkadia and use it as a headquarter to think of ways to stop ALIE. After everyone saying their goodbyes, Jasper, Octavia, Bellamy, and Clarke get in the Rover and leave Arkadia.
Polis
In Polis, Ontari is basically reveling in her new power, and Murphy is dutifully following. In the market place, Murphy’s kind of girlfriend, Emori, finds Murphy. She assumes that Ontari is Murphy’s new con, and calls her “one hell of a mark.” Ontari senses that something is going on, and comes back to collect Murphy.
Close to the sacred chapel place, Murphy waits for Emori. When she shows up, they start making out, and, once they get into the room, Emori is in awe of the picture of the first commander. This is an obvious clue to us that Emori has taken the chip, but Murphy doesn’t pay much attention to it. After this, Emori and Murphy proceed to have some, assumably, amazing reunion sex. Afterwards, Murphy tells Emori that she needs to leave because Ontari is crazy. Additionally, he tells her that Ontari isn’t actually the commander because she doesn’t have the AI.
Later, in the throne room, Ontari is holding an open court, so that her subjects can come talk to her. Everything seems pretty calm, but then, out of nowhere, Jaha shows up. Jaha calls Ontari out on being a “false commander.” Then, Emori comes into the throne room, and Murphy realizes that she’s taken the chip. Murphy tries to save his ass, but fails because Jaha knows exactly what’s going on.
Ontari orders the guards to take Murphy away because he’s betrayed her, and Jaha offers her the chip. From this, we can see how completely unfit Ontari is to be commander. Jaha, a person she doesn’t even know, offers her power and clarity, and she just takes it without a second thought.
The episode ends with ALIE sitting in the throne, signaling to us that she has basically taken over Polis.
Predictions:
- With Jaha and ALIE basically ruling Polis (and all of the grounders), he will order people to go find the delinquents. In the promo for next episode, we saw Abby trying to force Kane to tell her where Clarke is. However, we don’t think that he’ll actually tell her.
- The title of the episode (“Join or Die”) hints at more people being forced to joining the City of Light. We think that Abby might try to force Kane to take the chip, so that he can join the CoL. However, if he doesn’t take it, will he die for it?
- The delinquents will hit a dead end while looking for Luna.
The next episode of The 100, “Join or Die,” comes on Thursday, April 28 on The CW at 9/8c.