Previously: Sarah poses as the German to retrieve her briefcase and then finds that another one of her look-a-likes is a soccer mom.
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Variation Under Nature
Lorraine: Sarah is where we last left her– sitting in Alison’s basement, explaining to her two-twins that she never met her birth parents. She was adopted at 8 and came to live “here” at 12. The show is shot in Canada, but I’m now realizing that I have no idea where it’s supposed to take place. Internet says possibly Hamden, Connecticut. Huh.
Sweeney: Really? Weird. She mentions that Alison lives in Scarborough, a suburb of the city where she resides. I don’t know enough about Canada, but according to Google maps, that could be a suburb of Toronto. Canadians, please explain.
Lor: Allison wants to move the conversation back to Beth’s suicide, which she is having a hard time believing.
Sweeney: All of her police training that she was using to investigate what was going on. From what we gather in this episode, conversations like this (plus another thing…) are the extent of Alison’s involvement. When talking about inability to cope, these aren’t entirely solid comparisons.
Lor: Sarah again asks if Cosima can tell her what the hell is going on. Alison yells that Cosima shouldn’t tell her anything. As it is, Cosima nervously laughs that she can’t give her answers, exactly. Sarah asks how they are all related. Alison snaps that they aren’t. “Well, we are by nature. Um, she’s referring to nurture,” Cosima offers. Alison demands the German’s briefcase and Sarah won’t hand it over without some answers first. Bluntly, Alison gives Sarah the answer she’s looking for: “We’re clones. We’re someone’s experiment and they’re killing us off!”
This is interrupted by Alison’s daughter, who Alison quickly shoos out of the room. Cosima apologizes. She wanted to drop the clone bomb a little softer.
Meanwhile, Felix is still waiting for Sarah in the car. I would probably not be still waiting there. FYI, no one leave me in a get-a-way car, unless maybe I have my Kindle with me. File that away. (S: Noted.) A woman walking her dog knocks on Felix’s window to tell him that he’s parked on a neighborhood watch block, so he’s being watched. Those longjohn pajamas are super scary too. Felix decides he’s had enough sitting around. We watch as he lets himself into Alison’s yard and peaks through the window, where he can see Cosima explaining more of the clone deal to Sarah. Alison notices some movement outside and turns on the yard lights, so he freaks.
Cosima notices the lights and asks Sarah if she thinks someone is outside. Sarah jumps up and runs out. Outside, Felix finds himself in front of Alison, a gun pointed at him. He begs her not to shoot. Sarah arrives and stands in between the gun and Felix. She tries to explain that Felix is with her, but Alison is bordering on hysterical. Sarah slowly closes the distance between herself and Allison, and coaxes her into lowering the gun. The moment she does, Sarah smacks Alison ACROSS THE FACE and threatens to beat the shite out of her if she ever points a gun at her (Sarah’s) brother again. (S: An actress hitting herself IN THE FACE will be a tough one to beat next year. Unless more people hit Joffrey on this season of GoT) (L: I added this instance as a Traumaland Award nomination as soon as I saw it.) Alison shakes and it’s an instant switch in power dynamics. Sarah had been at a disadvantage in Alison’s suburban basement, with no information and on the receiving end of Alison’s ill-regard. Here, we suddenly remember that whatever else she is, Sarah is a survivor. A fighter, even.
Sarah and Felix run back toward the house. Cosima is waiting for them outside. She has Sarah’s keys and phone in her hand and semi-jokes that Sarah just broke the first rule of Clone Club.
Science-y blobs and DNA strands.
After the credits, we’re back at Felix’s place where he’s trying to digest the whole clones thing. “Soccer mom Sarah? Dreadlocked, science-geek Sarah? Arguably more attractive than the real Sarah.” (S: As some of you noted in the comments last time.) Sarah sarcastically thanks him for his input. She wants to ignore the clones, but Felix doesn’t think that’s possible. Not only is human cloning illegal, and he thought impossible, but there are already two dead clones they know about. Sarah says their plan remains the same: get the 75k back from Art, grab Kira and get out.
Beth’s house. Sarah examines herself in a mirror and asks her reflection if she’s going insane. That scene fades to Sarah-as-Beth (Sarah!Beth) walking into her precinct. She quickly finds Art and makes up a lie about things being bad with Paul. Any second he’ll find the 75k missing from that bank account. Art has 0 fucks to give and says Sarah!Beth will get the money when she’s back on active duty. At that, the Lieutenant spots Sarah!Beth and asks her and Art both for a word. He hands Sarah!Beth back her gun and badge and tells her she’s back on active duty. Sarah!Beth manages a small smile and shakes the Lieutenant’s hand.
Sweeney: Yay, money! Shit, being an untrained police officer!
Lor: Art tells her to hurry up because they have a 10-45. Sarah!Beth excuses herself to tthe bathroom first where she struggles with the gun holster and ends up putting the two extra clips in her back pocket. (S: LOLPD worthy moment. I’m now going to imagine that all of Traumaland’s inept officers just arrived on the job that day and are faking their way through it.) In the car with Art, she asks him for her money again and he gives her side-eye because he doesn’t carry around 75 grand in the trunk. After that, Sarah!Beth fudges her way through some radio communication earning her even more side-eye.
Lo and behold, Art and Sarah!Beth pull up to the very location where Sarah buried the body of the German. The whole site is now excavated. Art says the body was chewed up pretty badly, presumably my some digging machinery. Art asks Sarah!Beth what she thinks. “I think some idiot didn’t realize they were burying a body next to an active quarry.” Same kind of idiot that probably keeps 75 grand in her trunk, am I right?
The coroner joins them now for a little dark humor with Art, and to inform them that they have a tire print and will need a finger print because reconstructing the face will be near impossible. Sarah is squirming and excuses herself to make a call. She calls Cosima, who confirms that all of their fingerprints are close enough to flag a match. Sarah hurriedly explains that she’s pretending to be Beth at the moment, and that the police have found the German’s body. Art would have to use Interpol to find Katja, but if one of them had a criminal record… Womp, womp. Sarah says if the cops run the prints, they’ll find her mug shot– a mug shot that looks just like Beth. Cosima’s all, “wow. Sucks to be you.” Or really, sucks to be you who is kind of me. Sucks to be us. Though she comes off calm, cool and collected, Cosima also knows how to play the game. She tells Sarah to bring her the suitcase and they’ll talk more about these fingerprints.
Sweeney: Cosima’s, “Wow, welcome to the trip,” bit was hilarious. Aside from the hair/glasses making her more aesthetically different from the others, she’s also a unique personality in that she’s just so mellow and laid back. Sarah seems nearly Alison levels of high strung when these two interact.
Lor: Later, Art is talking to Sarah!Beth about the case, but trails off when he notices the clips in Sarah!Beth’s pocket. She turns the subject to her money again, but Art asks to see her weapon. She pulls it out and he gets upset that she rode with him without a loaded gun, and attributes it to her being trigger shy. Sarah!Beth makes excuses, but Art doesn’t want to hear it. He says he’ll work the case with the previously unnamed detective, DeAngelis. Plus, he threatens to shred the money if she brings it up again. From a poor blogger, I’m thinking, “UH. NO.” I get to ask about the 75k you stole from me as much as I want. Then again, I effectively stole that money from someone else, so things are all kinds of crazy right now. (S: Dead girl wasn’t using that money…)
Night time. Sarah meets Cosima at a bar. Without a word, she sits down next to her and stares at their identical reflection.
Tatiana Maslany as Cosima always reminds me of Alyssa Milano, especially when she smiles. I’m not sure why the resemblance is more noticeable with Cosima, but there you go.
Sweeney: Now that you say this, yes, absolutely. I think the fact that she always has her hair pulled back helps and something in the way the glasses affect the shape of her face.
Lor: Good observations.
Cosima asks for the briefcase but Sarah wants answers first. The bartender comes over and says something about Cosima being the smart one and Sarah being the wild one. Thank you glasses! Also, my little sister and I get mistaken for twins ALL. THE. TIME. We’ve been offered twin discounts, we’ve been stopped by strangers and we most definitely have received comments like this one. There was one time we were asked if we were identical cousins totally seriously.
Sweeney: …identical cousins? WUT.
Lor: Who knows.
Sarah identifies Cosima as the scientist Katja was going on about. Cosima says she’s actually a PhD student at the University of Minnesota in Evolutionary Developmental Biology. Also know as the Real Convenient Clone. (S: Sure is handy that one of the three in North America is earning an advanced degree in the science of their existence!) Sarah asks about Katja being sick and again Cosima says she’ll know more once she hands over the briefcase. Sarah snaps if she knows who shot Katja in the head. Cosima gives in and lays out the story: Katja contacted Beth with a story about how her “genetic identicals” were being killed off in Europe. Beth ran a facial recognition search and located Cosima and Alison, or in Sarah’s words, “you and soccer bitch.” Cosima confirms. But all this lead to more questions: Who is the original? Who created us? Who’s killing us?
I don’t think I thought at all about who was the “original” but I can imagine that it would be an important question to someone who found out they were a clone.
Sweeney: It’s one of those questions you couldn’t help but ask but would also be terrified to learn the answer to. As long as you don’t know the answer you can hold out hope that it’s you.
Lor: Cosima says that they’ve lost their cop (quite the euphemism for that whole suicide thing…) (S: Hey there, Veronica!) and they need Sarah to keep playing Beth. Sarah thinks Art will figure her out, but Cosima insists, especially since Katja’s fingerprints will match her own. Sarah concludes that she’ll need to get to the fingerprint results. Finally, Sarah grabs the briefcase, prepared to hand it over. She has one last question though: If we’re genetically identical…do you get that patch of dry skin between your eyebrows? Cosima chuckles and says Sarah should hold onto her sense of humor. Beth couldn’t. Well, dear, if you want Sarah to hang onto that sense of humor, probably don’t reference her dead clone-twin every time she tells a joke. Brings the mood down.
Police station. Sarah!Beth asks Art for an update on Jane Doe. The coroner found some remains, including bright magenta hair, and the skull fragments have entry and exit wounds. A shooting. In the middle of this, he informs Sarah!Beth that he booked them some time at the gun range so he can determine if Sarah!Beth can ride with him. Art is hard to like. It gets worse when he basically tells her to go clean her room desk.
Art’s about to leave with DeAngelis but his phone rings. DeAngelis shushes the office as he puts the call on speaker and we hear the distorted voice of the caller, asking if they are speaking to his partner too. The voice is distorted, but has a pronounced accent. The voice says, “She was just one of a few. Unfit for family. Now she’s horse glue.” The killer tells Art that Jane Doe died at Allenside park and hangs up. Art and DeAngelis start going over the details of the phone call as Sarah!Beth struggles to keep up. Art tells Sarah!Beth to go over the log and see if anyone reported shootings in that area as he and DeAngelis take off for Allenside.
Unfortunately, Sarah doesn’t know Beth’s computer password, so she has to schmooze the IT guy. (S: A Degrassi alum! What up, Canada!) He’s all, “oh, need help resetting your password?” and she bats her eyes at him as she says that and also that whole procedure for fingerprint results. We cut to the lab where Sarah!Beth is hounding the lab guy for results. He says he has to check his inbox and walks away from his computer, clearly very busy, so Sarah!Beth just goes into the inbox and finds the results herself. She quickly deletes them and hurries off. So… now they are sitting in his trash? Yeah. (S: SAME THOUGHT. Empty the trash, girl.)
Allenside Park. Art spots the glass shards from the shooting and can tell the direction the car peeled out and escaped.
Sarah meets Mrs. S at another waterside park. Mrs. S can’t understand how Sarah faked her own death and claims to be little interested in Sarah’s reason for why she did it. Sarah shares anyway. She saw a way to escape Vic and start a new life with Kira. Mrs. S basically laughs in her face. She isn’t fooled by the shiny car and new clothes. Mrs. S agrees to set up a visit. Sarah says Mrs. S isn’t Kira’s legal guardian, or hers for that matter, but Mrs. S says that while she will allow visits, if Sarah approaches Kira in any other capacity, she will stop lying to social services.
Allenside Park. Art finds the spot where the sniper fired from.
Sarah calls Cosima freaking out again. Cosima’s returned to school in Minneapolis and is wearing two-by-two-hands-of-blue gloves. I just can’t ever look at blue gloves the same. Sarah tells Co about the killer contacting Art and telling him where the murder happened. Cosima thinks this is good and Sarah should just stick with Art. She can’t, though, because Art benched her for being useless. She can’t even shoot a gun. Cosima says she can help on that end.
Allenside Park. DeAngelis spots a motorcycle tread that could be the killer’s getaway vehicle. Art spots a doll head. It apparently belongs to the decapitated Barbie Sarah found in Katja’s room in the previous episode. It has short, bright red hair and its eyes have been x-ed out, kind of like Sarah’s were in Felix’s penis-memorial-picture of her.
Sweeney: FELIX IS THE KILLER! Wait, sorry, wrong show.
Lor: After a Not Break, Sarah is at Beth’s house, getting ready and talking to Allison on the phone. They need to meet, but Allison doesn’t have a sitter. Sarah says they are screwed as someone knocks on the door. Allison asks her husband to watch the kids but he can’t. She relays this information to Sarah who is letting Felix into the townhouse. Sarah looks at Felix and tells Allison she has a solution and Felix looks at her quizzically.
Later, Allison introduces her kids to Felix, who eye him skeptically. Allison tells both Felix and the kids to behave. As soon as she’s gone, Felix asks the kids where the booze is. They have no answer for him.
At yet another ugly park, Sarah and Allison talk and shoot. At first, Sarah fails to shoot all of her targets, including a stuffed cow. Alison takes off her pink ear protectors and tells Sarah to try again. She goes over some of the difference between the glock Sarah is using and her own gun, which Beth recommended. Beth taught Alison how to shoot, and she’s grateful, as she thinks that whoever illegally cloned them is now killing them to cover the evidence. She has a family to protect. Sarah asks Alison for any other insight Alison might have on Beth.
Sarah uses the other gun and shoots down all the targets. The cow goes down with a squeak. Sarah’s impressed with herself.
Later, Sarah drops Alison off near her house. She reemphasizes that everything is on a need to know basis. They are choosing to trust Sarah. Alison says it’s her life, and she’s doing the best she can. Alison shares that Beth had a sizable fund, money used to buy information they couldn’t get otherwise. They were a cop, a scientist and Alison. The money was how she could contribute. For not the first time this episode, you can tell that Sarah is quietly freaking out. It’s the 75k. Alison tells Sarah that she could rob her blind, but she’s hoping that Sarah will realize that she can’t run away from them. Alison asks Sarah to con Beth’s bank. Sarah says she can. She can, and already has.
Allison gets out of the car, and grabbing tightly onto her vest, walks back to her house. On Tatiana’s hand, you can see the injury we pointed out in the last recap.
Sweeney: I flailed a little when I noticed it because I’m not entirely sure I would have if it hadn’t been brought up. We blog to improve our TV skills.
Lor: Once she’s inside her house, her daughter announces, “look Mom! We’re cross dressers.” Felix collects his stuff and the kids beg him to stay the night. He says his work is done and leaves the kids with an, “adios dragsters!”
Back at Beth’s townhouse, Sarah fills Felix in on the money being Allison’s. Sarah still plans on stealing it, though. Their pow-wow is interrupted when Paul unexpectedly arrives. Sarah pushes Felix into the room, telling him to hide, and he tells her, “You cannot hide in minimalist furniture!” A+, Fee.
Sarah!Beth greets Paul coldly and basically tells him to get lost. Paul tells her she’s acting like a bitch, he’s trying to be the bigger person, and he’s just here for a change of clothes. He grabs the clothes, Felix hiding just behind him in the closet. Sarah!Beth tells him about being reinstated and they keep bickering all the way back to the front door. Paul asks how she’d like it if he pulled this hot and cold act and she seems to sincerely suggest that he try it. Paul grabs Sarah!Beth, kisses her and turns her around, pinning her against the wall. Felix watches with his mouth hanging open. He feels her up some and she falls into the feeling for a moment before regathering herself and pushing him off. He looks at her and they smile a little at each other. He grabs her face and kisses her, more gently this time. He pulls away and says, “Sorry. Gotta go.” He grabs his stuff and leaves.
Sarah seems a little surprised and a little impressed. She laughs a bit as Felix comes out of the room with a loud OMG. “She doesn’t want to break up with Big Dick Paul!” It’s really funny if you ignore the part where she’s violating him with her lies. That’s gross. Felix is funny. Sarah cuts off Paul talk and says they have to remain focused. Get the stolen money back. Get out of town.
Shooting Range. Sarah!Beth holds her own. She asks Art about the Jane Doe case and they deduce that there were three people at the scene and the person who buried Jane Doe was probably not the professional sniper. Art shows her the picture of the doll head and then she gets a call. She quickly takes down the information. Patrol spotted the motorcycle she put out an APB for.
Art and Sarah!Beth find the motorcycle and let themselves into the room of the person it presumably belongs to. Sarah!Beth is a bit awkward as she draws her gun and follows Art into the room, looking at him often to try and follow his lead. Once they determine that the room is empty, they start poking around. Sarah!Beth picks up a Bible and opens to a marked page. Art asks what she has and Sarah!Beth quickly pockets what was marking the page: Katja’s passport. Instead, she reads the circled passage, Psalm 139:13-14. I knew that without looking it up, which is your semi-regular reminder that I am the Bible-reading Snark Lady. *Jesus points! Ca-ching*
Sweeney: OR MAYBE YOU’RE THE KILLER! Wait, sorry, I keep forgetting we don’t play that game here.
Lor: It’s a hard habit to break.
Art reads along with her and Sarah looks up and sees that the same verse has been written in red ink on a wall. As Art says the perp has deep-seated spiritual problems, Sarah!Beth turns and sees through the window, a gun. She pushes Art out of the way as shots are fired. Art is hit, but he pushes Sarah!Beth away, telling her he’s fine, and that she should go after the perp. She hesitates, but does go. Outside, she sees someone in a green park trying to get on the bike. She yells for the perp to stop, and they take off on foot.
Sarah!Beth awkwardly starts the chase as Art manages to stand and call in the shooting. Sarah!Beth runs into an empty lot and gun still pointed, she calls Art to tell him where she is. She thinks the perp ran into one of the abandoned buildings that surround the lot. Nope. The Parka Perp hits Sarah from behind, knocking the gun and phone out of her hand. Art hears her fall over the phone and screams after her. Hand on his bleeding neck wound, he takes after his partner. I almost forgive him for being a jackass earlier.
Beth looks up at the Parka Perp who has a weird knife in one hand. The hilt is fashioned as a fish. The Parka Perp is a woman, and in a heavy Slavic accent she bids good riddance to Elizabeth Childs. Sarah screams that she isn’t Beth and the Parka Perp pulls back her hood to reveal… ANOTHER CLONE. This one has like Buffy hair from that one time she turned into a beer-drinking cavewoman. BUT CRAZIER. (S: The crimpier the hair, the badder the girl! Bad Girl Styling Rule #4) Her eyes are rimmed red. Crazy Clone examines Sarah’s face and calls her a dirty “copy cop.” Sarah has been reaching for a pieces of metal rod near her. She grabs it and jams it into Crazy’s torso. Crazy stumbles back and pulls out a gun, but doesn’t fire. She only says, “not yet Not Beth,” before stumbling off, leaving her fish knife behind. Sarah grabs it and hides it.
Art finds Sarah!Beth and she claims to be fine, but she’s stumbling. Art has to let go of his wound and hold her up. Crazy Clone gets away on her motorcycle.
Night. Sarah!Beth sits in the back of an ambulance as she tells the Lieutenant that all she saw was a hoodie and that “he” hit her from behind. The Lieutenant calls them out for not having back-up but they thought it was only a flimsy lead. He asks to take Sarah!Beth home.
Art feels bad for not having Sarah!Beth’s back, but she assures him that he did. Things just happened fast. She doesn’t want him to drive her home, either. He relents and dramatically opens his trunk where he was in fact holding her money. He hands it back and apologizes for holding it over her. Sarah!Beth calls them even and he says he’ll see her in the morning.
Sarah looks down at the money, and we can’t see her hands, but in my head she’s caressing it. Nice money. I love you money.
At some point later, Felix and Sarah sit in a car. He asks her if she’s sure about this. She doesn’t answer, but she does exit the car. She’s at Mrs. S’s house. She looks through the window and sees Mrs. S reading to Kira. Sarah cries as she sees this picture of her happy daughter.
In a bathroom somewhere, Crazy Clone pulls the metal rod from her stomach. The camera pans back to reveal that her back is etched with wounds, running along both sides in an almost wing-like pattern.
Next time: Allison impersonates Sarah to help her with Kira in Orphan Black S01 E04 – Effects of External Conditions.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
Nicole is the co-captain of Snark Squad and these days she spends most of her time editing podcasts. She spends too much time on Twitter and very occasionally vlogs and blogs. In her day job she's a producer, editor, director, and sometimes host of educational YouTube channels. She loves travel, maps, panda gifs, and semicolons. Writing biographies stresses her out; she crowd sourced this one years ago and has been using a version of it ever since. She would like to thank Twitter for their help.
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