It’s about time they started paying off some of the plot threads this season!  And in good fashion, no less.  I was worried that the writers were steering away from the notion that Christie was learning a thing or two from Stahma, but the way she dispatched Deidre and then worked with Stahma to ensure the interests of her family was brilliant.  That, and the scene in which she laid out her terms with Alak and invited him to enjoy a nice Castithan bath, as a Castithan woman should not bathe alone!

                  

With Nolan otherwise distracted, Amanda was on the case, with Berlin providing the assist.  It wasn’t the uncomfortable pairing that I was expecting, but that’s more because Amanda was focused on proving herself.  As it is, she wound up in exactly the same kind of situation as Nolan often encounters: suspecting the truth, but forced to accept the lie in the name of interspecies peace.

 

Speaking of Nolan, it turns out that I was right about the nature of “Irzu”, which is a good thing.  That the semi-mystical aspect of the season arc is really just a sentient spacecraft AI with nanotech is a nice way around some narrative problems, and ties it more directly to the actual Arkfall basis of the series itself.  Not to mention that it provides a fairly logical basis for “Arkrise”, if the AI is looking to restore itself and implement a renewed war against humanity.

 

Given Yewll’s motivations and the aims of the Votan Collective, this is all tying together logically, and that’s a lot better than the disparate threads we’ve seen thus far.  The big question is how much of Irisa is really “Irisa”, and how much of her tirade against Nolan was the influence of the Kaziri AI.  I imagine it’s a bit of an overlap, but it raises the question of what will happen when she is freed of the AI influence.  If nothing else, this episode made it clear that those “possessed” are capable of living on after the nanotech is removed.

 

I just hoping that there will be another season of Defiance to allow the writers to explore those implications.  The ratings are a bit lower this season, and while the series isn’t in Alphas territory just yet and still relatively young, nothing is certain.  (The current delay on the renewal of Continuum is testimony to that.)  Doubling up the episodes seems like a strategy to open up Thursday nights for Haven after Labor Day, but it might also represent a desire to “burn off” episodes.  Only time will tell.