n Episode 8, Nuñez goes to see Sato, who has her throat injured by Mal’kah, at the hospital to find out who did this to her. He then goes to Peter’s house to warn him about Mal’akh. Katherine urges her mother to leave with her and Langdon. The Leviathan group invites Peter to a meeting to discuss the matter at hand after Mal’akh hacked into their system. Their sense of choice in a given circumstance reveals their moment of truth, while the dramatic tension in some scenes seems unrealistic.
An example is the discussion of Mal’akh’s ransom of a technology called “Cascade” at the Leviathan meeting. Peter stands his ground when the majority votes against him for not handing over the technology to his son. He doesn’t let his personal conflicts prevent him from fulfilling his objective of protecting the ancient wisdom. Others seem to alter their objective out of fear that their reputation and career would be ruined if they didn’t comply with Mal’akh. They also don’t see the bigger picture of the destruction Mal’akh could bring as Peter sees it. The competing relationships between Peter and the majority’s objectives draw attention to the scene. It expresses a feeling of disappointment and fear based on their inner values and beliefs that are designed either for social utility or mortality.
On the contrary, their decision making fails to sustain the psychological consistency of why it’s important to protect the magnificent ancient wisdom from falling into the wrong hands. For example, previous episodes showed that the Leviathan world was dominated by ancient wisdom and not by social consideration. Their mission, like the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Swords in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, was to protect the secret. To find the hidden secret, Langdon and Katherine were chased by a Leviathan extremist. Meanwhile, Knopp wanted Bellamy to spy on Langdon. In this episode, the group, except Peter, seems to give up without a fight about what’ll happen if the technology falls into the wrong hands. Even if there’s a connection between the ancient wisdom and the “Cascade,” as Mal’ahk believes, there is no telling what Mal’akh would do with it to harm others.
The lack of believable threat scenes doesn’t generate emotional intensity. An example is the computer hacking scene. It doesn’t explain what Mal’akh did in the last episode to infect the Leviathan system with a virus. There isn’t a cyber battle between the Leviathan techie and Mal’akh’s associate to increase the pace of the thrilling scene or to create an unpredictable moment. It just shows the guy is able to hack into the Leviathan system with flying colors, which doesn’t give any surprising insight.
Episode 8 isn’t as good as the last episode, but there’s a catch in the closing scene. Samyaza is back on the scene again. This time, the CIA has him in custody.
Rating: 5/10
