Orphan Black: Newer Elements of Our Defense Recap

Synopsis:  Helena works on her escape and discovers the insidious nature of the Castor compound while Sarah searches for the original DNA. Alison runs into some trouble with her new business, while Cosima pines for Delphine.

Rating: ★★★★★

There was very little clone interplay this week, so we’re going to hit the highlights character by character.

Sarah

Sarah’s stuck in the barn with crazy cult-leader’s wife on the loose with a shotgun outside. She manages to escape into the cornfield, where she finds that Mark is still alive, albeit bleeding copiously on the dirt.

Reinforcements come to help crazywife finish the job, but Sarah fireman-carries Mark the hell out of there before they can find them.

The two find a safehouse and Mark instructs Sarah on how to remove the bullet that’s lodged in his leg. Sarah gets a little queasy, but she pulls it off (out). Sarah rifles through the papers that Mark stole from creepy, pedophilic guy from last week and finds lab notes from Johansson. She calls none other than…

Cosima
Turns out Cosima isn’t doing so great emotionally. She may or may not be on the downturn of Kira’s stem cell treatment, but she’s definitely pining for Delphine. We’re talking wearing old sweaters and smoking French cigarettes pining.

Felix is having none of this, so he takes her out and starts her on a dating app. Have fun swiping left, chica. May the odds be ever in your favor.

Cosima gets a phone call from Sarah, along with some photos of Johansson’s lab notebook. Turns out that he managed to create a new clone with the original DNA samples from the Castor project and he implanted the embryo into his wife. #creepy

Alison

Business is booming for Alison – except Donnie thinks he’s been followed by the cops. The two freak out and get intercepted by a drug dealer’s lackey when they try to move their product into a storage container. Turns out that Ramone stole some of his merchandise from the dealer, and now he’s looking for a meeting with the Hendrix family.

Alison keeps calm, Donnie stashes a gun in his pants, and the two proceed to meet the lackey’s boss in a dark parking lot in the middle of the night. After being frisked, the lackey says only Alison gets to talk to the boss, so she steps into the truck.

She finds the dealer is none other than Jason, an old boyfriend she used to date in high school. The two reminisce in the car together before they strike a deal: she’ll pay him back the money for the product Ramone took and then some if he supplies her. Ever the savvy businesswoman, Alison.

Gracie

Poor Gracie. She goes back into the cult with her mother to meet the new creepy cult leader-du-jour. This one is superold and has some prominent cataracts – and enjoys weirdly feeling Gracie’s stomach (and gradually lower, please no.) before sending her on her way with the ‘blessed child.’

Unfortunately for Gracie, she has a spontaneous abortion, and her mother kicks her out of the compound permanently. Your kid just sat on display bleeding in a room full of cult followers. I think I speak for everyone when I say calm the fuck down.

Helena

Our girl Helena is still trying to escape from the Castor compound. Being the warrior that she is, she fashions a tourniquet out of her gown’s laces and causes a scene. When the guards inject her with opiates, she maintains consciousness long enough to scout the complex.

After she’s sent back to her cell, she fashions a key out of a bone from one of her meals using her teeth and escapes. She runs into Parsons, a male clone who is having some sort of  surgery performed on him judging by the open cranium and diodes plugged directly into his brain. Parsons begs Helena to kill him. Knowing that this may be her only chance to escape, Helena considers him for a moment, then promises him mercy.

She shoves a scalpel into his open brain and kills him. It’s graphic and super disturbing. Then the guards come running and take Helena away, but not before she spits at Victoria telling her she’s a terrible monster of a mother.

Back to Sarah

Sarah gets interrupted after her phone call with Cosima by Mark, who she ditched and called 911 when he passed out.  He takes her hostage and the gang go to dig up the grave of Johansson’s son for the original DNA.

After she finds the casket, another Castor clone comes to bring Mark in and kill Sarah. Luckily for her, Mark saves Sarah by pulling military rank on the other clone. However, the Castor boys don’t leave loose ends, so we close the episode with Mark approaching Sarah menacingly.