It’s getting down to the wire for both Animal Kingdom and Roswell, New Mexico, but it wouldn’t be dramatic if things started wrapping up, so naturally there was a lot of action this week. Let’s dive in!
On Animal Kingdom, J and Pope team up again to dispose of the Livengood’s body while Deran and Craig work with Frankie on their next big score. Strange how that dirty cop never shows up again in the episode, but I know we’re not done with him. Even though there’s only a couple more episodes left this season, I have a sneaking suspicion he’ll be around during the final season. But, it’s Animal Kingdom, so I suppose they could just as easily kill him off before the 13th episode even airs. We shall see. Anyway, J and Pope have to go through quite a few hoops to get rid of Livengood, but that’s after they scrub the bar down. Dirty work gets dirty evidently (bad joke, I know). What does end up happening though, is that Livengood’s body is going to go under the boarder to get disposed of, but first they have to cut off a hand. Seems like a good way to leave things a little open-ended for the Codys, but what do I know. Meanwhile, Frankie explains to Deran and Craig that before she helps them, she wants a fair cut. She says after this job she is out and moving away…sure. She’ll be dead by next episode for sure.
Not much forward movement in the present day, but in the past, we sort of get to see the “birth of Pope.” Smurf decides to confront and kill Max, but he ends up at her home getting ready to kill her in front of her kids. Well, Pope has seen just enough violence that he takes his trusty knife and stabs Max in the leg. This distracts him enough for Smurf to grab her gun and put many bullets into him. Of course she tells her kids to look away, but that’s only going to do so much. Julia appears to retreat into herself, while Pope seems relatively unbothered. You can tell this concerns Smurf a little bit, but ultimately decides she likes this connection she has with her son. Thus, Pope is born. Everything that has happened between Smurf and Pope over the past four seasons suddenly has a light shone on how it came to be. She uses her love to manipulate Pope into doing the most vile things. She made him a bit of a monster, and I imagine it’s going to take a long time before he finds a different version of himself.
Next on Roswell, New Mexico, there were lots of people pairing up but ultimately making the same discovery. And what a discovery it was! Before they all reach the same conclusion though, first Liz explains that if she gets her hands back on her research she should be able to science up the correct way to split the connection between Jones and Max. That means Isobel, Maria, and Gregory all head to some Christian retreat house to look for clues, while Liz and Max head back to her LA apartment to see if she can salvage any of her research. Well, their efforts were a bust, because even her hidden research was taken. That means Heath took it! The two find out he’s also been using it. Elsewhere, we also see that Kyle is out of his coma! So that means he gets to spend some time bonding with an uncle he never knew. His uncle spends most of the time trying to convince Kyle to step away from all of this, unlike his father. Well, I think that ship has already sailed. Ultimately, our three investigative groups all find pieces of the puzzle which reveal that the pastor Rosa spoke with a couple episodes ago is also an alien! And, wait for it, his best friend is Heath! What a small world.
While that mega mystery is going down, Michael and Alex are teamed up to work on the Lockhart machine ahead of an in-public first date (awwww). Alex assures Michael that he will be safe when working on the machine, but I’d say within the first thirty seconds he hallucinates Michael’s mother, Nora. She’s sort of a menacing presence, but I suppose Alex’s hallucinations would be reflective of his own thoughts and fears. Thus, Nora keeps telling him that despite whatever progress Alex and Michael make together, Alex’s father will always be looming over them. Alex tries to refute that by saying he spent that last year destroying everything his father had done to keep Michael safe. Holy true love, Batman! The hallucinations get dangerous though, but luckily just as Alex is about to walk off of a ledge Michael is there to pull him down. Not long after, they work together to pull the machine apart and tweak it to get it working properly. We’ll see exactly what that means next week, I suppose.
All in all, pretty good drama for the week. Again though, Animal Kingdom is still working at a snail’s pace and at this point I think this season is just one big lead up for the final season. Hopefully that one has a lot more action. I realize they are probably operating realistically time-wise, but it all just seems so slow. Roswell, on the other hand, is buzzing through storylines like they’re in a jetliner! The fact that a new alien exists definitely adds a new element, but I imagine he and Heath will stick around to potentially be the problem child next season. Jones is still the big bad of the season, but he’s taken a bit of a back seat in my mind. Still, plenty of developments to keep everything interesting. Can’t wait to see what each show has in store next week!