The show starts with the standard “previously on ‘The Mist'” which can be found by clicking here . In summary of the pilot – everyone was unhappy, a mysterious mist came to town and stranded them in random places around town. A dog got killed and a man named Brian told everyone who would listen there’s something in the mist…..
“I told them there was something in the mist”
The action starts where it left off last week. Kevin, Mia, Adrian, and Brian are all stood over the body of the police officer that Mia killed last week. Brian uses this moment to say his favorite line – “there’s something in the mist”. To be honest, if it was me, everything that happens from now on I’d remind them that I TOLD them there was something bad in the mist. They theorize over what the cause of the mist is as we cut to Copper Connor.
Instead of staying outside the station like he was supposed to, Connor decides to do the sane thing and flee! Driving through the mist he ends up crashing into a moose which totals his car. Unable to drive away, he decides to run into the church. He meets the priest and a grieving Nathalie Raven.
“Something dragged her back”
Still reeling from the demise of Mrs. Carmody tension builds in the mall. Everyone worries about Carmody Jr for a few minutes before trying to work out what exactly is in the mist. (They should ask Brian – he’s dying to tell people.) We meet Gus for the first time – I’m saying it now, he’s a bad ‘un! He tries to get everyone to lock the doors around the mall for their safety. Alex and Eve offer to help to get away from Jay who’s looking shifty.
Back in the church, Copper Conner and the priest discuss what’s going on. Connor admit’s he doesn’t have a clue what’s in the mist. He just forgets to mention that he left a load of people in the police station.
“The pills stay behind.”
At the police station, Mia is acting shifty. (Shocking I know.) She hunts for drugs but gets pill blocked by Brian. He ask’s her if she’s a junkie, naturally, she lies to him. They share a nice moment with each other after she lets her guard down a little. Brian tells her that he’ll have her back but she can’t take drugs along with her. Which seems like a fair deal.
“Poison wouldn’t rip his arm off!”
Returning to the mall and the Copeland duo are checking the doors are locked. To show the audience that Eve isn’t afraid of anything she’s the door locker. However, they stumble upon a door covered in blood and a dead body on the other side. Eve isn’t happy. Gus isn’t happy and neither is anyone else. The body is in the admin wing of the mall. Which just so happens to be where the security radio is! Some customers decide that this is the ideal moment to throw a little racial hatred to one of the workers. Alex saves the day and breaks the tension by remembering that there’s a drone in the electrical shop!
After escaping the police station Kevin and Co. make it to an abandoned car just in time. The mist is growing thicker around them. Now that there are characters on the move the tension starts to build.
Arr….
Back in the Mist Mall, our plucky group of survivors have got the drone working. As it travels down the mist filled hallway it finds a body missing an eye. There’s writing on the floor in blood – Arr – I’m thinking mist pirate. (That could be another movie altogether.) Nobody can decide what he was trying to write. They do however decide that someone needs to go down the hallway and get the radio. A brave woman suggests Gus as he’s the leader. He all but says no – and suggests a lottery. Told you he was no good!
Kevin and Co are slowly driving through the mist. It’s quite obvious from Mia’s shuddering and twitching that she’s going through some major withdrawal. (Name of the episode!) The group stops as someone comes running into the road asking for help. Before they even get the chance to decide if they’re going to be good people or not, the survivor pulls a gun on them and demands their car. Mia isn’t having any of it and drives off without a seconds hesitation. Shocking nobody, she crashes. After another tense scene with cracking car windows, the group gets out safely and runs through the mist into the church.
Three feet from the door Mia remembers the guns they packed so decides to run back for them. She barely gets a few steps before the ghost of her mother is calling to her. She naturally freaks out and tells Mist-Mom that she’s not real. Brian comes to her rescue and the two run into the church and Crooked Connor (it’s his new name).
“You left us!”
Kevin tries to show he’s a tough guy by shouting at Connor. He’s unhappy that they were just left – and with a 16-year-old as well! Connor lies and says that he had to run – he was attacked! Everyone tries to stand around and show that they are the alpha male. It’s all a little uncomfortable. Connor gets the upper hand when he remembers he’s a cop and re-arrests Mia.
The lottery of doom is underway at the mall. In a shocking twist, that nobody ever saw coming Eve is picked. A stranger called Clint offers to go with her. (He might as well be wearing a red shirt.)Alex and Eve share a touching mother/daughter moment before Eve leads to Clint to his ultimate demise.
“If the bee’s die, humanity will only have four years left”
In the church, Kevin tries to comfort Nathalie over the loss of her husband. He attempts a soft approach and tells her that her husband’s spirit is with them. She counters that he’s not. He’s dead. There is no spirit – you’re either alive or dead. She then does a Bill Nye and tells us that without bee’s we’re all doomed. (I’m calling it now – Giant Mist Bee’s!)
In the Mist Mall, Eve and Red Shirt run through the hall to the security room. It’s very tense, but they manage to make it without incident to the room. They also find the radio and it’s got enough batteries to work. Absolutely nothing can go wrong now!
“It screws with your mind.”
Mia gives Brian a very detailed description of what it feels like being in withdrawal. He takes a break from reminding her that he told everyone about the mist. They actually have a nice moment together and bond a little. She confides in him that she saw stuff in the mist – just leaving off that it was her mom.
“Arrowhead”
Eve and Clint are checking all the stations on the radio. They are greeted by static – nobody is answering any of the channels. Clint goes from Red Shirt to villain as he tries to get in touch with Arrowhead. He’s Shadow 41 – which is a total bad guy name. Eve understandably isn’t happy and asks what he’s doing. He barely replies to her, when she suggests they take the radio back to everyone he tells her the radio is going nowhere. She tries to make a run for it, Shadow 41 chases her. They have a fight in the hallway before Eve takes his gun and shoots him dead. Looks like I was right – he’s a redshirt bad guy!
“We should think less…”
It’s tea time at the church. Nathalie is absent but everyone assumes’s it’s her grieving. We get a shot of her opening a cupboard before cutting back to Eve in the mall. She lies to everyone about everything that happened. The way she tells the story, the radio didn’t have any batteries and she got separated from Clint in the hallway. Nobody seems’s overly concerned about him missing. Except for his group of friends who are shuffling in the corner. Eve’s onto them!
Nathalie reappears with two bottles of wine. I like this woman! She asks them all to raise a toast in honor of her husband. When the priest tries to point out that its holy wine she pours on the guilt. She tells a story about cheap wine and how much she misses her husband. This might have carried more weight if we’d actually seen him properly, but it’s sad that she’s sad. (She has wine – I’m going to agree with everything she says.) Crooked Connor ruins it all as he takes the wine away from Adrian.
“She called you babydoll”
There are some spooky shots of Bridgeville and the mist. It’s intercut with shot’s of Jay waking up and going exploring. Eve and Alex trying to sleep as Eve hides the gun. Brian and Mia are trying to sleep in the church, they’re close as Brian confides that he heard the hallucination she saw before. She isn’t going mad. As the episode closes Jay finds the shifty students from earlier have hung themselves. However, there were 3 students and only two bodies.
With that, we’ve finished episode two of ten! Overall a bit of a clunky episode. The arrowhead stuff was exciting because it was hinted at in the movie and the book. With more time I wonder if the show is going to try to expand on this. The characters are all still somewhat one note – the only exception being Nathalie. Kevin and Connor at this point are becoming very boring characters with no real depth to them. I really want to like Kevin but he’s just a little bland. Brian desperately needs to learn some new lines, but his relationship with Mia is very interesting to watch. They’re quite obviously going to fall for each other before he gets his memory back and remember’s he’s actually a bad guy! I just hope that the two episodes of setting things up will have a pay off next week.
What did you think? Is the show a keeper or should it get stranded in the mist?
