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Rachel lets Monroe and Randall into the Tower, but before they can get down to level twelve — where all the really fun toys your average genocidal dictator wants to play with are kept — the mysterious inhabitants of the Tower, last seen doing away with Randall's minion Mr. Austin, massacre Randall and the other Monrovies. Rachel and Monroe escape to Dick Cheney's secret underground office and squabble about the meaning of Rachel's revenge crusade and why Monroe is such a fuckhead and ooh, look, big guns!
Miles, Nora, Charlie, Neville, and Jason are reunited with Aaron in the woods outside the Tower. Aaron manages to get Miles, Charlie, and Nora inside, but the Nevilles are left to fend for themselves. And the Monrovies still haven't learned that you can handcuff Tom Neville, but unless you gag him, he's still dangerous. Neville manages to talk the terrified Captain Riley into starting a mutiny against Monroe.
Inside the Tower, Miles and Nora get separated from Charlie. Rachel has given Monroe access to Cheney's guns, and they rescue Charlie from the Tower enforcers. Monroe locks Miles in another interminable, emotionally charged standoff, while the Tower guards take Charlie and Rachel into custody and bring them to Grace and Dan, who's the leader of the Tower-dwellers. And here's their big secret of why the world has to remain stuck in the nineteenth century: because if they try to turn the power back on, it might work, or it might set the planet on fire. Sure. Okay then.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Previously on Revolution: The Tower is not actually a tower, and everybody wants to go there either to turn the power back on or to kill the people trying to turn the power back on. Also there is maybe a polar bear living in it.
We start right where we left off: with Rachel palming the grenade in Monroe's tent. She releases the lever and is immediately tackled by one of Monroe's guards. Major Franklin tackles Monroe. Rachel stares steadily, with completely dead, emotionless eyes, at Monroe while she struggles over the grenade with the guard who tackled her, and he manages to knock it outside the tent, where it explodes. Aaron sees the explosion from the forest.
Miles lands the helicopter carrying Nora, Charlie, Neville, and Jason somewhere in the woods several miles away from the Monroe encampment. (I guess Monroe's new power tools don't include radar.) Miles gives his troops the world's worst pep talk about how they're probably walking into certain death and they set out to rescue Rachel.
So the grenade didn't actually kill anyone (well, not anyone it was supposed to). Aaron watches from the woods with binoculars as Monroe and his guards escort Rachel to the Tower, where she puts her palm on the security panel. It blinks green and the doors roll open. Randall is all, THE FUCK? Inside, the lights switch on and Monroe, Randall, Rachel, and the others walk in, passing a supercollider on their way. You know, just your average secret bunker, equipped with a machine that can collapse the universe. Rachel hisses at Randall about how stupid he was, bringing Monroe here. He wants to know how she was able to open the door, since she doesn't have security clearance -- maybe Grace was responsible, he muses. Or else it's the polar bear.
Major Franklin and Captain Riley are back near the entrance when the huge doors slide shut, freaking them out. Elsewhere in the tower, we see that Landry Clarke's dad is the one who issued the order to close the doors, and had been watching the Monrovies make their merry way in. "Let's go say hello," he suggests, and his men grab their comically enormous guns.
Miles and Neville watch the entrance to the Tower with binoculars, looking for Rachel. Neville doesn't think she's there; she's probably dead in Nebraska, he ventures. Nora alerts them to scouts nearby--but it's actually Aaron, who was dumb enough to sit around reading by candlelight. He's delighted to see them because they probably have guns and grenades and possibly some beef jerky, while Neville's just like, hey fatty.
Inside the Tower, Grace has gotten the elevators working. And the satellites are still online, Randall points out to Monroe, showing views of Venice, London, Paris, Tokyo. All of which look pretty terrible, all grubby and half burned out. Randall brags some more about how this Tower can do anything: spy on anyone in the world, listen to their conversations, kill them. Such a great idea to give that power to your friendly local GENOCIDAL MANIAC. To access all those functions they need to get to level twelve, Randall says, which finally makes Rachel speak up, proving to Monroe that he was telling the truth. To the elevators!
Nora hugs Aaron and Miles is all yeah, yeah, happy reunion, let's go save Rachel, huh? Aaron fills them in on Rachel's insane plan and admits that he can get them into the Tower with Jane's journal. Only problem: all those troops in the way.
Elevator. The door opens, letting Monroe, Randall, Rachel, and a troop of soldiers out on level eleven. Randall suggests taking the stairs down another floor, but the building doesn't seem to want to let them down to level twelve, because the lights go out, sirens start blaring, and the men we saw earlier start turning everyone in the elevator into red chunky paste. (Seriously, it's like Walking Dead levels of gore. This is what you choose to spend your money on, NBC?)
Rachel scampers off and lets herself into a protected room, but before she can close the door big bank vault-style door, Monroe follows her in. She tries to kill him, again, but he disarms her and demands to know who the shooty bang-bang guys are.
Monroe camp. Tom and Jason haul over the amplifier from their helicopter, connect a couple of cans of gasoline to it, then drop a hand grenade on it. Boom. Great big boom. Franklin and the others run toward the diversion. Nora kills the last guy guarding the entrance to the Tower, and she and Miles hustle Aaron over to the security plate. While Aaron types in the override code, Miles and Charlie exchange gunfire with the Monrovies.
He manages to get the door open, and Miles, Charlie, and Nora scamper in just as they're running out of ammo, because this week we remember that running out of ammo is a thing that happens occasionally. Tom and Jason are on their way, but they get pinned down. Miles tells Aaron to shut the door, even though the Nevilles are still outside. Charlie shrieks and has to be restrained, because now she and Jason are in loooooove. Even though she basically told him she thought he was a murderer last week.
Inside the Tower room where Monroe and Rachel have secreted themselves, there's a smiling portrait of George W. Bush on the wall. Rachel again denies knowing who tried to kill them as Monroe searches for weapons. He says the only way they'll both survive is if she helps him, but Rachel reminds Monroe that she tried to kill him by suicide grenade, like, twenty minutes ago, so why would she help him now? Try to keep up, Bass. He rambles about how people who try to commit suicide aren't really serious about it so he knows she doesn't want to die. And he gets close enough that you'd think Rachel would scratch his eyes out or try to strangle him or something. But then he finds the closet o' guns.
Flashback. One week before the blackout, Rachel is fiddling with a pendant while she and Ben discuss how Grace made them in case something goes wrong with deploying the DOD's big Dark Ages weapon. She wants to stop the blackout, but Ben tells her she lives in a fantasy world where they can thwart the will of the U.S. military. They snap at each other some more, with Ben telling her he refuses to have this conversation right now and asking, "Can we please just get through this week?" Rachel agrees, but says after that they should separate. I cannot bring myself to give two shits about Ben and Rachel's marriage.
Miles, Charlie, Nora, and Aaron follow the same path through the Tower that Monroe's men took. Charlie can't believe her parents did this.
Tom and Jason are chained up in a tent. Major Franklin and Captain Riley come in and Neville congratulates them on their promotions with that particular I-will-gut-you-like-a-fish gleam in his eye. Franklin asks Neville how they can get into the Tower. Neville replies by asking about Jeremy, and if it's true Monroe killed him--if it's true that Monroe keeps doing that, killing the people who are closest to him. Franklin isn't swayed, but further interrogation will have to wait; he's called away to the infirmary. Neville seems to be getting through to Riley, though, who's pretty green around the gills.
Eleventh floor. The elevator door opens and shows Miles and Co. the carnage. There's a blonde woman in a black tank top lying facedown; Miles thinks it's Rachel. It's not, obviously. The elevator starts dinging and Aaron helpfully interprets that this means someone is coming. You know, in case any of the viewers forgot how elevators work.
Miles and the others run around the eleventh floor and close themselves in a room, barring the door with a cabinet. The room is full of cages, and Aaron stops, horrified, to ask, "Are those monkeys?" We do not see if there are, in fact, monkeys. Miles knocks out the cover on an HVAC vent and as someone starts shooting through the door, the four of them grab masks and escape into the vent.
The closet o' guns Monroe found has a security screen over it, which he is trying to bash his way through. He asks Rachel again what the room is: it's Dick Cheney's "undisclosed location" bunker, she replies. That is...kind of awesome, actually. Remember that Dick Cheney tried to get his house taken off Google Earth. I hope the bunker also has a man-sized safe! Monroe thinks Rachel can access the closet o' guns. Flatly, she replies that he's right, about everything. She doesn't want to die. She wants to see Charlie again. Ugh, why? But Rachel loves her dead kid more than her living kid, and is more dedicated to revenge than to continuing to live her life, for any reason. Elizabeth Mitchell's cryface vexes me.
Monroe protests that events (and by "events" he means "ruling the eastern United States with an iron fist, massacring civilians, executing my closest friends, and torturing indiscriminately") have gotten out of his control. He tells Rachel about his son with Emma and wonders what his son would think of him. Since you got his mother killed, he'd probably think you're an asshole, Bass. I realize this is supposed to be some sort of emotional confrontation and reckoning between Rachel and Monroe, but honestly they're both such reprehensible, irredeemable characters at this point that I want them both to be incinerated, if only so they will STOP WHINING ALL THE TIME.
Flashback to four months after the blackout. Ben is building a computer in the attic (always the attic). He switches on the pendant to power it and asks his DOS prompt if anyone is out there. Rachel comes in and he wants her to share in his glee over the computer, but she's just been searching for supplies in the city, which is full of dead bodies and abandoned children. She starts to break down, crying about how they are responsible for all those deaths. Yes, Rachel. You are. Ben reminds her that having a conscience now will only hold them back and prevent them from causing more mayhem to keep Charlie and Danny alive. I suppose it never occurred to them to go to Colorado at this point and turn the power back on? On Ben's computer, Grace answers that she's there.
Back in the Tower, Aaron explains that the guns the people chasing them have are coilguns, which use electromagnets rather than gunpowder. Apparently this is a real thing, but Aaron calls it "Area 51 stuff" and says he saw it on Mythbusters. He points out an armory on a schematic of the Tower that was in Jane's book (presumably) and they set out to arm themselves. Miles makes it almost all the way there, creeping through what looks like an enormous boiler room full of heating and cooling units and helpful catwalks, before someone--one of the Tower guards--almost catches him. He skulks around and goes another direction, then gets to the armory. Which is empty.
Riley's back to talk to Neville, as he requested. Neville plays on Riley's fear and his patriotism, saying, "The only thing wrong with the Monroe Republic is Monroe himself." Jason chimes in that Tom is just thinking about the lives of the men in the militia, which are increasingly at risk under crazy, paranoid Monroe's leadership. Riley considers what they're proposing, which is an all-out revolt against Monroe, but he's not willing to go out on that limb, and leaves.
The Tower troops have found Aaron, Nora, and Charlie and are blowing holes in everything in sight with their big magnet guns. Miles gets the drop on one of them, stabs him, and takes his gun.
In Cheney's bunker, Rachel sees Miles and the others on a security monitor. Monroe tells her to unlock the guns so they can go help them. Um, I am confident that Dick Cheney kept a lethally sharp letter opener in that desk. Rachel wants assurance that Monroe won't kill Miles. Monroe's all....eh. He promises not to hurt Charlie, though.
Miles really likes his new gun. He exchanges fire with the guy who is stalking them and covers Charlie, Nora, and Aaron while they...run around aimlessly. Another Tower guard catches up to them and is about to kill Charlie when he disintegrates from a blast to the back. On the other end of that blast: Monroe. Aaron, huddled against an air conditioning unit, wets himself. Rachel, also armed, helps pry Charlie out from under the coils of HVAC tubing that trapped her, and the thanks she gets is Charlie screaming about what Rachel is doing there with Monroe. Monroe just fucks off to somewhere because even he can't handle any more of Charlie's shrieking. And then Rachel, Charlie, and Aaron walk straight into a trio of hostile Tower guards.
Elsewhere, Miles and Nora have killed the people hunting them, all except for Monroe, who hollers at Miles that it's time to settle their little lovers' quarrel. They both power up their guns.
The Tower guards escort Charlie, Rachel, and Aaron to a living area where a bunch of people are gathered around sleeping rolls. The guards search the three for weapons, confiscating Jane's book from Aaron. Rachel snaps that they should just kill them if that's the plan. Grace steps out from behind another woman and says the plan isn't death, hopefully. Aaron introduces himself to Grace (remember that he and Maggie found her house way back in the third episode), and she says he's pretty famous around here already. And then Landry Clarke's dad--whose name is Dan, whew--greets Rachel.
Rachel says she thought all these people, whom she and Ben left working at the Tower the night of the blackout (except that the Tower is in Colorado and they were in Chicago--why does geography mean nothing to you, show?), were dead. Dan's all, not dead. Clean and happy! He accepts Jane's book from one of the guards and tells Rachel no one can get to level twelve, on account of the ability to kill everyone on earth from there. It's unclear if the living area is on level twelve, and that's why Mr. Austin and Grace didn't encounter Dan and his crew until Mr. Austin tried to take the elevator down a few weeks ago, or if they're on level eleven and no one is allowed on level twelve ever.
"I can't remember the last time I felt sunlight, or rain," Dan says when Rachel asks how long they've been underground. Should've gone a little heavier on the pallor makeup, then, because Glenn Morshower is a decidedly pink man. He says they spared her when they killed Monroe's men, and asks her not to make him regret it. Hell, do they have hot showers? Given the choice between scrabbling for jerky on the plains of Kansas and staying in this lovely climate-controlled environment that seems to have food and safety aplenty, I'd be first in line to protect level twelve.
Neville's jail tent. Riley is back and has come around to the idea of mutiny. He frees Neville's hands and says there are twelve soldiers on the side of revolt. They'll need to get rid of Franklin, who's still loyal. Riley unlocks Jason and Neville tells Riley he's proud of him.
Rachel wants to turn the lights on, but Dan's preparing to burn Jane's book and is firmly Team Let's Stay in the Stone Age, Except for Us, Here in This Room, and Fuck Everyone Else Who Might Enjoy Modern Medicine and/or iPods. Aaron pleads with Dan to help him make things better for literally billions of people, but Dan strikes a match and burns the book. Grace tells Rachel to explain what will happen if they flip the switch. Rachel, queen of Things That Could Have Been Brought to My Attention Yesterday, says the lights will probably come on, but there's a one in a million chance that the world will burst into flames.
Seriously? Are you kidding me with this bullshit? Flames. Really. FLAMES?
time, on the season finale: Miles and Monroe have the same conversation they had in the midseason finale. And Aaron flips the switch.