12 Monkeys S3 Episodes 1-3

12 Monkeys is back! Season three started off with quite a bang, and SyFy did something interesting this time. They released the whole ten episode season over the weekend of May 19-21st. Kind of like binging it on Netflix almost (or Hulu, where the first two seasons are). This was actually a mixed bag, since I couldn't pause the episodes so I had to take some quick notes as I watched. But enough about that. I'm going to divide the entire season up into several posts, taking a few episodes at a time, and share my thoughts. My initial reaction though: this acclaimed but ratings- challenged show is as great as ever, and it's a shame more people aren't watching. It's fabulous TV. 

Oh, and there will be some spoilers in this post. 

So we start where we left off last time- Cassie, Ramse and Jennifer are lost in time and Cole is desperate to find them. Worse, Cassie is being held by the cult of the 12 Monkeys, and unbeknownst to Cole, Cassie is pregnant with the Witness- the future leader of the 12 Monkeys. Yes, Cole and Cassie's child will grow up to be their greatest enemy. It's enough to make your head hurt! But at any rate Cole has been trying for months to find clues as to where his friends are, and he's starting to look rough. Stress and lack of sleep are affecting him and Jones is ready to pull the plug. After all, Cassie is not the mission, stopping the virus is... but Cole won't give up on Cassie. 

But success! One of the temporal markers he has left in the timeline goes off, and they've found it- Titan! The mysterious city where the 12 Monkeys have imprisoned Cassie. Cole goes in and almost succeeds in getting to Cassie, but in true 12 Monkeys fashion something goes wrong and more mysteries are in play. But we get to see... future Cole! Yes, future Cole saves present Cole and gives him a clue leading to Jennifer. Because- they need Jennifer. She's the Primary and all that, but bottom line is- she's always been the key to everything and that hasn't changed. They need to find Jennifer. 

Episode 2 - Guardians

So where is Jennifer? Well funny you should ask. Turns out she's in France, circa 1921. She finds herself in a trench as the Germans are defeating the French, and when German troops are shooting everyone she has to think fast. So she's like do I know any German? And we get... this. 

That's... Jennifer. The secret weapon of this show. 

So... Jennifer cools her heels in Paris for a few years until Cole and Jones find her, and come back in time to get her. Nice to see Jones getting in on the period action. It was a riot too to see Jennifer trying to plant clues in history books, including performing at a theater with plays that looked rather like popular movies of the late 20th century! This show is so fun. And when they show up to get her, all she can say  is "Finally". It's gotta be tough to be her. 

Cole is so fixated on saving Cassie he doesn't realize just how alone Jennifer has felt for the last few years, stuck in the '20's, and after a run-in with the cult ends up resetting the timeline, he gets another chance to get it right. And she forgives him. Jennifer is back on the team!

Episode 3 - Enemy 

This episode was dark. Olivia and Ramse hook up with Cole and the rest at the facility, but is there a deeper game happening? Jones is suspicious and so is Jennifer- they take no chances and confine both of them, but eventually Olivia convinces them that she's telling the truth. There was a really cool moment when Cole takes Olivia back in time three months and throws her in the dungeon, figuring that three months in solitary in a half- flooded room with rats will break her. And by all appearances it does- she looks so shaken when they go down to get her- but by the end she is clearly playing the long game, and even though Cole may have indeed been on to something when he said he knew how to break her, the joke may end up being on him. 

Also we get a good look at Jones' obsessions, and Olivia even asks her if the mission trumped her feelings for her daughter, which galvanizes Jones into essentially torturing Olivia by putting her in the time machine and splintering her at a slower pace, causing great pain. It's hard for everyone else to watch but Jones shows no emotion. But later, when Hannah tells her that's not the way, and relates how they all feared the mad doctor in the smokestack building, Jones realizes what she's become, and that tear in her eye shows she's not too far gone. She then goes to Olivia and cleans her up, and it's nice to see that Jones is still human- although as I note below if Olivia is playing the long game, then she's fooled everybody. 

Or has she? Jennifer warns them at the beginning, and again at the end, that they shouldn't trust Olivia. Cole ignores her and goes anyway- and I'm thinking after everything, WHY aren't you listening to Jennifer? 

Random Thoughts

Magdalena tells Cassie that she was raised to raise the Witness- that he selected her. 

When the Four Horsemen show up in Paris Jennifer tells them they're not supposed to be there. Wonder what that means? 

The Witness is the paradox in a box? Sent back in time to be raised in the past. 

Hannah's security team are pretty badass. 

"You'll upend the tables of history to save the ones you love. But me, you left behind" Olivia tells Cole. She clearly hates him for leaving her behind? She was the Kirschner girl in 1961...

Can I just say that Olivia is awesome? Alisen Down kills it and she is one of my favorite characters now. Also Deacon is becoming a favorite as well. Will he be the x factor? 

Olivia has the Kalavirus (love that title) in her blood and is immune to the plague. Also we're told she was engineered to ruin the world. What exactly is she?  

One of the fascinating things about episode three is that Olivia may truly be on the side of the good guys- she says she knows how and when to kill the Witness- but doing so means killing Cole's child (since that's who the Witness is apparently). And she tells Ramse about the Witness being Cole's child and he doesn't tell Cole he knows. So even as he tells Cole that the two of them are family, no matter what time they're in, he's actually playing his friend. It's kind of cold and Ramse has always been someone you never know if you can trust.