*Episode premise spoilers, which include season arc spoilers.*
A really strong episode, both emotional and exciting. My first time through 3Below, I was a little disappointed that season 2 gets away from the fish-out-of-water storylines of aliens trying to navigate life on Earth, but I can’t deny that the more “heroic” arc in the second half of the season is super well done.
Our heroes have learned that Morando isn’t just on Earth to kill them—he’s also after Gaylen’s Core, an ancient relic from Akiridion-5 that’s said to give its wielder godlike powers. The secret to its location is hidden in the memories of Aja and Krel’s parents. With Mother’s help, they plug into the Totality, which allows them to enter their parents’ memories in a race to uncover the secret before Morando does.
Before we get into the Totality, let’s briefly touch base with the characters who aren’t inside a living memory matrix. The rest of the gang has been kidnapped by Area 49B, and they’re down but not out. Steve has a really funny interaction with Lucy Blank, and Varvatos and Eli have a great moment together: after Varvatos literally carries Eli through a dangerous situation, Eli triumphantly shouts, “I did it!”, to which Varvatos responds, “You did nothing!!”
Our character of the week is King Fialkov, voiced by Andy Garcia. I’ve talked about Aja’s and Krel’s mom before, but now it’s time to look at their dad. As with Queen Coranda, Fialkov isn’t in the show very much, but we get enough of him in glimpses/flashbacks to get a sense of who he is and how he’s helped make Aja and Krel who they are.
Being in the Totality gives us our best look yet at the king and queen, which is both emotional and instructive for Aja and Krel. They’re chastened by memories of times when they were bratty to their parents and made to relive moments that are hard to watch. At the same time, they also see sides of their parents they never knew about.
Besides the time crunch aspect of searching for the secret before Morando finds it, the nature of the Totality adds drama to the proceedings. If a memory is disturbed or messed with, it’s destroyed, both within the Totality and in the minds of Fialkov and Coranda. Aja and Krel want to be the first to find out where Gaylen’s Core is, but they’re also aware that Morando has no compunctions about damaging their parents’ memories in his own search, and they have to try to minimize his destruction. And although Mother explains that the memories are static and the royals can’t interact with them, Aja and Krel have “ghost in the machine” moments where they’re convinced that their parents can see them.
At its heart, this is an episode for Aja and Krel, and it’s wonderful to watch them on this emotional journey together. They still have their fun sibling moments, of course, like Krel shouting, “Great talk, glad we took the time to weigh all our options!” when Aja runs headlong into danger as usual. And after Krel inadvertently harms an unhappy memory when he’s upset, Aja points out, “At least now they’ve forgotten what brats we were.” A bit ruefully, Krel replies, “Oh no, I’m sure they have plenty more of those.” I realize that Diego Luna and Tatiana Maslany probably recorded their voice acting separately, since it seems that’s how the industry typically goes, but they really create such fantastic sibling chemistry together.
But this is serious business as well. Things always get real on this show when Aja and Krel are separated from their friends and loved ones in heavy situations, when they’re made to press ahead just the two of them. Both feel the weight of this mission on their shoulders—if they don’t find Gaylen’s Core, Morando could destroy the Earth, and if they don’t get him out of the Totality, he might destroy all of their parents’ memories, leaving nothing of what makes them them once they’re finally restored.
For Krel, he also reckons with his relationship with his dad, which could be tough. After Fialkov was nearly killed in Morando’s coup, and now that Krel has gone so long without having his parents around, it’s easy to want to only remember the good moments. But in the Totality, Krel relives the way Fialkov could be dismissive of his engineering talents, writing them off as a “hobby” that distracted Krel from his real duties as the future king. As we know, Krel has a definite arrogant streak, so this doesn’t sit well with him, and it also hurts to feel like his dad didn’t recognize what he considers to be the most special thing about him. Luna plays this scene so well, capturing Krel’s anger and hurt feelings, then his guilt at lashing out at his dad’s memory.
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