SPOILER WARNING: POST CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED THE EPISODE

One Sentence Review

A dark tense brooding episode that divides the team and reveals a traitor within the heart of CID

Episode Synopsis

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Thoughts and Analysis

After a couple of filler episodes, Operation Rose and Martin Summers comes to the fore, and after a tense build up we are left with a gut wrenching revelation and even more questions regarding the nature of the Ashes world. I am still left wondering however, why Alex thinks that Martin Summers can help her back to the real world.

There are two stand out moments for me in this episode, which in chronological order are the death of Martin Summers (younger) and the reveal of the traiter in CID. Now I have to be slightly smug in that I guessed something irrevocable might happen to young Summers, and did intially think of mentioning the death possibility, but decided against it in the event it did happen and people accused me of being too spoilery. What I did not guess however was the Older Summers would murder him in cold blood or that it would happen towards the start of the episode,  I had figured an accidental shooting of younger Summers by older Summers or during Operation Rose.

The way it happened was just so shocking though as it came out the blue, it also indicates that what happens in the Ashes world does not impact the present, though part of me wonders if there will be a nasty sting in the tail for Older Summers in the final episode because of this. There is also the framing of Alex for younger Summers murder, and given her attitude towards him Gene must think she has motive. While I don’t think this will have any impact in this seasons finale, I could see Martin Summers body reappearing to haunt Alex in the third series (if there is one).

The other issue is Alex’s reaction to the news and apparent re-blaming of herself for her parents (and mother in particular) death and her apparant hallucination of her mother Caroline Price. My issue with it is simply that if what you do in this world does not impact the present then what good would saving her parents in the Ashes world do, as they would still be dead in the present if and when you wake up. Alex acts like she could have changed the past, when Summers death suggests you cant. Hopefully this will be explored more in the final episode.

Now as for the traitor reveal, the evidence and hints were there throughout the series and on the Ashes website that Chris could be the traitor and that it would be indirectly due to Shaz. It has to be said that this was very well done since at the beginning of the episode I thought it would turn out to be Viv given that he was put in the limelight thanks to his birthday party. From a dramatic standpoint though, for the reveal to have any impact it had to be Chris or Ray, and given that there seems to be a possibility of redemption for Chris, it would be far harder if it was Ray as the traitor. The reason being that if Ray was the traitor his motive would be loyalty to the free masons and it would be much harder to find a way to redeem him later on.

The only problem I had with the traitor reveal was that the way it was set up was too generic as it was the standard feed people slightly different information to identify the leak. This would have been fine except that Gene had already told everyone that he suspected a mole in the department which would immediately put me on my guard for such a tactic, though given that Chris was riddled with guilt, it is possible he knew it and took it as the way out of his bind. What I want to know is what other information did he alter for Summers, as that is who his contact had to be. There is also the question of what impact this will have on his relationship with Shaz, Ray seems to have abandoned him, though he should bear some blame for introducing him to the person who leant him the money, will Shaz as well?

The other important thing to note was that Gene did not seem to mistrust Alex in anyway and she was a part of the plan. This is despite her increasingly erratic behaviour, and her unprofessional and reckless conduct regarding Young Summers when revealing his identity to Lafferty. He also turned to her for what I assume is comfort and reassurance due to the Chris situation at the end of the episode when he turned up at her apartment glass in hand.

Overall then I thought this was a very good episode, though not the best of the series which I still think is the one where Supermac died. It is hard to believe though that there is only 1 episode left, and we are still no closer to knowing what Operation Rose actually is, though I assume it will happen next episode. So will Alex get back to the real world and see Molly?, will Summers suceeed?, and will the Galex fans finally get their wishes fulfilled?. I have no idea but I expect the answers to some of these questions will be given next week, and we will then be left waiting to find out if there will be a third and final season and have a years wait to see it.

Episode Rating

8/10