Doom Patrol Episode 4 RECAP (VIDEO SCRIPT)

Cult Patrol

• So the episode opens up with the most less-than subtle ass plot setup on the face of the earth, which I’d like to add I’m not necessarily mad at. 
• I say that because it starts seventeen years ago in a neighborhood in suburban Utah, where a family is celebrating the first birthday of their baby boy named Elliot.
• It then transitions to his 7th birthday
• /And outside of the fact that his parents let him get tattoos at that age on some white people shit, this happens: (chant)/
• ...(looks at camera) So this is a cult...
• /And it persists for a while, with Elliot getting more writing on him as he gets older. All the while his dad is watching thinking “Wait. This ain’t right...”/
• So when Elliot’s eighteenth birthday comes around in the current timeline - also known as “the sacrifice is finally ready” age - his dad tells him to run before his mom slits the dad’s throat
• Look, I just found a suitable way to keep DC from demonitizing these videos; I’m not about to risk that just so you can see some gore. You wanna see it? Either get DC Universe or “Go to China”
• Speaking of the current timeline, we’re introduced to Williby Kipley, who’s pretty much an Australian Constantine
• I wanna say that immediately makes him BETTER than regular Constantine because regular Constantine only has to deal with the supernatural.
• Kipley - along with dealing with the supernatural - is from the land down under. AKA the land where everything is trying to kill you, spiders regularly rain from the sky, and tarantulas are the size of puppies
• /Anyway, he enters Doom Manor looking for Niles to help him with the Cult, which is called the Cult of the Unwritten Book, but instead finds the Doom Patrol and asks for their help instead. He then explains that the cults purpose is to summon a giant eye called the Decreator to destroy everything, and the only way they can do that is if they read from the book once it’s ready./
• Now if you’re anyone like me, which if you are, I have to admit I’m both flattered and terrified at the same time
• Then you don’t really need any help figuring out that the book isn’t a book, it’s a boy. An eighteen year old boy. With tattoos. IT’S ELLIOT; THE BOOK IS FUCKING ELLIOT
• /So after Kipley creates a portal with a cigarette to snatch Elliot away from his psycho mother, they convince Kipley NOT to kill him in order to stop the cult from summoning the eye and suggest they seal the portal to the cult’s dimension instead/
• So Crazy Jane - who at this point the alter of Hammerhead is in control - volunteers to go to Spain to seal up the portal, and Cliff joins her in an attempt to understand why she’s been so abrasive to him lately
• /That’s when we find out that Jane was a bit thrown off at the aftermath of Cliff’s fight back in episode 3, and that the majority of the alters that’ve interacted with him so far - including Jane - kinda look at him in a different light now/
• And all while I was watching this, I couldn’t help but think: Oh no. They’re going back to using Jane as a development tool for Cliff
• Because at first glance, that’s what this interaction between the two of them looked like. Hell, they even went back to the “I’m connecting with Jane to make up for not being with my daughter” angle in the episode’s first shot with the two of them
• But, I’m glad to report that this is not the case. We’ll get to that in a minute though
• Meanwhile, while everyone else is on guard Elliot duty we get some good development moments from the rest of the Patrol.
• Larry and Elliot have a heart-to-heart about destiny and responsibility while the cosmic essence gets him to see an interaction it and Niles had upon first meeting the Chief, Cyborg and Kipley have a discussion about perception and doing what’s necessary to get the job done, and Rita takes a few steps forward into the world selflessness.
• You see, over the course of the episode, Cyborg has been using reverse psychology on Rita to try and get her to willingly participate becoming more active in not only finding Niles, but in trying to get her to look at the whole as a team and be less selfish when it comes to helping people
• Not my preferred tactic, but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t efficient
• /Because while Cyborg’s strategy was to slowly yet surely chip away at her, it comes to fruition a bit quicker because of Kipley’s involvement when she executes Victor’s attempt to get her to be proactive in the form of LITERALLY talking Elliot off of a ledge once he learns that his life has pretty much been a lie./
• And can I just say that seeing Rita actively make this decision on her own accord was one of the best moments of this episode to me
• Because while I understand her abrasiveness due to her sometimes lack of control of her abilities, she REALLY needed this moment to prove to me that she overcome this development path for her, since the majority of episode 2 seemed like a bit of a setback considering everything that happened with Mr. Nobody
• Now we can get back to Cliff and Jane
• /Who’ve entered a church and discovered that the portal to the dimension of the cult is in the punctured hands of a priest. But the plan is then turned sideways when the church and the priest in question triggers one of what I assume is a memory responsible for Jane’s alters in the first place, and Hammerhead attacks the priest as opposed to closing him off to the cult’s dimension, teleporting both of them there in the process/
• It’s then when we find out that Elliots parents have ascended to the position of the monarchs of the order. Including the dad, who’s still dead as fuck, and I find that continuity detail absolutely HILARIOUS
• But outside of the queen mother letting them know that the teams attempts to keep Elliot hidden were worthless and that their entire order is attacking the house as they speak, Cliff and Jade are finally forced to look at each other and themselves in the light that they see each other in, and the light that they are really in.
• That includes Cliff dealing with the fact that he looks at Jane as the daughter he never got a chance to raise, being looked at as the monster Jane now sees him as after episode 3, and the fact that all he is is a brain stuck in a robot; it’s pretty much that early 2000 existential meme made real.
• But it’s not just Cliff, it’s also Jane. We see how splintered her mind is, and we get more insight on what caused said splinter in the first place.
• The reaction she had to the priest earlier along with what was explored in the last episode continues to show that there’s more to Jane than just being a way for Cliff to develop, and that she’s an actual character.
• Plus, now that Cliff has had this truth about how he perceives Jane placed in front of him, it can be properly addressed later on down the line so Cliff can figure it out himself. Not to mention how they can both fix their perceptions of each other
• /Oh, and the cult’s home dimension is in a Krampus-ass snowglobe locate inside Doom Manor. Because where else would it be?
• Speaking of which, while Doom Manor is being invaded by lackeys of the cult, Kipley decides enough is enough and goes off to kill Elliot.
• /But because Rita is also not in favor of having Elliot killed, she incapacitates Kipley long enough for the servants of the cult to capture him, and they proceed to summon the Decreator right on the Doom Patrol’s front lawn. So in order to stop them, the present team and Kipley proceed to- (cut to credits)/
• Oh. Oh, this is a two-parter. Well fuck you too, Doom Patrol