Ascension 1x02: "Night One, Part Two"
Criminal investigations, radiation storms, conspiracies and innocents held at gunpoint; while episode 1x01 of Ascension set the foundation, 1x02 began to assemble the building blocks of one whirlwind story filled with plot twists at every turn.
The entire episode has you on the edge of your seat, trying to make sense of everything that's happening, but it isn't until the last two minutes that things come to a screeching halt, and it all starts to make sense.
Ascension isn't an exploration project, it's an experimentation project. The shifting of the stars, the radiation storms that strike, even things as simple as the flush of a toilet are all being controlled in an Earthbound lab, and we as viewers come to realize that Ascension, filled with a crew fifty-one years in the making, never really left Earth's atmosphere.
The entire project has been orchestrated to determine what would happen on the real thing, and the people on the ship have absolutely no idea that they are taking part in a lifelong experiment. But, if everything is controlled down to the finest detail, it makes both the scientists and the audience wonder... how did a gun get onto the ship?
Yes, yes, yet another twist revealed itself in this thrilling episode; the artifact that Stokes gave Lorelei in the pilot was a gun and, while we have no idea where it came from, it begs the question of whether or not the lower deck crew really are planning a revolution, and if Lorelei may have, for some reason or another, been involved. Was she in it for James? Or simply because she believed the same conspiracy theories that all of them did? That being said, if they were in it together, why would someone from the lower deck have killed her? Hence my new theory that it was someone up above that did it, and I have further proof that the Captain's wife was in on it.
While the Captain's main focus in his position is to ensure a safe journey for those aboard Ascension, his pretty little wife has other aspirations. She's incredibly power hungry, using her "girls" to gain favours and information from the powerful people aboard the ship and, when news of Lorelei's death breaks, she isn't the slightest bit shaken; instead, she sees it as an opportunity. An opportunity to ensure her place on the ship, and her husband's power. The murderer to her isn't someone to be feared; it appears that she practically thinks of him as someone to thank, for giving her the opportunity to make her husband and his crew seem like the good guys. Given her pompous outlook on life, it wouldn't surprise me if she thinks lowly of the lower deckers; she could even be working to frame them for Lorelei's death, thus enforcing the stereotype that they are rowdy, dangerous, and lesser than those up above. I'm telling you, she can't be trusted- but, as it turns out, neither can the Captain himself.
Really, sir? You sent your right-hand man on a mission to find Lorelei's killer, but you don't bother to mention that you were having an affair with her? I'd expect that from your wife, but from you? Oh, the shame. It's beginning to look like no one can trust anyone aboard this ship- everything is, quite literally, one big conspiracy.
Maybe those on the lower deck are smarter than others give them credit for.