Episode two of Halo season one is out, and some parts of it were downright confusing. From Chief being a bad friend to UNSC counsel meetings – there was a lot to take in. We dove into every nook and cranny to dig up the juiciest tidbits from this one. Let’s get started.
Part 1: A Quest for Knowledge
Scene 1
We open on UNSC Spartan Training Center
*22 Years ago*
We see the bare back of a young man with deep, deliberate scars. They look new.
The young man looks back and sees numbered bunks, mostly full of sleeping comrades, but one is noticeably empty.
He dresses himself. We notice the young man is sleeping on bunk 117. This is John aka Master Chief.
He stops by the empty bunk numbered ‘066’. Before leaving.
Chief is sneaking around with a gun and avoids detection by a UNSC drone.
He finds Soren at a gate. Soren’s armor says 066. He asks Chief why he forgot his armor and his ditch bag
Chief threatens Soren. Tells him not to run.
Soren says Chief is programmed. He wants Chief to come with him.
Soren: “We’ll be on the Rubble by morning. Have a good breakfast. No one will find us there. John, it’s a fresh start.”
Soren reveals that his arm is deformed because of the UNSC.
Soren would rather die than stay.
Chief pretends his gun is jammed and gives him 5 minutes head start before he reports Soren’s absence.
Scene 2
Chief and Kwan discuss what happened when they arrived at Reach.
Chief doesn’t know what the object is, how the object helped them, or why he decided to save Kwan.
Chief: “Would you let a kid be executed?”
Kwan: “No.”
Chief: “Why not?”
Kwan reasons that it’s wrong to let a kid be executed, and Chief says “that’s what I was thinking.”
Was Chief fishing for a rationale?
Scene 3
Planet: Reach
Epsilon Eridani System
UNSC Fleetcom
Halsey is talking with a man in uniform. She says the object is capable of creating enormous energy fields.
The Covenant sent two ships and twenty elite warriors to retrieve it.
Halsey and Admiral Parangosky have a plan to bring in Chief. The military man says the committee should hear it.
Scene 4
Vannak and Kai discuss how Chief always has a plan and would not abandon them.
“Still no contact, and his beacon is turned off.”
Riz tells them “slipspace vector tracking on the Condor just came in” and they go to track Chief down.
Kai seems especially troubled.
Scene 5
Chief guides the Condor through asteroids. They “exited slipspace into an asteroid field.”
They get to safety and dock at a large space station. It appears to be comprised of several asteroids tethered together.
Chief grabs the relic and walks aboard Rubble. The locals are startled to see a Spartan.
Troken: Squirrell.
Squirrel: What is it?
Troken says in Hungarian: Open your frigging eyes!
Squirrel: Get the boss!
Several people point guns as Chief and then someone yells “Willy!” and a forklift blocks the path.
Why would you want to corner a Spartan??
Chief easily pushes it out of the way.
Soren comes and tells everyone to put their weapons down. Soren must be the boss. Soren still wears his Spartan armor.
Soren says that Vinsher has issued a bounty for Kwan. Kwan says he’s a traitor to the resistance.
Soren says Vinsher is the preferred UNSC replacement of Jin on Madrigal and that he is cleaning house. He is offering cash for Kwan’s head, literally.
Rubble has an advanced railcar system – like a subway.
They get on a railcar and it looks amazing. A bumpy ride at first and then it’s beautiful. Flying through space on a cable. I want to go on that ride.
We go to Soren’s own personal asteroid home and meet Kessler, Soren’s son, and Lyaira, Sorren’s wife. Actually it’s spelled Laera according to imdb.
Laera says that Sorren talks of John often, but Soren downplays it.
Scene 6
High Charity
Covenant Command
Location: Unknown
The Blessed One, Makee, is grilling an Elite about his experience on Madrigal. Three prophets are also there.
Imdb says the prophets are Mercy, Truth, and Regret.
The Elite recalls that when Chief touched the object, he saw a ring. Makee seems happy to hear it.
A prophet says “It is one of the keystones. Finally.”
Another says “We must have it”.
Makee wants to go retrieve it herself. The three prophets resist the idea.
Makee says she is loyal and can infiltrate the humans because of her appearance.
Mercy says it’s too dangerous.
Makee says “you took me in, saved me. You tutored me and taught me of the great journey.”
Makee wants to show appreciation by finding the keystone and it leading them to the “sacred ring.”
Scene 7
Keyes is giving a briefing in an impressive conference room.
“Governor Vinsher has control of the situation on Madrigal.” But with more of an iron fist than we had anticipated when we put him in charge.
Vinsher has the colony producing again. “The other colonies are taking notice.”
Concern is expressed over their ability to control Chief.
Halsey introduces Cortana and gives credit to Admiral Parangosky. It augments the brains of Spartans just as they have done with their bodies.
“It will override Spartan consciousness and replace it with an artificial general intelligence.”
“Cortana is the next stage in human evolution.”
The computer makes their decisions for them. Faster, better decisions. And “most importantly”, it makes the Spartans controllable.
Keyes agues that it’s inhumane to suppress their consciousness.
Halsey says they already suppress their emotions with “hormonal pellets”. Spartans are their only useful weapon against the Covenant so the ends justifies the means.
An attendee challenges Halsey on her theories, saying her past work on this has led to legal problems.
“Didn’t that process depend on biological substrates derived from the illegal practice of flash cloning humans? Have you found a way around that?”
Hood seems to be in charge. He interrupts and asks if Parangosky is on board with Halsey’s plan. She reluctantly agrees to a pilot program.
Hood seems pleased and ends the meeting.
Scene 8
Planet: Madrigal
Madrigal City
Vinsher marches in front of a group of people bound and on their knees. He casually executes one after another.
“Remember the tale of the rebel Jin and what a spot he put Madrigal in. He led us into costly war and then he stole our hydrogen.”
Vinsher shoots down a camera drone with his handgun. He does not want this recorded.
We find Kwan was watching the drone feed from Soren’s house. Was she the one piloting the drone?
“Vinsher hated my father. He was always looking a way to cut a deal with the UNSC. Now Madrigal is his.”
Laera says she lost her family when she was a little younger than Kwan. Her whole planet to the Covenant.
She must be at least ten years older than Kwan. Maybe twenty. How long have the Covenant been attacking humanity?
Chief can’t taste food.
Chief estimates that he’s a day ahead of the UNSC.
Soren and Wife are inhaling something. They call it Clarity. Kwan says no thanks.
Soren says the Spartan program and the treatments are not permanent, no matter how long it had you.
Soren says that pellet in Chief’s back that “enhances battle focus” actually mutes everything.
Chief says it eliminates distractions, Soren says it makes you numb and that’s why Chief can’t taste. Soren says Chief should remove it.
Kessler stamps Chief’s hand with a smiley face. The parents act like its a big deal. It means they can count on each other. Chief takes it very seriously and thanks Kessler.
Time for bed.
Scene 9
UNSC Frigate – Stalwart Dawn
Outbound from Reach
Vannak, Riz, and Kai are closing in on Chief. They track him to the asteroid belt.
Scene 10
Miranda Keys catches the Admiral in the hallway.
Miranda wants the Madrigal object that Halsey was granted first dibs on.
Miranda takes credit for advances in shielding, active camo, and slipspace navigation. She claims that Halsey gets the lions share of funding.
Miranda claims great progress in understanding the Sangheili language. It isn’t spelled Sangelie.
Admiral Parangosky says no way.
Scene 11
Chief shows Soren the relic. Soren says he knows a guy and Chief assumes he means to sell it. Soren corrects that he knows an expert on Covenant tech.
They walk a busy street and Soren buys churros. Tells them about how Rubble is a haven for people who don’t fit in anywhere else.
“I’m talking about a whole other deal, man. Mystics. Guys like Reth are swimming in the cosmic river.”
Chief: So he’s insane.
Soren: He’s sensitive. Hangin out with the aliens will change you brother.
“Looks like a jail, but it’s not. It’s a refuge for them.”
A Mystic calls Soren “Mr Selfish”. Soren gives them some churros.
Soren says “they like sweets” and tells Kwan not to be afraid.
Everyone is in metal cages and acting psychotic.
One guy is obsessed with spiders and scorpions, another frogs.
One steals Kwan’s food.
Reth seems crazy. He is at a shrine of sorts. Squeals to close the door when they come in. Tastes Chief’s armor.
He’s curious about John’s fight with the Covenant.
He has a golden frog in the shrine.
Reth gets intensely interested in Kwan. Asks her name and says it several times.
They show him the relic.
Reth says “Covenant’s whole religion is based on things like this. Things from another time, things left behind. They roam the galaxy looking for pieces – looking for clues.”
The Covenant tried to use Reth to get the relics to work and it didn’t work.
Reth touches it and it does nothing. it’s because he’s not a “Blessed One.”
Reth says the Blessed Ones are “human but more so… the blessed one has an obligation. A responsibility. No, a moral imperative or an aperitif…”
Reth confirms that Chief doesn’t want to help the Covenant, then he grabs the relic and throws it onto Chief’s hands.
A hologram goes out from the relic and the Mystics starts screaming and going nuts.
John has more memories of his childhood.
An older boy.
A man is standing there over a drawing boy, is he impatiently waiting for john’s drawings?
A poorly drawn wolf maybe. Some kind of symbol in the top right. It’s signed John.
A woman says lets hang this one and takes it.
A boy, chasing dog (white wolf?) into a cave? Other people are running into the cave?
It appears the boy says “no” as the woman hangs the aforementioned drawing, and the boy gives her another drawing to hang instead.
More dog.
An unconscious child being carried.
Surgical instruments.
An ATV.
A black woman.
A pipe or a shovel handle or something, exchanging hands.
“I dont want to do it!”
A man in military attire, driving a vehicle.
A boy with blinding lights all around.
A camera lense?
The boy is well dressed.
A boy is drawing.
A man (seen before) says ‘John!’ aggressively.
John is crumpling up one of this drawings.
The vision is over. Reth yells, “What are you? You bring it to life but you are different than the one they have.”
Reth is yelling “It’s in your eyes!”
Reth teases that Chief doesn’t know what he is. Chief demands answers but gets none.
Reth: The image you made it produce, the ring, that’s what they want.
Soren: What is that ring?
Reth: A door.
Kwan: to what?
Reth: The end of life as we know it.
Chief: So it’s a weapon?
Reth: Yeah. You felt it didn’t you? The darkness.
Chief: Yes.
Reth: That means you can stop it.
Chief: How.
Reth: Destroy the artifact. Then destroy yourself.
Part 2: Decisions are Made
Scene 12
Chief storms out and says he has to go back to the UNSC. Kwan objects. The UNSC want her dead.
Chief says that he needs the other Spartans to help.
Soren thinks it’s more about wanting Halsey because she’s like his mom. Soren says Halsey doesn’t care about him.
Chief says Soren is a coward who ran away when things got hard. “You have no loyalty to anything.” This really wounds Soren. And after these last few scenes, is objectively untrue.
Soren reveals that because he only got 5 minutes to escape when they were kids, he got shot down and was burned all to hell, living off bark and beetles. They were on his ass for months till he got free.
Chief: You were wrong to run.
Soren: You were wrong to stay.
Chief has made up his mind. The Covenant can glass entire planets. He needs support to stop their designs with the relic.
Chief tells Soren he’s the only civilian he knows and asks if he can trust him.
Dang. After all that, Chief still has issues trusting Soren.
Chief makes Soren promise to keep Kwan safe and leaves.
Scene 13
Chief takes off in the Condor, and turns on his beacon. Silver Team on Stalwart Dawn reports it to the UNSC. The Spartans are commanded to bring him in.
We skip ahead in time and are back on Reach, initiating ground transfer of Master Chief and Silver Team.
The ship lands and we see Chief, in handcuffs, being marched into the base. A squad of troops stand by.
Halsey swoops in to secure the relic. Miranda watches her drive away.
Scene 14
Chief sits in a sparse jail cell. Halsey comes in.
Chief wants to talk about the relic.
Halsey tells him that his actions have been harmful to the Spartan program.
Chief says he felt something, and starts to talk about his memories. Halsey says thats not a constructive place to go. She wants to focus on the lab results.
Halsey asks what was it about Kwan that made him want to save her.
Scene 15
Kwan is watching a broadcast about Vansher.
“Madrigal has a gift. It runs through our rivers, in our lakes, and the ground on which we live. And with our partners in the UNSC, we will return to our places as the gem of the outer colonies.”
Scene 16
Back to Chief and Halsey.
Chief “couldn’t let her die.”
Halsey asks why she was different.
Chief says it’s him who is different.
*we cut to see Makee getting undressed (for bed?)
Makee sleeps naked, confirmed.
There are deep scars on Makee’s back.
Chief: “I feel connected to something. I don’t know what it is or why it chose me. But I know it’s out there. I can feel it.”
Halsey asks why he came back, Chief notices Kessler’s smiley face stamp on his hand and he says there’s no one else he can trust. Halsey thanks him and holds his hand.
Halsey: “We’re going to do great things together.”
As Halsey says this, we are shown the Halsey clone, representing the Cortana program.
*End of Episode*
There you have it folks! Make sure to join our Facebook group to get all the latest news, analysis, and recaps on the Halo TV show.
