Picking up from where we last saw our heroes on Killjoys, “Run, Yala, Run” (5×01) gets us right in the heart of a very twisted and brainwashed version of Old Town, Westerley. Johnny (Aaron Ashmore) is 
working in a factory with decontamination showers everywhere, but you don’t know exactly what’s going on in the factory. He is married to Yala (Hannah John-Kamen) and she runs the Royale. When D’avin (Luke Macfarlane), who’s still a Killjoy, comes to the bar looking for Jaq Kin-Rit (Jaedan Noel), Johnny and Yala freak out and it’s revealed that in the twisted brainwashed version that he’s supposed to be their son. Familiar faces show up in the Royale, the biggest appearance change being Pree (Thom Allison) but we also see Gared (Gavin Fox) flirting with a woman and then Zeph (Kelly McCormack) who seems just as weird as normal Zeph.
After knocking D’avin out, Yala and Johnny sneak onto Lucy (voiced by Tamsen McDonough). D’avin shows up and hilarity ensues. “Did you just try to shoot me?” D’avin asks Johnny, which felt like a callback to this last season when they talk about shooting each other being like a hug in their ‘family’. Apparently Jaq ran away from his genius boarding school on Qresh and D’avin is supposed to collect him and take him back, Yala explains that she never agreed but Qreshis can do anything they want so they took him. Yala stays behind to hopefully give D’avin a lead to find her son and when Johnny leaves them Lucy tries to talk to him which triggers his contamination bracelet. It’s like it triggers something in him, but he passes out. There’s clearly something between Yala and D’avin and when they touch, she flashes back to a host of memories.
It’s clear that Johnny and Yala’s relationship isn’t good and it hasn’t been good but there’s some wanting to try to mend it. The big question here is, were all of these personalities put in place by The Lady (Lily Reid)? Or do they mean something other than her just deciding the fates of everyone on Westerley? When Yala kisses Johnny during their little night in, she gets flashes of memories of her life on Lucy with him and the kiss feels wrong to her. She runs off to what seems like has to be their bedroom only to be locked in and to find a red box on her bed. The box holds the weapon to kill Hullen and immediately sets off memories and as she panics, her containment alarm goes off and she’s unable to get out which forces basically a full memory reboot and she remembers her whole life as Yala Yardeen/Dutch. When Dutch tries to explain to Johnny the truth, he’s just confused (not believing her) and was more worried she was going to ask him for a divorce.
Dutch stops Zeph, who she thought had remembered as well. Zeph goes on about how messed up
Westerley’s climate currently is and then takes her to her hideout and tells her about the conspiracy with the rain. Though Zeph isn’t her regular self, she still really wants to figure things out and is excited that Dutch is now her friend (and was hoping that they were lovers in their other life).
Pree has a heart to heart with D’avin because in this weird mixed up world, he’s a Killjoy and the local one. With D’avin trying to use Gared in order to get information on Jaq, Pree comes in to try to protect his secret boyfriend. D’avin agrees to back off, explaining that he’s just there for Jaq. Tipped off that D’avin is going to leave to go after Jaq without them, Dutch and Johnny board Lucy in wait for him and tell him “for a shitty town, we are very neighborly.” To me, this is just more proof that no matter how much The Lady changes, she can’t change the heart of people or Old Town itself. With a new lead, they head for the Red 9 location.
Meanwhile, at Red 9, Delle Seyah Kendry (Mayko Nguyen) not only looks more badass, but she is killing Hullen to keep Jaq safe. When the trio land at the Red 9 location, Dutch splits from the boys and finds Kendry and is relieved that she at least has her memories. Kendry explains that she and Jaq have been making plans while they’ve been “cosplaying” on Westerley. Kendry explains that The Lady plans on terraforming Westerley (again), but this time it’s for The Lady’s needs. When D’avin and Jaq come face to face, he reminds his dad that he wasn’t supposed to forget him. When they find out that Jaq got away, Johnny’s upset but Dutch is clearly relieved.
Zeph removes Dutch’s sensor and explains that the contamination bracelet is actually measuring stress hormones and when you panic, it goes off, and you go running for the decontamination showers. Zeph explains that she thinks you need hard hitting proof and no access to showers in order to break the original memories out. She leaves the red box with Zeph and tells her that she’s her fail safe in case they get to her and brainwash her again.
When Dutch goes to Lucy alone, she tells Lucy that she can stop hiding and she’s relieved that Lucy’s really still there because of Johnny’s off site auto-backup. She finds proof that the boys need to break them out of their brainwashed states: a hologram of Pree singing, Johnny’s wedding ring from when he was married to Pawter Simms (Sarah Power) for a day, and D’avin’s Skyborne dog tags. They all start to flashback and their bracelets go off, Dutch is unable to keep them in the Royale and run out into the rain. As this happens, Zeph realizes that the rain is The Lady’s fail safe to people not using the showers. They are immediately reprogrammed and turned against Dutch in that moment.
Zeph comes in and saves Dutch before the two of them go on the run. Dutch explains to her that in real life, she’s a badass and needs to embrace that. Even though Zeph tries to embrace it, she ends up shot and Dutch has to take her back to Zeph’s hideout to try to help her.
On a Hullen ship, we see a small girl who is obviously The Lady who visits a man in a prison, Khlyen (Rob Stewart). It’s revealed that he’s no longer Hullen because he bleeds red. He is asked how Dutch can be “awake”. He tells her that he should never underestimate his girls. The Lady taunts him that Dutch is all alone down there while he questions why she’s so scared. The final words from Khlyen are “now run, Yala, run.” To me, this is very much something that reminds me of The Flash since we get a lot of “run, Barry, run” (or basically insert any other speedster’s name instead of Barry).
What are your thoughts on the first episode of the final season? Is it everything you hoped for? What are you hoping to see for the remainder of the season? Tell us below!
Photo Credit: NBC Universal/Syfy
