“Alphas” took a bit of a break from its main season arc to explore some character relationships, but it seems that the Red Flag plot thread has come back with a vengeance. Oddly enough, this episode is really quite simple, proving more of a re-introduction to the larger issues surrounding the Alpha program than anything overly complicated.
In essence, the team is apprehended when there is evidence that one of them is a mole. Since all of them are in some way potentially compromised (something that the previous episodes were designed to highlight), a large part of the story is devoted to the interrogation of the team members and Dr. Rosen.
A few things do come out, things that perhaps should have been mentioned in passing in previous episodes. For that matter, those elements might have been mentioned, but I missed them along the way. The most important is that Gary is still friends with Anna, the leader of Red Flag. For the most part, this is dismissed as a major issue, since Gary says that they don’t discuss “work”, and he really has no idea where she is. If it wasn’t for the fact that Gary has been amply characterized as someone without filters, and honest to a fault, he would be a suspect regardless of the circumstances.
I also didn’t remember them mentioning MK Ultra before, but readers/viewers unfamiliar with that PsyOps program might want to do a little research. It makes a lot of sense that the Alphas would have been identified or tagged through that program, and also that assets related to that program would be retooled for tagging and tracking Alphas.
I was also a bit surprised to see that they were using one Alpha to screen the team. Listeners to the Critical Myth Podcast might remember that I pointed to several of the characters on “Warehouse 13” as evidence that Alphas had been part of the semi-canon “Syfyverse” for quite some time now. In this instance, it occurred to me that Agent Steve Jinks would have been the perfect individual to determine which of the team members was lying!
All that said, it seems pretty clear that the rest of the season is going to be devoted to the Red Flag plot element, at least to some extent. I don’t actually mind that it was set aside for a while, because the first season has been a nice showcase for the series as a whole and a reasonable shakedown period for the production staff in general. With a second season already ordered, the cast and crew can build on this foundation and use the season finale as a launching point.
Writing: 2/2
Acting: 2/2
Direction: 2/2
Style: 2/4
Final Rating: 8/10