Sanctuary: “Uprising” – The World is Not Enough for General Villanova!

Welcome back Sanctuary fans!

While last week’s episode dealt with Helen Magnus’ (Amanda Tapping) trip through time, this week we went back to the future to see how the “children” were getting on.

Before beginning my review we include the complete episode of Sanctuary season four (“Uprising”) provided courtesy of Syfy via Hulu. Enjoy!

As it turns out, that is not very well – the Abnormal refuge camp is in total disarray with fighting between them and the military, and Biggie (Christopher Heyerdahl) and Kate (Agam Darshi). Things get even worse when the Abnormal leader Thelo (Adam Copeland) is killed by an explosion.

Meanwhile erstwhile Dr. Will Zimmerman (Robin Dunne) is trying to talk down General Villanova (Tom McBeath) from committing genocide and getting nowhere in the process. To make matters worse Will is unable to get any support or help from Doctor Lee (Francoise Yip).

At the camp, some semblance of control is gained by Garris (David Milchard). However with Thelo (Adam Copeland) now dead, emotions are running extremely high.

Back at the Sanctuary there is an incoming priority call – from everyone. With Helen (Amanda Tapping) out of action, the network nominates Will as Acting Head of the global Sanctuary network. That ties him to the house, so Henry (Ryan Robbins) goes to the camp in an attempt to broker peace.

Will talks to Villanova again to little or no avail. The camp is currently safe – but at the expense of the calderas, where thousands of Abnormals are gathering. Villanova tells Will that his son died in Iraq, and that he’s just trying to stop people from getting killed (by wiping out Abnormals?)

Henry’s entrance into the camp is met by general distrust. But then, he is delivering the news that Praxis is destroyed – a fact the Abnormals inside were not aware of and now makes things even more tense than they were.

Will makes some calls, gets nowhere, and so calls in marker and rings up an acquaintance to do him a favour. Will is promptly hung up on and turns to dear friend and lover Abby Corrigan (Pascale Hutton) whom he believes will be able to pull a few strings to get the job done..

Back at the camp, Garris releases the military hostages, though Biggie and Kate are kept prisoner along with Henry. Kate tries to reason with Garvis, but with Praxis gone, events are spinning completely out of control.

Meanwhile, at… um, an undisclosed location, Villanova is making plans for mass genocide. He orders a bomb drop over the Chilean caldera, killing thousands of the fleeing citizens of Praxis who all end up as victims to Villanova’s heavy handed dealings.

At the camp, a female empath portrayed by the lovely Karyn Baltzer feels the deaths and relates this to Garris, screaming in horror and pain. Biggie summises that a strike has been made. Garris breaks the straps binding Biggie and Kate, telling them they are not free but that he can’t leave them unable to defend themselves. He passes the knife to Biggie, so that he can undo Henry.

Villanova gets a report that the strike has had a 58% casualty rate and dispatches a “mop up” operation to finish off the hapless abnormals.

Meanwhile back at the Sanctuary, Will’s favour turns out to bear fruit! FBI agent Abby Corrigan (Pascale Hutton) is one of the metal poppers that so entertained Nikola Tesla in “Vigilante” (episode 3.09) She has a freak-out about Hollow Earth, but comes around and contacts an ex-boyfriend for a favour of her own.

Henry has come to, just in time to hear the camp getting noisy over the first caldera attack. One of the Abnormals is rabble-rousing, but this is brought to an abrupt halt by Garris. He and Biggie manage to settle things down, enough that the hostages are able to move around the camp and help, at any rate.

Will has problems of his own, namely jealousy as Abby rings a whole list of exes. She gets codes for Villanova’s computer network. Will uses them to hack in so that he can track the general’s movements and discovers the next caldera attack is in Indonesia.

Once again we segue back to the camp, Biggie has uncovered something of a mystery – Fallon’s body is missing. As in completely. He has, however, found the murder weapon in Garris’ tent.

Abby and Will’s snooping in the military network opens a whole can of worms: files on profiling and genetic manipulation – signs that the United Nations is putting into place the “Abnormal Final Solution” as Will puts it. They realise that experimentation is being done on Abnormals to create super soldiers and probably worse. It is Helen’s worse nightmare become reality. (This hints strongly at themes for the rest of the season)

Henry contacts Will, who gives him and Garris details on the next caldera attack. Henry is sure that he can use the access to Villanova’s computers to block the satellite feed and prevent the attack – but that is only a temporary solution. After that conversation, Garris sneaks off into a tent and, after a coded whistle, out comes Fallon (Jody Thompson) looking surprisingly good for a dead woman.

So it has all been a ruse, with Garris complicit in the lies. However, he is more than a little irritated that she knew Adam Worth (Ian Tracey) would destroy Praxis and that she herself is allowing the deaths of so many of their people. Kate and Biggie storm the tent. Garris has clearly admitted the truth and now Fallon is being brought to book. She refuses to give any information but Kate simply brings in the same empath we saw screaming from the deaths of her kind.

Villanova is preparing the second caldera attack, just seconds away, when the screens go blank due to Henry’s interference. He orders a change of satellite, meaning that the Sanctuary team needs to hurry with their solution.

Henry is talking to Will about that when he notices an anomaly on the network – there is a second transmission tapped in on the conversation… and it is coming from within the Sanctuary! Will and Abby track the signal. It leads them to Helen’s bedroom… and Helen herself.

Helen discovers that the Abnormals at the calderas are acting as one, like a hive mind, and summises they are being directed by a psychic being or thing. They contact Doctor Lee, who suddenly becomes all nice and co-operative when she sees Helen. Will tells the doctor about the feeding ground beneath Villanova’s next target and explains how bombing that site would be a Very Bad Thing and give the Abnormals a foothold on Earth. This is what Fallon planned all along and sacrificed thousands of her own kind for. Lee contacts the general and orders him to stand down.

With a sort of peace restored, Fallon faces a tribunal and Garris leads his people back underground, promising to rebuild Praxis. Kate steps forward as an emissary between Hollow Earth and Sanctuary, determined to uncover who else was involved in Fallon’s plans… and probably also to further her relationship with Garris (so much for the denials of him being her boyfriend, eh?)

Once again back at the Sanctuary, Helen has some explaining to do to Will. She lets him know that she has been missing for 113 years, not days as he had believed. Will realises that hearing the truth is going to take quite some time and that he needs to be sat down. Helen adds that a bottle of Bordeaux would not go amiss!

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Misa Buckley