The 100 - 'The 48'

I paint; like that nice Mister Hitler.

After the bombshell ending of Season 1, The 100 returns with an episode ominously entitled 'The 48', and we quickly learn that our - for want of a better word - heroes have been split into several groups: The 48 are the surviving members of the original prisoner mission who have been taken by the 'Mountain Men' to Mount Weather survival station; Olivia has been rescued by Lincoln; and The Grown Ups have escaped capture and soon make contact with Kane and Abby's team from the downed Ark.

Clarke breaks out of her cell at Mount Weather and takes a hostage, but the folks there seem mighty welcoming, explaining that she was just in quarantine and... I don't know, apparently explaining this at any previous stage would have been a contamination risk or something. She immediately takes against their hosts, not just because the old timey world of Mount Weather looks too good to be true, but because they did not bring everyone back with them. The rest of the 48 seem willing to go with it, especially Monty and Jasper (the latter pretty smartly hooking up with a local girl.)

In the immediate case, this conflict displays how much Clarke has absorbed the necessities of the wilderness, becoming almost feral. In the longer term and simply based on the need for drama, I am guessing that Clarke is right on this one. Aside from the fact that their president is a bit creepy, they apparently flat out left Raven behind. My guess is that this is because what they really want is healthy breeding stock to integrate their bloodlines with the superior radiation and toxin resistance of the 'Sky People'. This is the only reason I can think of for not immediately beginning to add the battle- and environment-hardened members of the 48 to their patrol and search and rescue efforts.

Olivia has a poisoned wound, so Lincoln heads back to his village to get the antidote, despite being an outcast traitor. It looks as if this Romeo and Juliet plot could run and run.

The Grown Ups - the name I am assigning based both on their hooking up with the actual grown ups and because Bellamy, Raven and Finn represent the most 'mature' archetypes in the 100; Bellamy's pragmatism, Raven's practicality and Flynn's moral coherence - are rescued from the Grounder Tristan by Kane and Abby's party and return to their base, although Bellamy is almost immediately arrested for whaling on multiple traitor and murderer Murphy.

It's clear that acting-Chancellor Kane and Bellamy (and probably Finn and Raven as well) are going to clash a lot over Kane's age and experience, and his pronouncement that the law is back, measured against the 100's hard-won Earth skills. Currently, this looks to be the most interesting strand of the season, as it is less obvious which way it will go. I am waiting for an episode where Bellamy and Kane are trapped together in a Reaper tunnel or something.

I am assuming that we haven't seen the last of the Grounders either, and his reappearance at the end of the episode (accompanied by the mysterious sound of a crying baby) hints that Chancellor Jaha will also have a role to play, despite being stranded on a dying space station.