The Mist - S1E4 - Pequod

Previously on The Mist, “Show and Tell”

Kevin and the other church escapees find themselves holed up in yet another location after the vehicle they try to steal won’t start; they make another run for it to the nearby gas station where they meet Clay (Teagle F. Bougere), a man looking for his son. Kevin lies to the poor guy and says they haven’t seen his son, but Kevin literally tripped over the boy’s corpse on their way to the gas station. But Clay has a working vehicle and they’ll need him rested and calm if they hope to convince him to use it. This backfires as Clay is unwilling to use what precious gas he has left unless it’s to look for his son. Mia, as subtle as a sledgehammer, coldly tells Clay the truth. Then she has the nerve to demand that Kevin shoot Clay while he tussles with Brian over a gun. Brian gets a gunshot wound to the leg for his troubles.

Of everyone in this particular group, I want Mia to meet the mist.

Father Romanov is doubling down on faith now that it appears to be the end days, and it scares the crap out of him because he feels responsible for all the souls in the church. The intensity in which he engages the trapped congregation gives the impression things will not go well. And it doesn’t help that Nathalie seems to have found some peace with their situation and believes the moth that landed on her the day before is a friend. Surprisingly, Connor shows the most compassion when it comes to dealing with Nathalie. Still, he tells Father Romanov that when he was outside, it felt as if the mist knew him. Evil-ass game recognizes evil-ass game, I guess.

Nathalie traps a spider in a jar and worships it. When Father Romanov demands she kill it, she refuses so he does it for her. She scoops the remains back in the jar and sets it by candles. Dozens of spiders scatter throughout the jar and that’s not creepy at all.

Meanwhile, mall fever is setting in so Gus busts out various board games to keep folks from going stir crazy. This leads to an awkward and confusing silent exchange between Alex and Jay. This remains more unsettling than the murderous mist outside. Alex seems to have doubts that Jay raped her, which leads to the question was Adrian lying or mistaken?

While Eve tells Shelley (Alexandra Ordolis) and Kimi (Irene Bedard) how happy she is Kevin isn’t there with them (Eve is the worst), Alex takes Shelley’s daughter Lila (Lola Flanery) to the bookstore to read her a children’s book Kevin wrote. The bookstore is connected to the exit nearest where the dead bodies in shopping carts were released.

Vic (Erik Knudsen) and Ted (Jonathan Malen) aren’t done with their bad ideas and use a spear gun to pull the carts back into the mall. When one gets stuck, Ted heads out into the mist to retrieve it, and comes back dead. Since Vic ain’t shit, he barrels through the bookstore, letting the mist in and trapping Lila and Alex with it. A dark shadow shaped like a huge man stares down Lila as Shelley and the others helplessly watch and then it kills her. Alex is spared because she “fought it as hard as she could.” Later, she admits that she waited for it to take her and cries that it didn’t. That’s all Shelley needs to hear. She goes back to the other group and tells Jay he was right: Alex is a liar.

The mall group votes to exile Vic and sends him packing with three days worth of provisions and a weapon. I have a feeling he’ll be back.

Into the Mist (And Other Bits of Note)

I’m still wondering if dead bodies can be reanimated with whatever lurks in the mist. If so, this adds another layer of danger for the people in the mall since one of the dead soldiers is now back in the storeroom.

Eve and Alex are both so unlikable. It’s hard to care about them. Same goes for Mia. Why are the women (including Nathalie) written to be either useless, brash, or insane?

As sad as it was, the series needed the events in the mall to raise the stakes and add some excitement that’s been missing since the pilot episode.

Kevin mentioned that the mist seems to thicken when people are around. Perhaps this and the shadow man suggest a level of sentience.

The episode title, “Pequod” is also the name of the whaling ship in Moby Dick. The naming of the vessel is described as such: It is revealed that the Pequod was named for the Algonquian-speaking Pequot tribe of Native Americans, decimated and scattered in the early 1600s by the Pequot War and by the epidemic that preceded it. The Mashantucket (Western Pequot tribe) and Eastern Pequot tribe still inhabit their reservation in Connecticut. “The epidemic” feels significant.