Z Nation - S4E8 - Crisis of Faith

Previously on Z Nation, “Warren’s Wedding”

BITES AND MORSELS

The group made it to the Canadian border and immediately received a warm welcome by an assorted horde of Zs. Trapped inside a church, Warren and Murphy restore their trust in each other, Doc finds religion (of sorts), and thanks to a shifty survivor they mistook for a graverobber, renewed the entire gang’s faith in surviving the apocalypse is renewed. Plus, Kaya continues her search for Citizen Z but had a run-in with a few Zona goons.

ZOMBIE ROLL CALL

Talk about an episode chock full of weirdo dead folk! What part of Canada wasn’t represented at the border crossing? Between the Mounties, hockey players and a pair of hosers that didn’t quite give Murph or Doc any kind of fight like their scrappy American counterparts. Sorry, eh! The same can’t be written be written about the sisters of perpetual decrepitude inside the church Warren and the others used as shelter. Talk about a rabid bunch of flying nuns!

There was a small revelation of sorts involving Mad Zs that was dismissed by Doc… after one of the hockey Zs had his face smashed in, it emitted noxious fumes that somehow revive those who died well before the zombie apocalypse occurred. In this case, it was a bishop who was sealed in an airtight tomb. It didn’t take long to make him dead all over again but he sure was strong. Drugs are bad, kids. Don’t inhale.

TAKE OFF, EH!

After last week’s uber bizarre episode that featured zombie Juggalos and ultimately became an excellent argument for the merits of good parenting, “Crisis of Faith” was a deceptively poignant tale that began the slow journey of bolstering team resolve and, hopefully, will finally lead them to getting their groove back. It’s been a rough road for the crew in the last three episodes alone; they lost Lucy, a camp full of refugees, possibly the last bastion of their former lives in Zona, and they’ve been a shanghai’d and tortured for good measure. Not to mention Roberta’s troubling visions, and Red and Addy are lost somewhere in the wilderness.

They all finally agreed that Newmerica is their safest bet, knowing the longer they stayed on the road, the more likely all of them will end up in a ditch. Their streak of bad luck is manifesting some terrible new habits and attitudes among them as well, chiefly in 10K and Lilley. It’s nice to see Nat Zang and Gracie Gillam give their respective character a bit more flair, albeit it’s edging towards the dark side. It’s equally concerned and understandable slant; aside from Murphy, the youngest survivors among the group have endured the most traumatic events this season. Tommy believes he lost Red, nearly killed Addy and all the bad times shared between him and Murphy bubbled back up to the surface after he returned to the mainland.

While it’s apparent 10K’s demeanor has changed, he remained relatively nonplussed compared to his new zombie-slaying companion Sgt. Lilley. She has proven herself time and again and became an invaluable member of the group, yet it’s apparent that Lt. Mueller was the constant she needed to maintain her composure. Granted, Lilley was poised and steady handed for most of “Warren’s Wedding” as her training clicked on automatically, but there are moments when the Sarge is teetering on the unhinged, as seen in “” and in this episode when playing with the Mountie Zs before dispatching them, along with her desire to take out their “enemy” who nearly had them all killed when he attracted every zombie within earshot of the church bells.

Enter their new pal Louis (Andrew Highlands), a loner with an odd habit of collecting charms, pendants and reliquaries as a testament to his faith that life will be verdant and thrive once again. Naturally, our group has a difficult time believing any of that after all they’ve experienced in the last three seasons and change. Short of Murphy’s time on Zona the past two years, all of them continued to keep their heads on a swivel because they didn’t know when death would be approaching. Add to the fact that Alvin now knows what Roberta feels every time her visions appear (nice to know he’s some of his powers back thanks to Lucy), hope and faith are qualities that have little value among them.

Yet in his short time with the survivors, Louis rubbed off each of them during their quest for the relic of St. Theresa. Renown for her healing powers, Louis sought a bone of Theresa’s believed to be buried in a crypt underneath the church. While chipping away an escape and desecrating a tomb, Warren, Doc and Murph all latched onto Louis’ unwavering conviction about the promise of tomorrow. It didn’t hurt the team experienced a miracle of sorts that provided an escape from the horde and the relic Louis had sought for who knows how long.

Of course the episode didn’t end in lollipops and rainbows - in fact, the final moments were pretty damn surprising - nevertheless it was encouraging to see our favorite band of rogues feeling more upbeat about their place in this wild world, and are gradually accepting their slights and “curses”. Theirs is a complicated dynamic but for the most part, there is little any of them wouldn’t do for the other to survive another day. And that, ultimately, takes a considerable amount of faith.