The tunnel? Again???

Legion is a very odd show. This isn’t news to anyone who has watched it, certainly not by “Chapter 12.” Even bearing that in mind, I’ll say this was a weird episode. For me, it kept veering back and forth between, “Ok, that’s clever” and “Enough, we get it already.”

It starts off with a weird version of Syd, dressed in furs in an igloo of all places. She sees a light behind her and crawls out the tunnel, which turns in to her being born. Bit heavy on the imagery there, in my opinion. The scenes skip through various points in her life as she grows up, the most important of which seem to be watching a couple make out in an art museum, and young Syd going to a punk club, which I guess went horribly as she ends up strapped down in what appears to be an asylum. This all fades to black, then returns to the museum setting, where David tries to guess what all this means. Syd tells him he’s wrong and he needs to watch it again.

And he does. Much of this episode is a rewind of Syd’s life as described above, with different emphasis and expansions on some of the scenes. Among the other scenes of note are Syd being mocked by girls at school, and a boy pressing her for a kiss. That one goes horribly badly, and is a scene that Syd comes off not so well in. I mean, I get it, but that was not at all nice.

Amid the various replays, Kerry and Cary split again, and it doesn’t look anywhere near as smooth as it used to be. They have an unpleasant scene with Agent Clark as he stumps by on his cane, who brings them up to date on recent events. They find David up on the roof, his hand hovering over Syd’s head, and both of them immobile. They get moved to the lab, and no one seems sure why they aren’t waking up.

Another episode from Syd’s early life is one we’ve heard referenced before. She uses her power to swap places with her mother and have sex with her boyfriend. Considering her power ends with the bodies swapping places with the minds, you have to feel for the guy. He goes from unexpected shower sex with his girlfriend to suddenly being in there with her teenage daughter. The mom doesn’t handle it well, especially as she must know how Syd’s powers work by now.

After at least one more replay of Syd’s life, David gets a close enough guess so that Syd finally shares what she’s been trying to tell him. It’s an interesting philosophy of life that I can somewhat understand, but I don’t agree with. With a short stop off in that white space they like visiting so much, they finally wake up to chaos at the Division. The episode ends with a very unexpected visitor arriving.

What I liked: it was an interesting look into Syd’s early life, I’m just not sure how much I care about it or that I needed to see it. I know no one on this show is exactly a hero, but Syd really comes with some baggage. Wow.

What I didn’t: The rewinding/ “again” gag got kind of old. Did make the review easier to write, though.

It was an odd episode in an odd season of an odd show. I’ll give a straight 3 out of 5.