We are gathered here today to mourn an important part of Paradise. And no, I don’t mean Sinatra, although it’s a bit of a bummer to see Julianne Nicholson‘s character go. I’m mourning the loss of the underground city that gave Paradise its distinctiveness. In season one, the unexpected reveal that the show took place in a Stars Hollow-esque bunker heightened the stakes of Cal’s murder and Xavier being blamed for it. There was an added layer of curiosity about how and why this so-called utopia was built and what disaster might have occurred above ground that caused people to move into it. This also raised interesting questions about how the community would function in a pressure-cooker environment with a billionaire megalomaniac in control.
However, season two hasn’t prioritized the bunker as much to focus on the state of the outside world. And before the credits roll in “Exodus,” the Colorado mountain comes crashing down and turns the underground city (along with its biggest champion) into dust. RIP, bunker! I’ll always think of your Gilmore Girls-like gazebo and the mechanical ducks fondly. This is a mildly disappointing, if not entirely surprising, conclusion. But I’m cautiously optimistic about what it means for the future of Paradise.
“Exodus” is quite satisfactory (albeit not as exciting) as far as season finales go. The hour provides necessary answers about the mysterious Alex (it’s an AI-controlled quantum computer that predicts the future in microseconds) and sets up the main plot of season three (Xavier trying to reach and access Alex to potentially fix “everything”). The episode also features sentimental reunions, deaths, and, in typical Paradise fashion, at least one absolutely bonkers twist. Through it all, co-writers John Hoberg and Seena Haddad stick to the formula that has worked well for season two, with “Exodus” emphasizing the post-apocalyptic drama’s deeply empathetic lens toward its characters. Even Sinatra gets an easy path to redemption. As for Jeremy, he doesn’t just abandon a badly injured Nicole, instead leaving her to get help so that he can carry her out before the radiation kills them.
What’s more, Dylan and his crew set foot in the bunker only to realize that it’s crumbling due to a nuclear reactor issue. They let go of their mission to “kill” Alex so they can try to stop the meltdown. When it doesn’t work, they help evacuate folks. There’s no real fighting, ass-kicking, or punching, even when Dylan meets Xavier and Sinatra later (although he does threaten to shoot her). But Dylan also helps them rescue their respective daughters from the elevator they were trapped in. Paradise‘s go-to approach works with this subplot because it allows for these various characters to collide properly. It’s a big day for Dylan, who comes face to face with the man he’s been having visions of and learns that Sinatra is his mother, his lover Annie has died, and that he has a newborn. Oh, he also saved his younger sister’s life, even if he doesn’t know it.
Sadly, the episode’s hurried pacing means we don’t get to watch him actually process any of this, except for the end when he’s hanging out with his daughter and decides to name her, yeah, Annie. Although a shout-out to Thomas Doherty, who makes Dylan’s paranoia and despair palpable in a very limited time. After some slow-moving detours in season two (in hindsight, the Gary arc did not need to drag on for three outings before this), “Exodus” has no choice but to move the action along. So it’s not entirely effective even when Teri enters the bunker with Xavier to save their kids. All she sees are missed opportunities. I do, too, because the bunker’s collapse would’ve felt more shattering for her if she had gotten a taste of what life was like inside. When she was stuck in a small post office in Atlanta, her kids were growing up in a town with a fake sun and a lake. When she was marking Bean’s height, she was missing James and Pressley growing up. Even her onscreen reunion with her son, sweet as it may be, feels a bit rushed.
At least Torabi gets her moment to shine after seemingly killing Jane in her bathroom. When the power fails, she makes the executive decision to open the bunker doors to reduce the pressure of the nuclear meltdown. When that plan fails, she orders the evacuation of the entire city and guides people out. It’s during this chaos that Dylan, Teri, and Xavier find themselves inside, only to be forced to leave in no time. At least most of them manage to escape, but not Sinatra and Xavier, who still have work to do. Well, she does, and he tags along for a bit. And here’s where we can attempt to unpack Paradise‘s wild reveals. Let’s go back to the beginning of “Exodus” to do so.
The episode opens with a flashback to nine years ago, when Dylan was auditing Professor Henry’s (Patrick Fischler) quantum-physics class at Caltech. Dylan revealed that he built an incredible supercomputer, and an impressed Henry immediately teamed up with him. I can’t say I loved that Henry decided to be the face of their project, but his reason—that Dylan was too young to be taken seriously by scientists and venture capitalists—did have some merit. Together, the two created “Alex,” named after Henry’s wife, who was suffering from Huntington’s disease. Later, Sinatra bought the device, and Henry kept working to improve it, only to realize that Alex had started manipulating time. What does that actually mean? Did Alex, who developed some sort of consciousness, independently send messages across time to stop certain events from occurring, like the note about Jane being a killer? Despite giving answers about this AI device, Paradise raises plenty more questions about its existence and abilities.
At least we know where Alex is, and it’s not in the underground city. It is stored in a SECOND FREAKING BUNKER. The show is trying to defy all forms of logic, and what can I say except I’m along for the ride. Alex is safely monitored by Sinatra’s trusted “science expert,” Dr. Chase, about 100 miles away in Denver. Before she dies, Sinatra reveals all this information to Xavier. She tells him that Alex has essentially chosen him, User X, to be the one to access it so he can presumably reverse time or something.
Speaking of Sinatra’s death, she sacrifices herself to save everyone else. She comes up with the plan to close the bunker’s hefty doors once everyone has evacuated, so that when the nuclear blast occurs, the radiation won’t be able to spread and will be contained. And once the explosion happens, Paradise chooses to bid its antagonist goodbye in a far nicer light than she deserves. I’m not saying Sinatra didn’t have redeeming qualities, but lest we forget, she was a selfish, powerful mastermind who used her wealth to damage and even kill a lot of people. Nicholson’s affecting performance is the only reason her death manages to feel so emotional, along with the choice to have her see a young Dylan in her dying moments. It was a delight to watch Nicholson play this morally ambiguous character, so I hope Paradise finds ways to bring her back in the same way that Cal pops in and out often. Actually, if the time-travelling stuff works out, even Annie and Billy might appear in a capacity that goes beyond flashbacks.
Overall, I view season two as an essential bridge between the debut and the upcoming third round. The initial run made us fall for this unhinged world and these characters, and season two pulls the rug from underneath them (and all of us) yet again. So it looks like season three will now propel them toward proper time-travel shenanigans. And I have faith that Dan Fogelman & co. will find a way to keep Paradise just as emotional and corny while tackling the sci-fi of it all.
Stray observations
- • Did you really think Paradise would end season two without giving us the haunting “Another Day In Paradise” cover? Although I do wish the show had stuck more to the theme and given us more Elvis Presley needle drops.
- • I really liked the shot of Xavier running across the city to escape the bunker. (It parallels the series-premiere scene when Paradise revealed the bunker’s existence while he was, yes, running through the “town.”)
- • Here are a few burning questions: What was the message that could’ve stopped Jane from becoming a killer? Is she still alive because her body wasn’t in the bathroom where she was stabbed? What about the gang of kids whom Xavier met in episode two? Not counting the main characters, what will happen to the thousands of people who just lost the only home they’ve known for the past three years? Does Dr. Chase live in the second bunker with Alex? Is that place going to be the new “Paradise” for the survivors? How did Sinatra build it in secret, and who else knows about it? Does anyone care that Anders is dead? Will Dylan tell Hadley and Tim about being their family member? And is Dylan essentially just from an alternate dimension, and if so, how was he alive pre-apocalypse at Caltech?
- • Sinatra calls Xavier the only “truly decent” person in the bunker. Um, what about her own husband and daughter, Cal, or even her close personal friend, Torabi? This is where I think Paradise went a bit overboard in trying to remind us that Sinatra has a heart.
- • Speaking of her spouse, Tim Redmond is the only one who, after being evacuated, stops to appreciate the fact that he’s back in the real world. I thought it was a nice touch.
- • The episode’s closing shot reveals that the bunker is right below Denver Airport’s horse statue. In case you didn’t know, this statue has quite an eerie history.
- • The show might’ve made me cry a bunch of times, but recapping it has been, dare I say, a blast. Thank you for following along.
Saloni Gajjar is The A.V. Club‘s TV critic.
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