Violet recaps Season 1 Episode 8 of The Tomorrow People, titled Thanatos, where we find out what “Thanatos” means, and get some flashbacks about John’s time at Ultra! Following the recap, both Violet and Josh share their thoughts on the episode.
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The Tomorrow People, Season 1 Episode 8: Thanatos Recap Overview
Need a quick Tomorrow People episode recap of Season 1 Episode 8, titled Thanatos? Here is a summary of events for the episode. Each event is linked to the more detailed Tomorrow People episode recap for Thanatos if you need more information!
- In a flashback, Jedikiah uses John as the first test subject for an experiment. In the present, John and Stephen help Russell and Cara sneak into Jedikiah‘s place so Cara can read his mind about Thanatos.
- Jedikiah wakes up and grabs onto Russell as he teleports back to the Tomorrow People lair. They strap him to a chair, and question him about Thanatos, without success. Jedikiah talks with John alone. We see a flashback of the first time John discovered he could kill.
- The Founder brings in a team of telepathic specialists to track Jedikiah. Stephen tells the Founder about Morgan, and a team of Ultra agents is sent to her apartment, leaving Stephen outside as a lookout. When Morgan teleports out, Stephen catches her, but lets her go.
- The Tomorrow People blackmail Jedikiah into revealing that Thanatos is the nickname of Professor Aldus Crick, and his location. Stephen, Irene, and John visit Crick, and Stephen thinks his father was in Limbo when he saw him.
- Jedikiah pretends to choke on food, then attacks Russell when he tries to help him. Cara teleports over to save Russell. The Founder determines Jedikiah is underground. John teleports Jedikiah to another location and pulls a gun on him. We see a flashback of John shooting Roger.
- John angrily shoots at Jedikiah but doesn’t hit him. Ultra agents arrive and capture John. As Stephen watches the agents bring John in, he sees John‘s memory of Roger‘s dying request.
The Tomorrow People Episode Recap: Thanatos, the Details
Break In
Season 1 Episode 8 of The Tomorrow People, titled Thanatos, begins with a flashback to 6 years ago, where John is being strapped to a chair, preparing to be the first test subject. Jedikiah appears to get sentimental, but claims to just be reminding John of the risks. Jedikiah closes the chamber door, locking John in, then starts the test, which significantly lowers John’s body temperature. Then a solution is injected into him, and he begins to convulse.
Suddenly, Jedikiah wakes up in the present, and he is with Morgan. They reminisce about how they met. She was posing as a psychic, and he got his palm read. She says she never met anyone like him, of any species. They kiss, and she invites him back to bed, but he declines and leaves.
Meanwhile, Stephen tells John, Cara, and Russell about the word his dad told him: “Thanatos.” He did some digging at Ultra, and thinks it may have been a secret research program his father was part of that Jedikiah has since buried. Stephen thinks it might be the key to finding his father. Russell and Cara come up with a plan to sneak into Jedikiah’s place so Cara can read his mind to find something out about Thanatos.
John and Stephen monitor them through video feed, and have Tim kill the power for a moment, which allows Cara and Russell get inside. Power is then quickly restored before the security guard gets too suspicious. Russell uses a device to unlock the door to Jedikiah’s room. They find Jedikiah asleep in his bed, and Cara touches his forehead and gets a flood of memories. One memory in particular is following the death of another Tomorrow Person who had been exposed to the same test John had. Jedikiah and John talk, and John says he feels good, but doesn’t feel different. Jedikiah tells John to rest up for the next phase of his training.
Oops
Suddenly, in the present, Russell drops something, and the noise awakens Jedikiah. Cara immediately teleports away, but Jedikiah pulls a gun on Russell and activates a device which prevents him from using his powers. They fight, and Russell is able to deactivate the device and teleport away — but Jedikiah grabs on and teleports with him. They both reappear in the Tomorrow People lair. Russell punches Jedikiah and knocks him out.
When Jedikiah wakes up, he is strapped to a chair. In the other room, Russell explains to Stephen, Cara, and John about what happened. John wants to get him out of their lair ASAP, but Cara says they can still use him to find out about Thanatos. Stephen gets a page from Ultra, and leaves. Russell, John, and Cara ask Jedikiah what Thanatos means, but he merely says that it means “death” in Greek. Jedikiah refuses to say anything more until he speaks with John alone. Cara and Russell leave the room, and Cara tells him Jedikiah must have learned a few tricks about not having his mind read, and that she needs more time.
Jedikiah reminds John it’s in both of their interests to get him out because of “certain information.” Jedikiah warns John that the others will abandon him if they find out the truth about him. In a flashback, Jedikiah brings John to a room where a man is kneeling with a bag over his head. To find out if the experiment worked, Jedikiah asks John to shoot the man in the head. The man begs for his life, but John pulls the trigger. However, there were blanks in the gun, and Jedikiah applauds him for passing the test — he not only has the ability to kill, he has the conviction. Jedikiah then hands John his real assignment, and when John reads it, he cannot believe Jedikiah is serious.
John tells Cara that Jedikiah wanted his helping getting out, and that he told him no. Cara tells John that she saw into Jedikiah’s memory and saw what he did to him, and she also felt that Jedikiah loved him like a son.
The Founder Shows Himself
At Ultra, telepathic specialists are tracking Jedikiah. They were sent by the Founder, who introduces himself to Stephen in person. He tells Stephen it’s only a matter of time until they find Jedikiah and his captors. Stephen returns to the Tomorrow People lair to warn them about the Founder and his team of telepaths. However, Cara wants to continue to look into Jedikiah’s mind.
Stephen goes back to Ultra and tells the Founder that he has a lead on Jedikiah’s disappearance. He brings up a profile of Morgan, and says Jedikiah was investigating a breakout on his own, who may have kidnapped him. The Founder sends a team to Morgan’s last known address.
Cara continues to question Jedikiah, and when he taunts her, she punches him in the nose. He brings up her “daddy issues” and she repeatedly punches him, until John pulls her off. Cara tells John that Jedikiah still cares about him, and is covering up something because of it.
Picking up where the flashback left off, we learn that John’s assignment is to kill the man that trained him, because he has gone rogue.
Stephen shows up at Morgan’s place with the Ultra team. They leave Stephen outside as a lookout. As the Ultra team enters her apartment, Stephen sees Morgan teleport outside. She tries to nonchalantly walk away, but Stephens catches and cuffs her. Morgan confesses that she loves Jedikiah. Stephen lets her go.
Dr. Death
Cara, Russell, and John show up to interrogate Jedikiah. They tell her they found Morgan, and threaten to hand her over to Ultra. Jedikiah says that Thanatos is a nickname for Professor Aldus Crick. Tim fills them in on Crick’s resume. With Crick guiding them, Stephen’s father and Jedikiah conducted dangerous experimentation, so much that they started calling him Dr. Death, hence Thanatos. They blackmail Jedikiah into revealing Crick’s location. Irene volunteers to go to Maine to find Crick, since she’s the only one that knows anything about physics.
Back at Ultra, the Founder is frustrated that Morgan was not caught. The Founder has his assistant unplug one of his telepaths, thus killing him, and plugs himself in to look for Jedikiah.
Stephen, John, and Irene visit Professor Crick at his log cabin. He explains that he, Jedikiah, and Stephen’s father started Ultra to gather and protect the new species. Crick also reveals that Stephen’s father could stop time. The theory was that one stopping time while teleporting would arrive in a time out of time, which they referred to as “Limbo.” Stephen thinks that’s where his father was when he saw him. However, Crick says that even Stephen’s father was unable to stop time while teleporting. Stephen is convinced that there’s a way for him to get back to Limbo, though.
Ultra Zeroes in on Jedikiah
Russell brings Jedikiah some food, and Jedikiah pretends to choke on it. When Russell tries to help him, Jedikiah attacks Russell. Cara teleports over, and punches Jedikiah in the face, thus revealing that she still has powers. Later, Cara tells John that she told Jedikiah they found an antidote to the serum, but he didn’t seem to buy it. Cara suggests that Jedikiah never gets free.
At Ultra, the Founder has been able to determine that Jedikiah is being held underground in a subway station. Armed Ultra agents are sent on a subway train as the Founder zeroes in on the exact location.
John unties Jedikiah and teleports him to another location, where John pulls his gun on Jedikiah. Then we see a flashback of John watching as Stephen’s father gets into a car, and turns it on, and the car explodes. Roger teleports away unharmed. John walks up to him with his gun drawn. Roger tries to explain that he was protecting their kind, but John shoots him in the chest.
Ultra Captures John
Back to the present, John resents Jedikiah for making him kill Roger. He says he trusted Jedikiah like a father, and he used him. John says he lost everything that day, then shoots all the bullets of the gun at Jedkiah. However, all of the bullets are expertly shot around Jedikiah, and none hit him. John tells Jedikiah that he is not Jedikiah’s creation, and he is not his son. They hear cars pull up outside, and Jedikiah apologizes to John, telling him that he had to know once he had him above ground they could track him. John tries to teleport away, but can’t. Jedikiah explains that it’s an Ultra safe house, and the D-chips are probably activated. Three Ultra agents apprehend John, as Jedikiah says he wants John alive.
The agents bring a beat up John back to Ultra, and Stephen watches him being brought in. It seems that John conveys a memory to Stephen of watching Stephen’s father die. John apologizes to Roger, who has John promise to protect the others like them, and to find his son.
Violet’s Thoughts on Season 1 Episode 8 of The Tomorrow People: Thanatos
Although it was kind of interesting to see some more back story on John’s time at Ultra, and his relationship with Jedikiah, I was not at all impressed by this episode as a whole. So many things did not make sense, from Russell not teleporting away when he realized Jedikiah woke up, to Stephen just happening to be the only lookout outside during the raid on Morgan’s apartment, and Morgan only teleporting to just outside her apartment building, to Russell being dumb enough to fall for Jedikiah’s trick, to Cara being even dumber for unnecessarily teleporting to save Russell from Jedikiah, to John teleporting to an Ultra safe house… it was just really hard to watch and not get angry at all these unrealistic mistakes everyone was making.
After the last couple episodes that were filled with teenage drama, with all of these nonsensical things that occurred this episode, I’m kind of leaning toward writing this series off. I am a little curious about Stephen’s father though, and about this whole “Limbo” thing, so I’ll keep watching for now, and hope it gets better.
Josh’s Thoughts: The Tomorrow People, Season 1 Episode 8: Thanatos
COMING SOON
Scenes from The Tomorrow People, Season 1 Episode 9, Death’s Door
Here are scenes from the next episode of The Tomorrow People, titled Death’s Door:
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This show is getting better in the past few episodes. It’s got more interesting for me as it’s went on. I definitely almost stopped watching this show, and it’s entirely possible that I still might if it drops off in quality again.