A Mind Occasionally Voyaging

Leah and I resume watching after a few days off to see Ned climbing into bed with Alice and being all sweet. Leah concludes that Ned was only an ass because he’d never gotten laid. Leah has forgotten that Ned kidnapped Trudy and Amber.
The next day, Alice finds the note, and Bray reads it aloud: “Forget about ever seeing them again”. Ned freaks out and doesn’t believe him, then suspiciously runs off.
Seline, who has no right to be snooty, gives Ellie grief about hooking up with Luke. Jack has run away.
Bray and Pride get in a fight, then Bray has a breakdown. Ned would feel guilty if he were capable of guilt.
Bray runs away and gets roughed up by street punks. Ebony extorts Ned. The Guardian scares Ron Weasley a little more, still no one believes him.
KC interrupts Bray’s bender looking for a buyer for the Guardian’s ring. He trades it for a horse, though even he isn’t sure why. Bray wanders around in a stupor until he happens upon the Mozzies, which is surprising since for people bearing a dangerous grudge, they sure took their own sweet time.
Alice starts to become suspicious of Ned when he starts treating her decently. KC gives May a horse, because he’s still sweet on her and not very bright.
A party of wandering Klingons find Bray. May tries to draft Pride into a leadership role, which finally makes Seline grow a pair and bitch out everyone.
Pride and Lex go to look for Bray in a rough part of town, but are saved by bad foley. Lex questions Edward Scissorhands’s motives, but as Pride speaks only in fortune cookie, not much progress is made.
Ebony confronts Moz, and draws a metaphor about mosquitoes: “Always like a mosquito to think it’s found something only to find out it’s bitten off more than it can chew.” So, Ebony’s skills: ass-kicking; lying; cheating; psychological manipulation: check. Metaphor: well, no one’s perfect. She goes on to propose a complex alliance.
As part of her ridiculously circuitous plan, Ebony goes back to the Mallrats and proposes Lex declare himself Sheriff. Lex asks Pride to be his deputy.
Bray wakes up and reflexively macks on Moon, Hot Chyk of the Horse-Training Tribe. They sold KC the defective horse (Who. by the way, Seline is going to ride to prove Pride wrong), but they seem to be mostly okay. I’m guessing they’d gotten the horse in a trade themselves.
Ellie tries to get Luke a job with Ebony’s new order. Ebony points out that Luke isn’t liked or trusted.

• Ellie: That never stopped you
• Leah: That’s true.
• Ebony: That’s true.

Lex shows up in his new Sheriff Duds, which make him look like a cross between Marshall Dillon, Mad Max, and Boy George (Seriously, does everyone really need facial makings?).
The Guy Who Looks Like Pride But Isn’t, Leader of the Horse Trainers, finally recognizes Bray as a Mallrat, and mention that they’ve met a mallrat before, a sort of big dumb guy whose name they didn’t catch — Bray, despite his concussion, rexognizes this as a pretty accurate description of Ryan.
Ebony catches The Guardian terrorizing Ron Weasley, but doesn’t do anything about it, because her plan is just that complicated
Bray returns to the Mall, having left a Dear John note for Moon that The Guy Who Looks Like Pride But Isn’t destroyed. Once he tells Seline that he’s got news about Ryan, she rides off on the freshly tamed horse.

Sidebar:
The end theme from The Tribe, Abe Messiah, was written by John Williams and Matt Prime. John Williams, as you probably know, wrote “Every Song In Every Movie You Have Ever Seen”. Matt Prime, of course, is the lesser-known younger brother of Optimus Prime.

Luke, showing his industrious can-do spirit, has minted money. Lex tries to use this new money to hire a posse (Dagnabit, Deputy, I told you to round me up a little posse!), but they won’t buy it. Also, behind Lex are posters of others who are vying for the job of Sheriff, including Moz, and, so far as I can tell, The Predator.
Of course, the whole “Money” thing doesn’t work because money is only worth anything so long as everyone agrees that it’s worth something. And, being children, they lack the sophistication and education to fall for that sort of shit.
After Moz’s next little outburst, Ebony proposes a free election and nominates Bray for president of the city, on the premise that while the tribes may not like the idea of the Mallrats leading them, they probably like it better than any of the other candidates.
Ned has had enough of Ebony’s failure to give him unbounded wealth and riches and threatens to tell the tribe what he’s up to. Edward Scissorhands beds May.
Ebony bitches out Ellie for not wanting to use her newspaper as a pro-Bray propaganda machine, but she’s dedicated to being impartial and giving both sides and not pointing out that Moz is a petty little tinpot dictator and bully. She interprets “give both sides” as “treat the truth told by one side as being on an equal footing with the lies told by the other side,” so basically, she’s the US media from 2001-2008.
Also, for some reason, the Mozbians all decide to be Lex’s deputies. Lex does not support a trap. I’m not saying it’s a trap, but my god that’s an obvious trap.
It’s hard for Ellie to convince Moz to give an interview, because Ellie’s willingness to betray her friends is hard to believe. Then Moz decides to rough up Ellie for no clear reason. Ellie is sure to still write a Fair and Balanced article which wins Moz the election. Fortunately, Lex shows up looking for his posse. (Always say these lines aloud. It’s funnier that way).
Ebony tells the Guardian that Ned plans to bust him out to trade him to the kidnappers for Amber and Trudy. As usual, because Ebony is lying, the Guardian believes her.
She orders Ned to take the Guardian to Moz. I think her plan is for the Guardian to kill Moz for her. Or possibly Ned, though I have a hard time seeing what advantage Ebony sees in killing Ned. Well, other than being rid of Ned. Oh. Actually, that is perfectly adequate reason to launch a scheme this complex.
With the Guardian missing, Bray can’t possibly win the election, so Luke suggests Ebony instead, but Ebony doesn’t want it and has to be convinced. Then she has an epileptic fit the third time they offer her the crown. Well, seriously, how does ANYONE not get it at this point?
The Guardian hits Ned with a crowbar, prompting the question: Why did Ned leave a crowbar in the coffin with the Guardian? And, really, this was Ebony’s plan? Really? Wile E. Coyote came up with simpler plans than this.
Stopping only to change his clothes and redo his makeup, the Guardian goes to spring Trudy and Amber.
The Mozbians find Ned’s body and are polite enough to return it to the Mallrats. Lex launches the most ineffectual investigation ever. The thing is, he doesn’t have a pair of sunglasses to dramatically put on.
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
The Guardian unlocks Amber and Trudy’s cell, and is all threatening to them, because though he’s not really catatonic, he’s really nuts, and believes that he needs to kill Trudy to get back in Zoot’s good graces.
Ebony busts in just in time to save them, because Amber and Trudy’s death isn’t really part of the plan. The Guardian body-slams her and runs away.
The democratic election goes for Ebony, despite heavy cheating on both sides and a surprising number of votes for Pat Buchannan.
Out in the wilderness, Jack tries to learn how to fish, and stops some people from roughing up a young girl who turns out to be Chloe. Amber has a nightmare about the Guardian.
Lex catches KC giving paid Guardian tours, and shakes down both KC and his customers for their comically large currency.
For Ebony’s second act as leader, she raids the treasury. (Her first act was to move back into the hotel). She’s working some sort of double-deal with Moz, and keeping Bray distracted.
Tyson gets attacked by the Guardian, but she manages to talk her way out of it by coming back with a posse Brady. Ebony agrees to send a posse to capture him, but independently contracts the Mozzies to assassinate the Guardian ahead of time.
When Chloe comes back, KC falls for her, and May gets all creepy and jealous toward Amber, Chloe, Trudy, maybe even Brady.
Amber shames Pride into going after May. Ebony fucks with Luke’s carefully controlled economy, ordering that Luke increase his cash production, and Luke notices that he’s basically just repeating the same old pattern as with The Chosen.
The Ambush of the Guardian nearly fails, with Ebony’s hired assassin being no more useful than the others.
Luke leaves, Jack stays, The Guardian reveals Ebony’s evil scheme to seize control, but no one believes him quite enough. Ebony sends a distraught Ellie off to visit her sister and tell her that The Guardian confessed to offing her boyfriend. Ellie delivers the message, because for a journalist, she is pretty thick, and it doesn’t occur to her that Ebony just wants Alice to go off in a homicidal rage.
Alice goes to kill the Guardian. Luke talks her down. Then The Guardian uses his super human strength to rough up Luke.
When they find Alice, she claims to have killed the Guardian. Ebony pardons Alice, banishes Bray and Amber, and celebrates her new-found absolute power. The Guardian, however, is sneaking off with Luke, telling him about his vision. When they reach the docks, The Guardian sets Luke free, because there’s a Chosen waiting to take him away. He offers to take Luke with him, restored to his rightful place as a Chosen.
Amber goes into labor outside the city, despite the fact that she’s only been pregnant for about a week.
Ebony toasts her power. There’s only really one thing that could stop her now.
A C4 cargo plane flying over the city.
Piloted by the Cybermen.
Paratroopers descend on the city and announce into their metal facemask microphones that “The invasion taskforce has landed.”

• Leah: I call shennanigans

Episode 31 opens with the Guardian reveling to the noise of chaos outside as his movement collapses into in-fighting and violence. Across town, Amber angsts over the thought of bringing a child into this crapsack world.
Luke agonizes over his past evil, Bray agonizes over the fact that Amber’s seriously considering an abortion, and The Guardian goes full-on-crazy and has a conversation with his paperweight (Probably he’s actually talking to Zoot’s picture on the opposite wall, but the paperweight is in the frame and Zoot’s picture isn’t.), which Leah thinks is a marriage to Tyson, but The Guardian is so crazy by now that it’s hard to make much sense of it.
Ned The Leprechaun and Alice try to tunnel their way out of the mall, and Ned nearly confesses to wanting to jump Alice’s bones.
So Yeah…
Ebony tries to seduce Edward Scissorhands, pointing out how alike they are. He sagely notices that they are in fact not even a little alike.
The next time the Guardian sees Zoot, we’re allowed to see him too. Zoot thanks The Guardian for his hard work, but he will not be requiring his services in this world, and would he please off himself and the rest of the Chosen. The Guardian goes all mua-ha-ha evil and decides to leave this world in a giant world-destroying shindig.
Selene, the poster-child for codependence, laments that Zoot has so often punished her, and refuses Luke’s offer to help her escape. When she finds that Luke isn’t willing to die for Zoot, she immediately loses faith in Zoot, and throws herself at Luke. When Luke shuns her, she either recovers or goes off to do something suicidal. Not sure which yet.
Alice and Ned break through a wall in the sewers, uncovering an open space with a chain link fence beyond it, where it is night time. Strange, mall architecture in New Zealand. Ned tries to escape through the hole, which works as well as it did for Winnie-the-Pooh when he ate all of Rabbit’s honeyhunny.
The Guardian unveils his plan: he’s gonna blow up the mall with himself and the Mallrats inside. He’d let them go free, he says, except that Zoot told him not to.
Which goes to show just how crazy The Guardian is: He actually did have a crazy vision of Zoot. And now. on Zoot’s orders, he’s going to off himself. But in his vision, Zoot didn’t tell him to kill the others. He’s lying about his crazy vision.
The countdown is set at 30 minutes, so we probably only have two or three hours before it goes off.
Alice and Ned decide to be all heroic and hold off the guards so the kids can escape through the tunnel. This fails utterly, and only KC escapes. Luke emerges from hiding and challenges the Guardian for being crazy. He gives an impassioned speech about spreading the word of Zoot and how it’s madness to follow the Guarian, and how everyone should follow the path of Zoot on their own.
The Guardian makes the fairly accurate retort that the reasonable religion that Luke proposes is a pre-virus religion. His argument boils down to “Sure I’m crazy, but our religion is kinda predicated on crazy, which makes me a good fit.”
However, Amber and Trudy show up and try to convince him that he’ll be forgotten in a week if he blows himself up. Tyson is still convinced she can talk sense into him, but, well, she is wrong.
With mere minutes to diffuse the bomb, it seems all hope is lost, because no one is willing to run away. And then, the one person who might be able to talk the Guardian down shows up: Zoot.
(Well, actually it’s Bray wearing his brother’s clothesZoot Suit, but I think they somehow expected that we wouldn’t work this out, as it’s a big cliffhanger)
Incidentally, that was KC’s idea. Now, this is a clever bit of actually setting something up ahead of time, because earlier in the season, KC was running a scam selling Zoot memorabilia.
Tyson asks the crying Guardian for the code to disarm the bomb.

• Ross: Six.
• The Guardian: Six

The full code is 666, obviously, but The Guardian says “660”. Fortunately, no one falls for that. In the aftermath, Ellie tries to smuggle Luke out of town, but he wants to stay and stand trial instead. Bray gives a rousing speech, Lex and his wife make ammends, and Ron Weasley picks up Bray’s discarded Zoot Hat and stares at it creepily transfixed.
Later, Bray has flashbacks to Zoot’s funeral, and has some crazy time over the loss of his brother. He and Amber canoodle until Ebony of all people interrupts because she wants someone assigned to guard the Guardian so that he doesn’t get assassinated before his trial. She doesn’t want him dying in a suboptimally painful and humiliating way.
Tyson goes to the Guardian, because even though she’s made up with Lex, she’s still obsessed with the idea of “fixing” him. Lex shows up, and Ebony has to cold cock him to stop him killing the Guardian.
Alice and Ned sneak off to bonk. Seline sneaks off to jump off the roof. Trudy and Bray fail to talk her down, but Tally brings Brady up to the roof, and Seline decides, I dunno, that she won’t commit suicide in front of a baby.
The next morning, Alice wakes with a deep sense of regret, and some girls wearing fetish gear and bug-eye masks besiege the mall shouting “BRING HIM OUT!”
Amber has to give a speech about the importance of Justice and Not Just Lynching The Guardian, butI think the wind or her makeup is hurting her eyes, because she’s squinting like French Stewart the whole time.
Lex tars and feathers May, and Luke turns himself in, then privately intimates that it’s important he be convicted and executed, as it’s the only way to keep the city from turning on them.
At his trial, Luke confesses, which is good enough for everyone involved except Ellie. Amber finds him guilty and sentences him to freedom (consumed by his own guilt, of course), which pisses off everyone, including Luke, who was sort of hoping to commit suicide-by-angry-mob.
Ellie hugs Luke in relief, which is, of course, when Jack finally makes it back to the mall.
Edward Scissorhands packs up to return to his tribe, who have been called the “Ecos” for some time now, because the writers forgot that they were originally introduced as the “Gaians”
Luke tries giving himself up again, this time to the fetishistsMosquitoes, but Ebony saves him, because she’s convinced he’s just acting repentant, and, um… Well, okay, she does it just to be contrary.
The Mallrats hold a rededication ceremony, but Amber is busy whoring herself up when she’s attacked by someone in a trenchcoat.
Bray waits until the kidnapper has made off with Amber and Trudy — until this single attacker who is obviously also a child manages to slip out unnoticed with two women — when he decides he’s waited exactly long enough and goes to not find them. Everyone goes off searching, but most of them end up making out instead.
Lex catches KC leading the Weasleys in hiding some food, and he yells at him for being an incorrigible scam artist, and today Lex has decided not to be antisocial. “When will you learn to think about others?” Lex demands. Leah answers, “When he grows up and becomes a power ranger.”
Eventually Ned finds a ransom note, saying that Trudy and Amber will be released only if they hand over the guardian. Unfortunately, it’s unsigned, so they have no idea to whom they ought to hand him, but the fetishistsMosquitoes are the only other tribe they’ve bothered naming, so they’ll probably assume it’s them.
Which they do, but it’s not them. They find a second note giving a meeting place, and requesting “No Trix”, which either means that the kidnappers are illiterate or it’s a clue that they’re adults (Trix are for kids).
Bray totally decides to sell the Guardian up the river, but he’s conflicted because he knows Amber is going to dump him for abandoning their principles.
Ellie has an awkward date with Jack, then rushes off to profess her love for Luke.
Alice beds Ned again, and discovers that Ned has been chewing the same piece of gum since before the fall of civilization. Sigh. Gum does not work that way. (Seriously. Alice points out that it must have lost its flavor. Screw its flavor, the latex should have broken down by now).
Bray’s conscience wins, and he decides to try to pull a fast one on the kidnappers. Jack laments his breakup.
Ron Weasley steals The Guardian’s ring, but as he does, The Guardian seizes him and threatens him. Fortunately, no one believes him that the guardian isn’t quite as crazy as he seems. The kidnapper fails to show, which is because it turns out that it’s Ned.
Yes, Ned. Alice’s Boyfriend Ned. Ned the Only Person Who Was Alone When it Happened. Ned The Guy Who Wears a trenchcoat. Ned who freaked out when Bray announced his plan to not hand the Guardian over. Ned the guy who’s illiterate. Ned who hates that rabbit with the breakfast cereal. Ned who — well huh. I guess it’s actually entirely obvious when you put it that way…