Sense8 Episode 9: Death Doesn't Let You Say Goodbye

We once again return to Sense8. Last time, Nomi escaped the clutches of the man who’s been hunting her and the other Sensates with the aid of Will, Sun and Capheus, Hernando left Lito, unable to reconcile the fact that he chose his career over Daniela’s well-being, and Kala’s father-in-law to be was mortally wounded.

We open with Riley walking along the beach and finding a cave. If you recall, in an earlier episode, she told Sun that when she was a little girl, she once went into a cave because she thought she heard the voice of a legendary fairy spirit. We can reasonably assume that this is the same cave. Nomi, ventures into the cave, which looks incredible by the way. I’m not sure if this cave is a real world location or a set-piece, but either way, it really adds to the creepy and foreboding atmosphere that this scene is trying to create. Riley sees someone else in the cave and recognizes her voice as the same one she heard in that cave all those years ago. Obviously, this person, a woman named Yrsa is not an elf, but rather, a Sensate from another cluster. Riley suddenly finds herself in this woman’s house, and she sais that she’s been watching over Riley for sometime.

In Mexico, a drunken Lito pours his heart out to a sympathetic bartender. The bartender recognizes Lito from a TV show he did a few years back. The bartender, who is also a homosexual, tries hitting on Lito, but Lito angrily rejects his offer, still clinging to his reputation and what it means for his career.

Back in Iceland, Yrsa reveals that she used to work for BPO, the company that’s been hunting the Sensates. One of BPO’s initiatives was a genetic census, something they claimed would identify genetic diseases, but in reality was a means to locate potential Sensates. Riley’s mother had a terminal disease and brought Riley in as a baby to make sure the same disease was not in her. Yrsa saw the report on Riley before anyone else. In order to protect Riley, Ysra inadvertently made young Riley believe she was cursed and had to leave Iceland. However, this only made Riley believe that her mother’s death, as well as something that happened in the mountains that isn’t elaborated upon, was her fault. When Riley asks if Yrsa has any children, she says that she never wanted them because she was afraid that they’d be like her and hunted for it, and she wouldn’t want to feel them die. This prompts Riley to have a flashback of herself in the mountains clutching a newborn baby.

Meanwhile, Will’s also having a flashback to something he witnessed as a child, a young girl on an operating table being experimented on by the white haired man who leads BPO, who we’ll later learn is called Whispers. The girl, who shifts into Angelica as she talks, warns will not to look at him just before he wakes up. Frustrated, Will gets up to get a beer out of his fridge, only to find Jonas Maliki sitting on his couch.

Back with Riley, where we learn that she wanted to die in those mountains, because that was the only way she could be with “them.” I’ll let you guys in on this a little early. Before running off to London, Riley was married. While driving to the hospital in a blizzard along a mountain road, a car accident claimed the life of her husband and caused a premature birth that eventually claimed the life of the baby as well. Since then, Riley seems to have been suffering from survivors guilt.

Will learns that Jonas is being held in a secret BPO facility and by the looks of things, is being subjected to some pretty nasty experiments. Jonas has no idea where he is exactly, but tells Will not to worry about him as he’s no longer of any value to Will and the others.

Back with Riley, Yrsa says that it’s time for her to go, but before she does, she explains about the psychic network in the body that links the Sensates. It’s all well and good, but the explanation sounds a bit too “midi-chlorians” for my taste.

Back with Will, he shows Jonas his notes on BPO, but their interrupted when Riley enters the room. Will and Riley catch up and tell each other and reveal that neither one is alone. While Jonas believes that love between to Sensates can be a beautiful and powerful thing, Yrsa believes it to be dangerous and even narcissistic. Yrsa asks Riley to ask Will when he was born. It’s here that we learn that Will and Riley, and presumably all the other Sensates were born on the same day and likely at the same time. (August eighth to keep up the number eight motif of the show, in case you were curious.) However, when Yrsa learns Jonas’s name, she pulls Riley out of her connection with Will immediately, saying that Jonas is not to be trusted as he once worked with BPO, as did Angelica

In Germany, Wolfgang is at Felix’s bedside when his uncle walks in to taunt Wolfgang for a while. The subject soon turns to that of Wolfgang’s deceased father, and how he would have done anything to take revenge on the man who killed his brother or anyone who crosses him. Knowing that Wolfgang tried to screw him over, Wolfgang’s Uncle tells him that because his brother’s blood runs through his veins, he will grant him a pass, just this once, but this chance will not come again.

In India, Kala is discussing the murder of Rajan’s father with the police. It’s also mentioned that Rajan’s father was trying to pass a bill that would have made certain religious practices illegal in India, explaining the motivation behind the assassination. Since the police are aware of Kala’s devotion to her faith, they appear to suspect that she was somehow involved. Despite Kala’s feelings of guilt, Rajan assures Kala that she’s done nothing. Despite this, Kala cannot help but feel that the only reason that Rajan’s father came to the temple in the first place was because he’d figured out that Kala was not in love with Rajan, and now, she cannot even bring herself to tell Rajan the truth.

Next, we get what is easily one of my favorite scenes in the entire series. Lito sits alone in a Museum, admiring a piece of artwork that he and Hernando once admired together. Nomi, who senses Lito’s pain, finds herself in the museum and sits down next to him. By this point, the Sensates’ connection has grown so strong that Nomi and Lito instantly recognize one another despite having yet to actually interact. Nomi opens up to Lito about how she was almost killed last episode and now, she’s terrified that she’ll never see Amanita again. When Nomi asks where they are, Lito says that it’s the Diego Rivera Museum. Lito says that when Diego Rivera’s wife, fellow famous painter Frida Kahlo, died, he had said it was the worst day of his life because he realized too late that the best thing in his life was his love for her, something Lito can obviously relate to right now. Nomi asks what happened with Hernando, and Lito says he got scared. Lito plays heroes all the time, but in real life, he’s a coward. He tells Nomi the story of his first date with Hernando. He recalls how much he loved the way Hernando talked about the things he loved like art and wrestling with such passion and love. The more Hernando talked, the more worked up Lito became and he couldn’t hold himself back anymore. Lito and Hernando’s first passionate kiss was in the bathroom of this very museum, followed shortly by Lito giving Hernando a blowjob. Lito says that Hernando understood how their relationship had to be from the very beginning, but now, he feels he will lose the love of his life because he was too afraid to lose everything he ever worked for. Nomi sympathizes with Lito, but she also knows that there’s a huge difference between what we work for and what we live for.

Now, it’s Nomi’s turn to open up. She says that as a young child, she loved dolls, something her father could never forgive. At the age of eight, her father forced her to join a swim club in the hopes that it would “make a man out of him.” At that age, Nomi was really uncomfortable with her body and didn’t like to be naked, especially in front of other boys. When taking a shower before being allowed in the pool, she would wear a t-shirt and try to hurry through it. The other boys would tease her for that. One day, she tried to stand up for herself, and the other boys stripped her naked, turned the heat all the way up on the shower and held her up to it. To this day, Nomi still has scars on her stomach from the second-degree burns. Lito, who can also feel the memories of this traumatic experience breaks down in tears and offers Nomi his hand to comfort her. Nomi says that it’s okay, because that experience helped to make her the woman she is today. After that, she quit the swim club and stopped trying to fit in and be one of the boys, because she knew she never would be, and more importantly, she didn’t want to be. On that day, Nomi realized that the violence she suffered at the hands of those bullies was nothing. It was just petty, mean-spirited children being who they are. The real violence that is truly unforgivable is that which we do to ourselves when we’re too afraid to be who we really are.

I’ll discuss it in further detail once we get to the episode wrap up, but I just want to take a moment to say how much I absolutely love this scene and how grateful I am that it happened. You see, at this point, all of the Sensates have paired off. Will and Riley obviously have strong feelings for each other, Kala and Wolfgang have a budding relationship and while there isn’t any romantic connection between Sun and Capheus necessarily, they do still share a strong bond and seem to care for one another. Since Nomi and Lito are the only ones in the group who are of LGBT persuasion as well as already in relationships, that sadly means that they’re the odd ones out, so I’m really happy that these two got to share this powerful moment.

In Korea, Sun’s father comes to visit her in prison. Sun’s father says that he hasn’t been sleeping since Sun was sent to prison and admits that he has never been a good person. He says how much he misses Suns mother and that he’s had a lot of time to think. All his wealth and power is meaningless without Sun in his life, so he’s decided to tell the truth.

Back in India, Rajan tells Kala that his mother needs to see her. Kala joins Rajan’s mother at her husband’s hospital bed. She says that she was once just as passionate about her faith as Kala is, but stopped actively practicing once she met her more progressive husband. She asks Kala to pray to Shri Ganesh and tell the deity that her husband is a good man who despite his attitude towards religion, has helped many people.

In Iceland, Sven has driven Riley to the graves of her husband and child. Riley apologizes for not visiting them, but she was too afraid to face them. She recalls a time when her husband, Magnus, once picked came to her college and picked Riley up for a date on horseback. Looking back now, Riley feels, after all that has happened, like that happened to an entirely different person, that the person who loved him and wanted to have a family with him isn’t her anymore. That version of Riley died with Magnus and their child.

Meanwhile, in Nomi’s apartment, there’s a knock on the door. Nomi grabs the knife, thinking it might be someone with BPO, but is overjoyed to see that it’s Amanita and the two share an extremely touching reunion.

In Nairobi, Capheus finds Riley sitting on his bus. Capheus gives a warm and friendly greeting, but Riley is too emotional right now to even speak. Capheus does his best to comfort her, trying to relate by explaining his own problems. Finally, Riley opens up by saying she never told anyone else about what happened to her family, and that when it happened, she was so grief stricken that she couldn’t bring herself to even attend the funeral. Capheus tells Riley that he once had a sister who was born when he was eight years old. He loved her with all his heart, as did their mother, but they did not have any food to feed her, so they were forced to give her away to an orphanage in order to save her life. For Capheus, it was the hardest thing he ever had to do. As he puts his shoulder around Riley to comfort her, he says that some endings can also be beginnings.

In a very nice scene set to a cover of Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door by Bob Dylan, Lito walks around his now empty apartment as he leaves message after message on Hernando’s machine but to no avail. Lito says that he has all these voices in his head, but Hernando’s is the only one he cannot live without. For a brief moment, Lito considers taking his own life, but the gun he uses turns out to be a fake, causing him to realize that so is everything else in his life, ending the episode.

Remember what I said last time, well, I take it all back. This, is my favorite episode of Sense8. Everything in this episode hits it’s mark, be it learning more about what it means to be Sensate and finding out more about the ones who’ve been hunting them or the more emotional scenes with Riley opening up about the death of her husband and child and Lito having a breakdown over the loss of the man he loves. Even little moments like Kala praying for Rajan’s father were much appreciated.

However, I need to talk about the scene between Lito and Nomi. In case I didn’t make that clear in the review itself, this scene is absolutely phenomenal for so many reasons. Jamie Clayton and Miguel Silvestre have been the MVP’s in the acting department for the whole series and this scene gives them both ample time to shine. I love how the scene is framed to wear something like a blowjob, which in any other show may be framed as something dirty or sleazy, can be made to seem powerful and beautiful. I especially liked Nomi’s story, difficult to watch though it may have been. While she experienced something horrible and traumatic, she still looks back on it as a positive turning point in her life, and she tries to use what she learned from that experience to help Lito. This scene also makes the two characters’ scenes later in the episode all the more meaningful. While Lito tells Nomi the story of his happiest memory, at the end of the episode, he finds himself at his lowest point. In contrast, Nomi’s story is that of one of the most traumatic experiences of her life, but when she reunites with Amanita, she is overcome with happiness. Both scenes are incredibly powerful, Lito’s in particular. I’ve said in most of my reviews that the best scenes in the show are the ones in which the Sensates interact with one another, and I found this scene to be the best of the bunch. Both of the characters are well-written and likeable, the actors turn in phenomenal, emotional performances, and though it may seem cliché, the inclusion of the song Mad World as the incidental background music was a nice touch.

As I said, this episode was my favorite thus far. We only have three episodes to go, so I hope you all join me next time we cover Sense8.