Paradise Reveals How the World Ended and Drops Bomb About Cal’s Killer — Read Recap
This week’s Paradise answers a lot of questions about what, exactly, happened to end civilization as we know it? (Hint: Part of it is exactly what you might’ve guessed, and part of it is something you probably never saw coming.)
Plus: It appears that Sinatra wasn’t lying about Terry’s survival. Post-apocalyptic ball’s in your court, Xavier!
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Read on for the highlights of “The Day.”
‘I SWEAR, I’M NOT A MONSTER’ | A title card at the top of the episode lets us know we’re watching a flashback to Oct. 28, 1962, near the culmination of the Cuban Missile Crisis. A man wearing a military uniform sits in his study, drinking. When his wife enters, he talks about how the world might’ve come to an abrupt end had the captain of a Russian nuclear sub not gone rogue and decided not to launch the missiles at his command. “It’s going to happen again, Miriam. It’s goddamn inevitable,” he says, dejected. “What if the wrong person’s at the controls next time? What if the wrong person decides not to turn around?”
She tells him to come to bed, because “you can’t save the world tonight.” But he lingers in the office, flipping the lights off and on. All of this makes no sense right now, but it will.
In the present, Xavier calls BS on Sinatra’s claim that his wife, Teri, is alive. “Everything was destroyed. It’s a nuclear winter out there,” he says, which indicates that the catastrophic event wasn’t just climate-related. Sinatra calmly says that yes, that’s what they thought initially, but it’s not exactly true. She goes on to explain why she had Billy kill the expedition team (“it was going to open a whole can of worms”), and her matter-of-fact delivery is so disturbing that even she remarks on it: “My God, could I sound any more like a Bond villain? I swear, I’m not a monster.”
We learn that the scientists who went above ground set up short-wave transmitters, which are still active, “and I’ve been listening,” she says. She plays him a few of the recordings, which indicate that “people are alive, and they’re looking for us, and I believe your wife is one of them.” But Xavier shuts that down quickly. “She was in Atlanta,” he says, shaking his head. “It was a direct hit. It was unsurvivable.” But Sinatra lets him in on a secret: President Bradford “did something that day” that he doesn’t know about. Xavier scoffs, unbelieving, because he was with the commander-in-chief for that entire, awful day. Now get out your Wayne’s World flashback fingers, because it’s time to go back to the day the world ended!
THE BEGINNING OF THE END | The horror starts in Antarctica, where a supervolcano erupts under the ice sheet. As ash fills the atmosphere and parts of the ice shelf melt, it triggers a 300-ft.-high tsunami heading north at 600 mph — aka exactly what was predicted by that climate scientist Sinatra talked to at that conference years ago. Xavier, watching the news while at work, can’t get through to Teri, who is in Atlanta. But he does make contact with the kids’ school, and instructs the staff there to keep Presley and James with Jeremy Bradford.
The mood is understandably tense as Cal gathers the Joint Chiefs of Staff for an oh-s—t meeting. Russia has gone dark. China is mobilizing its forces. Finally, Cal asks: “How bad is it?” NOT GREAT, CAL. As the tsunami continues its path of destruction, it takes out all coastal cities in Australia, Chile and South Africa — and it’s doing it exponentially faster than the worst-case scenario the experts modeled. Everyone assembled suggests that the move to DefCon 3. “OK,” Cal says, “I’m calling Versailles.”
As Cal preps to record a comforting-if-not-entirely-transparent message to the country, Xavier’s text to Teri gets through: She’s still at the Atlanta airport. As he’s trying to deal with that, a truly chilling news report unfolds on the TV outside the oval office. A news reporter in the field is reporting from the roof of a tall building, and she notes that the ocean has receded three miles from land. Then all of a sudden, BOOM there’s a massive soundwave — which usually precedes the tsunami, she helpfully informs us — and then another huge BOOM. Her nose is bleeding, and her eardrum has burst, and I very much do not enjoy the dread I feel as the water rises up over the dark city behind her and then crashes down over her, knocking out the signal as the wave lays waste to everything it touches.
VERSAILLES FALLS APART | Cal asks for a moment alone in the Oval before the recording; only Xavier is in there with him. Agent Collins is worried (side note: AS HE SHOULD BE) and babbles a little about how Teri is stuck in Atlanta. Cal tells him to talk to Gen. Curley, because “he’ll get her here.” The guidance he eventually receives: She needs to get to an air reserve base 25 miles from where she currently is, and she’s gotta get there soon, because the final transport leaves in 85 minutes. Xavier realizes that she’s not going to make it — the distance is too great — but he finds the quickest route and finally gets through to his wife. She reports that she’s walking with a bunch of people, but she doesn’t have a car. “Steal one,” he says fiercely before the call drops.
Immediately after taping the address, Cal gets news that China and Russia have started exchanging fire, and that explosions have been reported in Denmark. The Joint Chiefs want Cal to move up the evacuation; Agent Robinson, who’s in charge of getting the chosen few out safely, shows up right around now to start whisking POTUS to his plane.
On the way, though, Cal stops to talk to a porter who’s worked in the White House for nine administrations. The older man is unbothered by the chaos around him, and he jokes that he’s seen it all before. When he laughs off Cal’s suggestion that he go see his family — he’ll see them tomorrow, the porter says — it galvanizes the president to buck the plan and head back to his office to speak to the country live. “People deserve to know what’s really happening,” he reasons to his apoplectic advisers. “They need a chance to say goodbye.”
Paradise’s Big Mysteries: Did We Just Get a Clue to What Went Down in Atlanta? Join TVLine’s In-Depth, Ongoing Investigation
HOW IT ALL FELL APART | Xavier knows that as the clock keeps ticking and more people find out that the world is ending, things are going to get ugly. He and a junior Secret Service agent don bulletproof vests and grab automatic weapons as Cal goes on TV and tells everyone exactly how dire the situation truly is.
When he’s done, the atmosphere inside the White House quickly devolves. Someone drops a gun, and a staffer grabs for it; another agent has to shoot him. Everyone freaks out. In the middle of all of this, one of Teri’s calls gets through to Xavier, but he fumbles his phone in the madness. Once he has it back in hand, she’s no longer on the line.
There’s a bunch more shooting as Cal and his protected colleagues get in the elevator while a pack of frantic staffers rush it. People are surging onto the South Lawn. The president’s Marine One helicopter has taken hits. The man carrying the suitcase of nuclear codes gets shot on the way to the aircraft; Xavier, who took off his vest to make sure that Cal had one to wear, scrambles back to get the critical information. Then the younger Secret Service agent that had been working with Xavier is denied access to the helicopter, so he pulls his gun and aims it at Xavier. As Xavier is talking him down, Robinson shoots the younger agent in the head. “He wasn’t going to shoot me!” Xavier explodes. “Do your f—king job!” she responds. Guys, I’m starting to understand why they didn’t like each other much at the start of the season.
The helicopter brings them to Air Force One, one of several planes that will take the Versailles group to Paradise. Presley texts her dad to let him know that she and James are on board, but Teri isn’t. Outside the aircraft, Cal urges Xavier to board: “Your kids need you. I need you. Let’s go.” But Xavier is seething. “When did you know she wasn’t going to make it?” he wonders. “When you told me she was still in Atlanta,” Cal answers. OOF. They argue, with Xavier letting the president know exactly how much he holds him directly and personally responsible for everything that’s happening. Eventually, though, both men get on the plane.
A crushed Xavier holds his kids close as everyone is given the wrist device they’re expected to wear from now on. Presley and James wonder where their mother is, but all their dad can do is hug them as the plane takes off.
C’MON — NUKES?! | You might be wondering at this point: Can this episode get any more harrowing? IT CAN! Air Force One hasn’t been in the air long when the pilot announces that everyone needs to brace for impact, because they’re about to encounter the high pressure soundwaves we saw during the news report earlier. After one hits, the plane flying to Air Force One’s left crashes: We later learn it was carrying Supreme Court justices, members of Congress and officials from the Department of Defense.
Cal eventually comes out of his office to apologize to Xavier and hand him a satellite phone, which might prove more effective in getting a call through to Teri. Then he tells him to use an empty office if he wants some privacy.
THE RED OR THE BLUE? | As everything on the ground continues to go to hell, Cal gets an update. The fear that nuclear-empowered nations might use the climate chaos to make a move on taking over the world has come to pass: Several nuclear devices have been launched, one heading toward India, another toward Colorado — AKA where the planes of survivors are headed. Intelligence networks are breaking down. Oh, and the plane carrying the Joint Chiefs took too much damage from the sound wave, so it’s going to land/everyone on it is going to die in the near future. The military experts’ parting advice: Fire the United States’ nuclear arsenal at all known targets.
Sinatra comes into Cal’s office to point out that all of her team’s scenarios had the world ending via nuclear war. THANKS, SINATRA. GOLD STAR. They talk about how the president has access to the “red switch” that will kick off nuclear war. But he also lets her in on the “blue switch,” which is a linked array of global electromagnetic pulses that will fry every electrical circuit on Earth BUT also disable the nukes. “It’s a switch that would shut off the world,” he notes. (Remember the cold open?) She thinks it’s better for humanity to die in a “bright flash” than whatever would happen in the aftermath of the tsunami. Plus, she points out, the EMPs will ruin their ability to see what’s happening outside the bunker. But Cal is resolute: He’s not going to launch the missiles. “We are humanity’s last hope,” he says, dismissing her and then flipping the blue switch.
‘BE A GOOD FATHER TO THEM’ | But will the EMPs stop missiles already in the air? That’s the question at hand as Xavier gets through to Teri, who apologizes for not being able to make it to the transport in time. “I even stole a car,” she tells him. He reassures her that he and the kids are safe and are being taken somewhere secure, and then — as Xavier watches a real-time display of where the nukes are heading and/or have hit — the Collins (well, Collins and Dr. Rogers-Collins) have their heartbreaking final conversation.
“Tell them it’s OK to be happy, OK?” she says. “Mommy loves them whether I’m there or not.” She cries in fear and loss; Xavier has tears streaming down his face, too. (You OK, anyone else who read The 9/11 Commission Report? Because I certainly am not.) “I’m holding you right now. I’m protecting you, baby,” he tells her. “I got you.” They keep chanting how much they love each other, and then “Be a good father to them” is the last thing Xavier hears before he sees a nuke hit its Atlanta target. The call goes dead. Xavier collapses, sobbing.
NEW INTEL ON CAL’S KILLER | And just like that, we’re back in the present… where Sintra is telling Xavier that no nuclear missiles actually hit Atlanta. (!) As he tries to process this information, she continues to play the survivor recordings, one of which is of Teri trying to get in touch with her husband. “Tell him I love him,” Teri says on the scratchy transmission. “Where is she? How do I find her?” he demands, and when Sinatra isn’t instantly forthcoming, he shoots near her feet. So she quickly calls the bar and has him ask for Presley — who isn’t there. Yep, Sinatra’s back in control (if she was ever out of it). And does this woman know how to drop a dramatic revelation or what?
“The DNA from Cal’s murder didn’t match anyone in the bunker. It appears our killer came from the outside,” she says, as Xavier’s head and heart are about to go offline from overstimulation. “What did you do to my daughter?” he demands. But Sinatra is done sharing intel. So she tasks him with returning the weapons he took, finding out who killed Cal and returning Paradise to normal “if you ever want to see your daughter or your wife again.”
Now it’s your turn. What did you think of this episode’s big revelations? Hit the comments with your thoughts and your predictions for the finale!
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