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https://readysteadycut.com/2022/10/21/the-peripheral-season-1-episode-1-recap/

Recap – what happened in The Peripheral season 1, episode 1?

Episode 1 opens in 2099 in London, with enormous, towering statues dominating the skyline. A man nervously waits at a park bench. He is soon met by a young girl who walks barefoot over to him. She speaks with a wisdom that doesn’t quite match her years and talks of saving the world. It’s an intriguing opener that I’m sure keen viewers will be smart to remember.

Then we cut to Blue Ridge Mountains, 2032, where Flynne Fisher (Chloe Grace Moretz) looks after her blind mother in a large, rural house. She checks up on her brother Burton (Jack Reynor), who makes a living playing immersive VR games in his airstream. Flynne worries that Burton has been stealing his mother’s pills and goes to give him a good telling off. Burton convinces Flynne to play in his game instead though, so he can afford to pay for more medicine. Flynne happens to be a bad-a*s pro when it comes to these particular games and eagerly enters the VR experience. The game play is beautifully realized, feeling fresh and visually unique. Flynne of course wins Burton some money and goes to the cash machine to withdraw her funds.

Director Vincenzo Natali (Cube, Westworld) sculpts a believable and well-thought-out future as Flynne bikes to work. These subtle hints to a near-future make for excellent world building. Flynne is an employee at a 3D printing shop, where she gossips with best friend Billy Ann. They discuss Flynne’s infatuation with police officer Tommy, who is soon to be married, and Flynne’s squandered endeavors. She’s clearly capable of much more in life, but prefers to live within her means, instead of selling out in Burton’s fantasy worlds.

That very same morning, Flynne is handed a futuristic headset from an elusive, Colombian company. Burton has been offered to test out this cutting edge technology for a generous fee. They were impressed with his VR gaming skills and believe he is the ideal candidate. Of course it was Flynne’s services that they were really after and Burton asks her to test out the kit in his place. She’s hesitant at first, but accepts, struggling to contain her excitement.

The game takes Flynne to London, 2099, as witnessed in the opening scene, with those looming historic statues. Flynne inhabits Burton’s avatar and rides a motorbike through the city streets. A narrator directs Burton towards Buckingham Palace and a swanky party. His first task is to seduce a mysterious woman and then kidnap her. There’s a tense sequence that follows involving Burton fighting a knife-wielding robot that hints at the cinematic qualities of the series. And then Burton gets to meet the woman who was ordering his avatar about all this time. She is Aelita, played by Charlotte Riley (Peaky Blinders).

Flynne returns to the real world and explains the experience to a rather jealous Burton. In the game, Flynne can feel everything, even pain and she raves about the ultra-realistic game play. That night, she journeys into town to retrieve her mother’s pills. Here she has a run in with some vulgar gangster types and is heroically saved by Conner, a drunk, triple amputee with nothing to lose. He helps her to complete the transaction as intended, making enemies with the thugs in the process

The next day, Flynne finds out from her mother that Burton was in fact gifting her with his extra pain meds not taking them away from her, and she is quick to apologize. Flynne then re-enters the game for an entirely different experience. She finds herself on an operating table as Burton. The woman that she kidnapped, Mariel, was needed for this important piece of surgery. They replace Burton’s eye with Mariel’s. Flynne feels everything during this excruciating and gruesome operation, but manages to control her heart rate to cope with the pain. It’s a terrifying slice of body horror thrown into this sci-fi thriller that likens the series to Black Mirror.

The ending

Next, Aelita and Burton drive to a secret location and use Mariel’s eye to scan their way into the building. An elevator takes them down 95 levels to an unusual structure. Here, Burton uses his own eye for another retina scan. This one is equally painful, although they are interrupted mid-flow by an intruder. Aelita orders him to fight, but he is quickly apprehended, whilst the unknown enemy moves on to Aelita. Burton somehow squirms out of his ties, revealing a robotic arm underneath his prosthetic skin. The killer asks Burton for his real world name and location, strongly suggesting that this game has real world consequences. Burton is then killed by a sonic weapon and Flynne wakes in her reality.

Flynne vomits and declares that she is never playing the game ever again. At work the next day, she is contacted by Milagros Coldiron, the company that paid for her services. Wilf from the opening scene is the man on the phone and he warns her that she is in imminent danger. A bounty has been put out on the dark web and Wilf believes that Flynne and her family are the targets. She races home to find Burton throwing a small gathering with his friends. He laughs off her story, but Burton’s friends send out a precautionary drone to assess the situation just in case. The drone picks up on a gang of gunmen heading for the home.

https://readysteadycut.com/2022/10/21/the-peripheral-season-1-episode-2-recap/
The Peripheral season 1, episode 2 recap

We commence in the future timeline, with Research Institute boss Cherise Nuland (T’Nia Miller) discussing her company’s breach with the gunman Daniel, who we saw in the previous episode, where he shot Burton’s avatar in the head. Daniel is blamed for this infiltration. Quickly responding to his own mistake, he’s traced Burton’s operator and has a bounty out on his enemy’s head already. A gang of ex-military personnel are on their way to eradicate this problem as we speak.

This seamlessly segues to Flynne’s timeline, where her home is under attack. Burton’s friends hack the enemy’s drone and are able to pinpoint the killers’ exact locations. Flynne rushes into the house to protect her mother, whilst the men fight back outside in synchronized fashion. A shootout ensues as the two teams battle one another. It’s a darkly lit fight, with the good guys ending victorious.
The Peripheral season 1, episode 1 recap – what happened in the pilot?

In the future, Wilf is contacted by a mysterious man called Lev (JJ Feild). Lev updates his ally, stating that Flynne was attacked by bounty hunters the previous night, but thankfully escaped unharmed. Flynne somehow happens to be the only one who can help them locate their missing Aelita. When Flynne re-enters the game she awakens in her own avatar. Wilf explains her next mission, although Flynne has more pressing issues, such as, what the hell is going on? Wilf admits that Flynne isn’t playing a simulation, she is actually inside a ‘peripheral’, a robot body. She isn’t physically in the future, but has been involved in ‘quantum tunneling’, a data transfer of some kind, which places her mind in the future world, while her body remains in the past. OK that’s a lot of scientific techno mumbo-jumbo, but let’s just run with it, shall we?

Wilf proves his statements true by allowing Flynne to step outside the building. She sees a scarce London and those looming eye-soars throughout the cityscape once again. He then produces a newspaper and points out Flynne’s mother’s obituary. She will die in four weeks time from a brain tumor. Wilf promises that they can cure her of this illness and will send across the medicine if she helps them find Aelita.

Flynne exits the game, which is now revealed to be a future reality, not a simulation as first advertised. She sees Burton and the gang piling up the dead bodies after the shoot-out. Flynne tells Burton to bury these bodies and then heads off into town to retrieve her mom’s new meds. Flynne administers the medicine herself and talks openly with her mother about the disease. The mother had kept the seriousness of the illness a secret to protect Flynne.

Meanwhile, Deputy Sheriff Tommy Constantine unintentionally finds the invisible trucks, which may very well have belonged to the bounty hunters now buried on Flynne’s land. He asks Burton for his military expertise with a bullet he found inside the truck. Burton assists, but Tommy is highly suspicious of the man and his friend’s midday gathering. Burton just about manages to cover his tracks though.
The Peripheral season 1 review – slick sci-fi with cinematic visuals

Flynne travels to an eerily quiet London in 2100, where she hopes to find some answers. Here, she meets with Wilf again and is introduced to the other members of the gang: Lev, Ash and Ossian. Flynne notices extinct animals brought back to life, moving tattoos and many other future technologies, yet she isn’t impressed by any of it. All she wants to know is what is going on and this sequence tries its best to explain somewhat of the backstory, laying on the expositional dialogue a little too thickly. They talk of parallel timelines and of Aelita’s involvement. She worked for the Research Institute and had access to the past world. Without Aelita they have no ties to this past society, she is therefore a crucial component in their own secretive plans. Flynne asks about her own future and her mother’s illness. They seem vague or defensive about Flynne’s fate and admit that her mother’s illness may not be curable. Flynne demands certainties on her mom’s illness before she will assist in the hunt for Aelita.

The ending

Burton asks for Conner’s help in fortifying their land, so they can protect themselves from further bounty hunters. Then, a local crime boss named Corbell is offered ten million dollars by futuristic bad guy Daniel to kill Burton and Flynne outright. He thinks this is one rather nasty joke, but finds 2.5 million has been transferred into his account as a good will gesture.

As if by magic, that very same night Flynne hears noises coming from downstairs and discovers her mother rifling through the fridge. When they turn on the lights, her mother’s sight has fully returned to her. It would seem that the people from the future are desperate for Flynne’s help and have fulfilled her wishes.