Runaways season 1, episode 7 review: Refraction

There’s a major death in the latest episode of Hulu’s Runaways. Spoilers are ahead.

Last week’s episode of Runaways saw Jonah (Julian McMahon) miraculously healing Chase’s dad, Victor Stein. This latest episode, “Refraction,” finally gave us insight into Jonah’s abilities and origins. We still don’t know exactly who he is, but besides his ambiguous identity, this episode gave us other questions to ask. Questions along the lines of: is Victor Stein really dead?

The episode starts 25 years in the past with a young Victor and Janet Stein together in a college class. After Victor serenades Janet with talk about time travel, the episode cuts to a further time period with Victor holding a baby Chase in his arms. Right after, another time jump takes us to a pre-teen Chase as he waits for Victor to pick him up from school. Victor’s “mean dad” demeanor escalates as Chase screams at him for not attending his after-school activity. Angry, Victor hits his son, twice, and then we cut to the present where Victor is in his lab. He was napping like a boss, but the sound of his mini “time machine” wakes him up. To his utter surprise, the machine shows him a message from a much older Chase (with a beard) from the future.

From there, there’s no mention of the time machine in the entire episode, but the element of time sticks around as we later find out that Jonah is much older than we initially thought. Frank, Karolina’s dad, found a picture of his wife Leslie with Jonah. The caveat, though, is that the picture shows Leslie when she was in middle school while Jonah looks like he hasn’t aged a day.

While all of this transpires, Karolina, Chase, Alex, Nico, Molly and Gert are at their school’s open house. It is here where Molly tells them that Alex’s mom, Catherine, is suspicious of her, and possibly the entire group. What follows is Catherine telling Molly’s adoptive parents, the Yorkes, that she must be taken out of the equation. They don’t kill her, rather, they make for her to leave the country, to live momentarily with relatives she has never seen. We then cut back to Victor Stein in his lab, now with Jonah’s healing antidote out of his system. Angrier than usual, he strikes down Chase with the special gauntlets they both made episodes back. Victor then tries to kill Chase with one final blow, but is stopped by his wife Janet when she shoots him in the chest, supposedly killing him. Additionally, the episode also touched upon Robert Minoru and Janet’s love affair.

“Refraction” was definitely one of the show’s top episodes. At times emotional, Molly’s (Allegra Acosta) bit when the Yorkes told her she had to go away was heartbreaking. The tears in her eyes as Gert tried to calm her down was perhaps the most empathetic the show has been. It was a beautiful moment indeed, as I truly felt like I was in Molly’s shoes. And that’s mostly due to Acosta’s phenomenal acting.

Frank was also one of the episode’s highlights. I’ve mentioned in previous reviews how he mostly has nothing to do on the show, but now it’s different. Ever since Jonah came into the picture Frank has made himself useful. The two of them have actually formed a connection lately. Jonah gave Frank healing gloves in this episode and apparently, Frank wants to become and be venerated as a false prophet. Though, in Jonah’s limited appearance in “Refraction,” Jonah said the Church will eventually fall. Jonah wants to put all of his attention on Pride, but what his end goal is, we still don’t know. Frank better hurry up before there isn’t a church to win over.

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There wasn’t much to do for the young gang in this episode. Alex was still trying to break into Wizard’s system and the rest of the group was just there. This was mainly a Molly and Chase-centric type of episode, but it would’ve been nice to see the group do more than just be in school.

As for Victor Stein, it seems he is actually dead. But is he really?

Jonah has shown that he can (possibly) cure cancer, so bringing someone back from the dead is a plausible ability he can also have. Last episode Jonah said that Victor was an essential part of Pride and his plan, so, perhaps another miracle is set to occur next episode. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Top Moments:

• One of the funniest parts of the episode was when Dale Yorkes accidentally spilled a drop of Jonah’s healing antidote on his skin. Imagine drinking 15 cups of coffee; that’s how hyped he was.
• Another top moment was when Frank discovered that Jonah is virtually immortal. I can’t wait to know who he really is.
• The most unexpected and jaw-dropping moment in “Refraction” was when Janet shot Victor.
• It seems that time travel is what Pride is working towards achieving. We only saw Victor’s time machine for a little while, but bets are it’s going to become a huge plot point going forward.

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Stay tuned for more episode reviews of Runaways.