Doom Patrol season 2, episode 6 review: Space Patrol

“You had a %&!@ing spaceship in your garage this whole time?!” Spoilers for Doom Patrol season 2, episode 6 follow.

After Dorothy unleashed the Candlemaker on Baby Doll in the DC Universe series, Jane is in a coma. The Doom Patrol doesn’t understand what’s happening and before they can ascertain what transpired, Dorothy runs away to space. Because really, where else was she going to go?

While Cliff and Niles try to retrieve Dorothy though, Larry begins to learn more about the Negative Spirit inside of him.

The Immortus Initiative

There are very few things that Doom Patrol hasn’t done in its 21 aired episodes so far and one of those things is going to space. Well, in a shocking twist to absolutely no one, they go to space in this episode. It’s absolutely ridiculous on all fronts and, for a couple minutes doesn’t really work all that well. Seeing Dorothy, by herself, looking out the window of a spaceship was slightly off-putting and it felt like it spelled doom (no pun intended) for the rest of the episode. Not because of the context of the shot though, the actual shot just looks incredibly weird, and not in a good way. However, the rest of the episode displays that one shot doesn’t make an episode.

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Cliff and Niles’ attempt to bring Dorothy back with them is one of the most earnestly heartfelt things to happen this season. It’s one father, this being Niles, speaking candidly to another his failures and the other, Cliff, simply listening. It’s an incredibly personal moment for the two to have, especially as Cliff kind of hates Niles, for obvious reasons. So much between the two here is incredibly honest, both from a character perspective and a writer’s perspective. This honesty is what makes these interactions so impactful. Too bad Niles has to ruin by shooting Cliff out of an airlock, which was incredibly predictable because Niles is just plain awful.

Before Niles does that though, Cliff and Dorothy have a really nice scene together, which is what gets Dorothy to come back to Earth. Cliff loses his sarcastic nature and his noted feelings about Dorothy and instead, just listens to her. He lets her vent, just like he did with Niles. It’s a sweet scene for the two to share and also shows that the tin man does have a heart.

As for where the spaceships came from, well it turns out the Niles was the one who invented space travel under the name, The Immortus Initiative, this itself a reference to a Marvel villain. It turns out that this group was Niles first attempt to commune with Negative Spirits before Larry and well, if actually worked right, after a time. It feels like a bit of a retread of last season with another attempt for Larry to come to peace with the Negative Spirit, but it also presents a new idea of what may happen as his story moves forward. It’s more of an interesting development rather than anything revolutionary.

Funeral for a Personality

With Candlemaker killing Baby Doll and another of Jane’s personalities, the Underground is rightfully in disarray about what to do. This is something that has never happened before and no one knows how to react, let alone Jane.

This has been said before, but Diane Guerrero is absolutely phenomenal. She can bounce back and forth between personalities, seemingly at will, but this isn’t what this episode is about for Jane. This about her trying to find any semblance of control and Guerrero is fantastic. This episode has some of the most dramatic moments for Jane and, through Guerrero’s performance, it’s easy to pull out several emotions at any point of this episode regarding Jane. It’s heartbreaking at times honestly.

Rita on stage

As for Rita, she has the most normal day out of any of the Doom Patrol in that she gets to perform once again. Well, perform may not be the right word as she is in a play based on the ending of season 1 of Doom Patrol. It’s a nice bit of meta humor that also helps get some humorous reactions out of Rita. It’s completely disconnected to the rest of the happenings in this episode, but it brings some needed humor.

The best part here for Rita though comes from her interactions with the actress who is portraying her in the play. When the actress goes on her own created biography of Rita, which is obviously unbeknownst to her, Rita’s face is so funny. April Bowlby is fantastic in this scene and does a great job of portraying disgust that is very loosely hiding behind a veil of niceties. It’s a great scene for Rita even if it doesn’t really add much to overall story of the episode.

Despite some minor hiccups, Doom Patrol delivers another heartfelt episode with just enough humor to balance out the drama.