Doom Patrol season 4, episode 3 review: Nostalgia Patrol

“Is that the summation of my life? Am I just meant to be alone?” Spoilers for Doom Patrol season 4, episode 3 follow.

As Rita is floundering in her despair, she gets a flyer about a retrospective of her filmography, but there’s something more going on with this than she knows.

While this is going on, Vic meets with some old friends that he hasn’t seen in a long time.

Here is what happened in Doom Patrol season 4, episode 3 “Nostalgia Patrol”.

Doom Patrol season 4 episode 3 review

Finding purpose

Rita and Jane begin to try and find their new purposes now that everything they’ve planned has been thrown out the window. Rita goes to a retrospective on her filmography that seemingly only she knows about and, well, she gets sucked into her films, leading to the Doom Patrol getting sucked into these films as well.

Before this happens, Jane realizes that the puzzle pieces she poured out were aspects of her psyche, and while something else happens once her realization occurs, this quickly sets her on the path that her arc this season will seemingly be. Not much else happens with this storyline in this episode, but the beginning of “Nostalgia Patrol” does a solid job of setting up where Jane’s arc will eventually lead.

As for Vic, he meets up with some old friends, trying to relive the life that he used to have before he became Cyborg. But very quickly, it turns out that he can’t go back to the life he had before he was with the Doom Patrol. He and his friends are not the same people that they were before and how this episode handles this realization is fantastic and genuinely heartbreaking.

The slow reactions that this group has with each other, slowly realizing that they’ve all grown to be different people with very different lived experiences, leading to a blow-up, it’s all too real. It’s one of the mostly genuinely human moments that the show has had in a series filled with them and truly captures the spirit of simply having lived, no matter the pain that comes with it.

Into the Rita-verse

But along with the fantastic character moments, this is Doom Patrol after all, and the plot of the episode is suitably crazy. So, while trying to support Rita at her retrospective, the Doom Patrol are dragged into these movies by a mysterious entity named Dr. Janus who is apparently attempting to get Rita to emote as much as possible. Just a regular old day for the Doom Patrol. And it’s a whole lot of fun seeing everyone react to being in these films, especially the horror film that Rita was in. It’s definitely not the most ridiculous that show has ever gotten, but nevertheless, it’s still a whole lot of fun.

As it turns out though, this Dr. Janus that has dragged the team into these films is an emotional vampire and an old weapon that Nile has a file on, but with one crucial thing missing, how to defeat it. So, while the rest of the team is stuck, Madame Rouge gets drunk, lamenting every bad thing she’s  ever done, and thankfully leaving the notes on Dr. Janus out in the open for Keeg to see and learn from.

Before Keeg can destroy the shared hallucination that the team is in, Janus throws Larry, Cliff, and Jane into a death trap and forces Rita to work through her emotions regarding everything that’s happened this season so far, and it’s fantastic. And while it’s a great character moment, it also introduces the first mention of what is probably the true villain of this season, General Immortus.

Doom Patrol continues on its excellent way this season and delivers both the weirdness and fantastic character work that you’ve come to expect from the series.

The first three episodes of Doom Patrol season 4 are now streaming on HBO Max.

What did you think of Doom Patrol season 4 episode 3? Let us know in the comments below!