Loveday Writing

This episode is all about Nathan’s last day on Earth…again.

Nathan and Nora decide to spend a fun last day on Earth together, whilst Ingrid and Backup Nathan admit to each other that they almost kissed their respective counterparts. In her anger at Backup Nathan almost kissing Nora, she goes into the suite bathroom and asks Tinsley to let her use Nora’s avatar. In Luke’s suite, Aleesha tries to discuss the pros and cons of Karina, with Luke suggesting that he meets her.

Backup Nathan goes to see Ivan and thanks him for giving Choak’s hard drive to the Real Nathan, only for Ivan to discover that one of the AI Guys recorded their exchange. Ivan then asks the AI Guy to keep it a secret.

Back in the real world, Nora is cooking breakfast in bed and tries to organise for Blue Man Group impersonators to see Nathan, only to end up with Blue Dude Solo who is not affiliated with the Blue Man Group, who will apparently do a weird dance for him. Nora gives him breakfast and tells him that she has booked rowboats for them, only for Holden to call her into work and she reluctantly agrees to go in.

Meanwhile, Ingrid successfully enters Lakeview in Nora’s avatar and tries to tempt Backup Nathan into kissing her. Backup Nathan tells her that they are just friends and he loves Ingrid. Back in the real world, Nora tells Nathan that the evidence they got from Choak’s memories are inadmissible as the uploads are the intellectual property of the upload companies, so the information they got from the memories is stolen property. Nathan offers to testify, but Nora tells him they’d have the same problem, as he signed away the rights to his brain scan when he uploaded.

Back in Lakeview, Aleesha and Karina ring Choak’s doorbell to do a wellness check, but walk away when he doesn’t open the door. They then run into Luke in the hallway and he introduces himself to Karina. Luke suggests to Karina that they spend time together and get to know each other, Karina agrees and tells him that she’ll clear her schedule.

Meanwhile, Ingrid calls Backup Nathan ‘babe’ whilst she is in Nora’s avatar, which leads to him realising what she is doing and tries to get her to tell the truth, however his plan is ruined when a Horizen worker sees her and puts her to work.

Back in the real world, when Nathan and Nora leave, she tells him that the firm has a new star witness under heavy guard, and that Holden has offered her a permanent job and if she lasts a year, the firm could pay for her to go to law school at night. Holden then calls her and asks her to come back as the firm’s partners want to see her, and they go back into the office.

Back in Lakeview, Luke, Aleesha, and Karina spend time together at an executive level bar, where Luke shows and tells Karina about the various hacks he has discovered and taken advantage of, during his time in Lakeview, which includes free premium Lakeview membership. Meanwhile, Ivan discovers that the AI Guy has shared his secret with the other versions of himself and when he reprimands them, Choak’s prefera overhears him and asks questions.

Meanwhile, Ingrid overhears the other male Horizen workers make sexist remarks about Nora and calls them out on it. When Luke returns to his suite, Aleesha is waiting for him and asks for his opinion on Karina, he tells her that Karina is just like them but also a little sketchy, but to stick it out and see where their relationship goes. Moments after Aleesha leaves, Luke discovers that Karina has disabled his premium Lakeview membership.

Later, Aleesha asks Ivan to tell her what secret the AI Guys are keeping, as the prefera informed her that they are keeping one. Ivan manages to avoid trouble by getting the AI Guy to whisper the secret and tells her that the secret is that they have a crush on her. Ingrid, as her real self, returns to Nathan’s suite and he tries to get her to tell him the truth about using Nora’s avatar, only for her to stand up for Nora.

Back in the real world, as Nathan and Nora are about to leave, Holden tells them to look out the window at the Blue Dude Solo that’s outside the building. The star witness, who is revealed to be the download doctor, also arrives. One of the firm’s partners reveals that the doctor took a bribe to sabotage the first download as upload companies had to crush the competition. Holden points out a motive to the upload companies doing this – why pay for centuries at Lakeview if you could download into a young body and start over. The partner reveals that the doctor has all the upload companies’ info from Freeyond to stuff the firm doesn’t even know about yet. This reveal leads to Nathan and Nora realising that his head won’t explode and he’ll be fine.

The episode ends with a snackbot that was spotted earlier in the episode being used as an explosive to kill the download doctor by the conspiracy.

Overall, this was a solid penultimate episode for this season, with the simultaneous reveal that Nathan’s download body is not in any danger but the conspiracy is onto Holden’s lawsuit. I also appreciated Ingrid experiencing character development by walking a mile in Nora’s shoes when she is using her avatar, and Luke discovering how sketchy Karina is. I also felt that the AI Guy’s inability to keep Ivan’s secret was nice comic relief sprinkled throughout the episode.

It will be interesting to see where the finale takes us and how the season will end.

Stray Observations:

-Luke was once catfished by a terrorist, apparently he was a colonel in the Revolutionary Guard and a part of Luke will always love him.

-There is an executive level bar in Lakeview called “Search Bar”.

Best one liners and interactions:

• “Ingrid owns this body, Horizen owns my thoughts, but my heart, that belongs to you.” (Real Nathan to Nora)
• “Where the fuck is that old sack of code?” (Aleesha to Karina on Choak)