Shorts Review: Red vs. Blue Season 12 Episode 9

Hold up a second. Do we actually get to see what happened to Sarge and the gang? Oh, happy day!

Spoilers Below

We go back to the end of Season 11, where Locus is looking after the survivors, and Wash is the only one coherent. Locus gave Wash a choice to fight, or give up, and Locus admires that Wash wanted to fight. Wash seems to come to, but he’s in what looks like Project Freelancer. Wash is having flashbacks to when he met the Reds, and he shot most of the team under orders. Wash, Sarge and Donut are being held captive by the Feds. The person in charge frees them, and gives them their weapons back. Wash has no idea what’s going on, especially since the guy who let them go fainted.

The guy is named General Doyle, and he is seen talking to Dr. Greg. He finds the group. Wash then goes through the last few days, where he was helping survivors, crashed the ship, and then they all became wanted men for crashing on the planet all because of the Feds. So, he’s just a wee bit confused. Doyle does his best to flip their stance, by attacking Felix’s words to Wash. According to Doyle, the acts of freedom the rebels committed were really acts of terror, and the three of them were to be saved. They buy in from Wash, Sarge, and Donut is a slow burn, but they eventually get won over to the Fed’s side. They get Lopez fixed, and then look to find Freckles, but Locus tells them that they don’t have it.

Locus tells them that everything they did was to take them in. Shoot to wound and intimidate, he says. He has a one-track mind, and he has to finish his mission. Emily tells him to leave them alone, but before he goes, he gives Wash Freckle’s primary storage. This has some really good CG in this scene, but it breaks from the game footage a bit. Lopez talks a lot of shit on Locus, but Locus understands everything, which freaks out Lopez.  Then Dr. Greg introduces herself to Sarge, Donut, Wash, and Lopez. She wants them to end the war, because prosthetics are so lame. The team tries to figure out what is the right thing to do. They decide to stick it out for a bit, and hope that the others aren’t in too deep.

I was hoping that this story would go parallel to the Republic story, but they did the right thing. Things would have gotten entirely too confusing. I was glad to see that Locus got a lot of screen time, and go into what happened at Crash Site B. Something is off with Wash, because Locus seems to be hitting a nerve with knowing how Locus thinks. I think Locus will be a character that can shine for the rest of the season, and going forward. Well, that’s if he doesn’t get killed by Wash or Felix.

I think that Miles Luna is absolutely killing it. He has written a season thus far that is clear, concise, and has fantastic structure. I had doubts going from the end of last season, and the beginning of this one. But those doubts are gone, and this looks like some of the best episodes yet. My one gripe, however, is with the CG. It doesn’t look bad by any stretch. My problem comes with when using it in specific moments, it breaks up the experience between game and CG. If it were up to me, I would have it all or nothing. It’s really obvious where the CG comes in. Thankfully, the one or two scenes per episode doesn’t detract from the episode overall. If you haven’t been able to catch this episode, or season, get on it now.