Review: Pantheon “The Gods Will Not be Slain”

There’s a lot that has happened during Pantheon thus far. And by a lot, I mean a literal shit ton. I thought last week was going to be all of the backlash and repercussions from Laurie’s attempt to go public with the UI progress. Yet, there’s so much still to deal with. For any action and event that happens, more backlash occurs, and that’s Chanda’s attack on Laurie, sinking her floating server farm.

The United States is far from first when it comes to uploading intelligence. We get the “first” American who wants to be in this program. Oddly enough, it’s a woman who’s trying so hard to get away from her family. And it worked. I like how we got some backstory of one of the uploads before they got scanned, because it adds some emotional weight. The Russian or the Chinese uploads, however, are Pantheon’s version of the main characters from Rogue One…disposable.

And then there’s Cody. This man is so emotionally detached from the world, he may as well be a robot. It’s hard to connect with this man, even though he’s gone through a lot. He watched his wife die, pretty much twice at this point. Maddie and Ellen are trying to do a small memorial for Laurie, but he ends up turning it around on them because Maddie is in complete preservation mode for her dad. David does not want to be exposed. The problem with Cody is that he went off without thinking, and it backfired on him. He has a few conspiracy nuts but that only makes him look worse. He looks awful with a bunch of nuts behind him.

And then there’s Chanda. It’s a bit stereotype-ish for Chanda to go unhinged and go after nuclear codes. But I get why. With Laurie taken out of the picture, the only person that would be the big bad end game boss would be Chanda. David wants to be left alone and get a cure for the defect. Every other upload is just a pawn at best. The uploads outside of Chanda and David are just the Rogue One cast.

It’s hard for me to care about Chanda when his views changed so radically since Laurie tried to go public. He went from trying to find a cure to “Fuck it, I want to watch the world burn” in the span of one episode. I’m not sure if it’s him in full self-preservation or whatever, but this turn of events made him out to be just a cookie-cutter end villain. This goes even deeper when Chanda makes his end game move. I wish I can get behind this, because his move to try to get David off the board was next level smart. Unfortunately for Chanda, he doesn’t know who he’s messing with.

Maddie has grown so much since “Pantheon.” During the first couple of episodes, Maddie was a timid little girl who was getting pushed around by everyone and everything. However, during “The Gods Will Not be Slain,” she is no pushover anymore. She squared up with Cody. She even went so far as to pull her dad out of his bullshit long enough for him to get up and fight against Chanda. Maddie is no Rogue One character, at all. This gem of a character is straight up Luke Skywalker. There was one particular moment that solidified her growth. That was when she was talking to Caspian about what’s going to happen with the UI program.

She pulled a straight G moment when she told Caspian to shove it all. The only thing she wanted was for him to possibly help with finding the fix to David’s UI. He ran out. And she has every right and ability to make him feel like shit, especially after telling her that if he gets disappeared, to release everything about him.

Otherwise, Caspian’s story has been rather flat. It’s been him going from jet, to plane. to secret lab in Norway, trying to piece together the life Pope wanted for him. Caspian got the VIP treatment of this facility, ultimately getting to his incubation and baggy room. There, he was met with the whole list of people who fucked him up. Pope, his “parents,” and Van Leuwen. Pope seems to be following Caspian, because in reality, Caspian is the (manufactured) second coming of Stephen Holstrom.

But that’s all well and good. What I really want to talk about is this god damn fight between David and Chanda. Just like with any scene involving a fight between two UI, this was made with expert craftsmanship. If I didn’t know any better, I would say this fight would fit in perfectly with any fight in Dragon Ball Z, Naruto, One Piece, you name it. There are so many things that happen, from slow motion exits, Luffy-style limb stretching, and moving so fast that David and Chanda both seem to disappear and reappear like teleportation, that make this fight out of this world. I wish more cartoons on this side of the world took a page out from Pantheon‘s style. I would do wonders.

What got to me was what seems like the end of Logorhythm. In a moment where I was sure Cody was going to die from getting pushed closer and closer to the armed security at the doors, an unlikely savior came out in the form of Dr. Waxman. However, the big reveal was Holstrom’s motivation, and what’s going to happen to the UI program. Caspian thought he was doing right by destroying the whole program. Yet, Pope is right in regards to everyone still keeping the program and lying about its existence. In this, however, Pope may have given the proper motivation, and giving him the keys to making the one true god to rule them all. And that man? David Kim. Pope’s face turn was not something I was expecting. This was a plot twist I was not expecting, and I am all for it.

For a season finale, almost all of the boxes were checked. Chanda and his group of Rogue One castoffs are in a nebulous position. David Kim’s position right now is up in the air. Caspian finally took the seat he was meant to take with Pope helping him where he needs to be. There are enough questions to make season two a reality, because this was a huge question I had going in. As a finale, I feel like this was par for the course for Pantheon. I think I was just expecting more from the fight from Chanda and David, even though the short fight did give me exactly everything I needed for the moment. It was just looking back on it that made me wish for more.

There is one thing that I felt like a major fumble, and that was the scene with Caspian and the entire group of Logorhythm employees. It felt like this was a come to Jesus meeting for them to get Caspian to listen to them and keep everything afloat. In the end, it felt like this scene was completely unnecessary outside of a flimsy way to make it burnt into our heads that Caspian was deadset on completely dismantling Logorhythm, even though that didn’t even stick. This time could have been given to the fight between Chanda and David to give us a more fleshed out fight.

That doesn’t mean that “The Gods Will Not be Slain” was bad by any means. I thoroughly got everything I was expecting. However, there was nothing that made it as good as “We Are You.” That was perfection for Pantheon. It was hard to not feel like there was something missing, even after going over “The Gods Will Not be Slain” with a fine tooth comb. It was a great episode in a vacuum, and saying “The Gods Will Not be Slain” was par for the course for Pantheon is not bad by any stretch of the means. Then again, it’s almost expected to feel a bit of a letdown after experiencing the epitome of perfection.