Death is a natural part of life. It's the one thing that unifies us as human beings, the one thing that everyone will experience in their lifetimes. Since
The 100 premiered, death has been the show's only constant, hanging over this brutal world like a dark and ugly specter, taunting us and threatening beloved characters. The fight for survival is what motivates characters to keep moving, what forces capable hands and informs decisions. Death is what these people know and understand, and at some point, they will all fall. And so it's inevitable that some of the people we've come to know and come to care about over the course of the show won't make it through this journey toward peace.
But recently that specter also hasn't felt quite as dangerous as it used to, and although it'd be wrong to say that the show has gone soft or pulled punches given the the harrowing events of Mount Weather, the shameful massacre that occurred just prior to the events of "Hakeldama," and Monroe's death last week, it's been a while since an honest-to-goodness major character has died, a character whose death means something monumental, that has the potential to alter the show's trajectory and cause a ripple effect. Which is why from a narrative standpoint, I'm not too upset that Lexa died in "Thirteen" even though it's a big loss for the show. I know her death has likely devastated a good chunk of the show's fandom and potentially alienated even more, but within the context of
The 100, it's just the sad reality that these people have to live in and without those stakes, the show wouldn't be doing its job. People die on
The 100. It sucks and it hurts, but it is what it is because that's the environment these people live in now. Lexa's death is a pivotal moment for the series, one I think writer Javier Grillo-Marxuach handled with care and grace in an episode that had to answer a lot of questions, and I look forward to seeing how it shapes the rest of the season.
But having said all of that, I can't say that Lexa's death was a shocking development. Alycia Debnam-Carey is a series regular on AMC's
Fear the Walking Dead, which meant her time on
The 100 this season was likely always going to be brief, and so I've been preparing myself for her exit all season. Which is not meant to say that I had insider knowledge that Lexa was going to die, just that based on circumstantial evidence, it felt inevitable. But regardless of that, the writers have also been foreshadowing Lexa's demise for weeks now, beginning with the introduction of the Nightbloods and Lexa
making ominous statements about how Aden would succeed her as commander if anything should happen to her. (
Her fate was also sealed when she and Clarke finally had sex because everyone knows that once people have sex on TV or in movies
one of them is going to die.) So instead of feeling shock when she was shot by a bullet meant for Clarke, I'd kind of already made peace with the situation and moved right on to thinking about how this would affect the show and affect Clarke moving forward.
As the ladies of
Wicked taught us, people come into our lives for a reason, bringing something we must learn, and we are led to those who help us most to grow, if we let them. In their short time in each other's lives, Clarke taught Lexa that life was about more than just surviving and that violence didn't have to beget violence, while Lexa taught Clarke that she could love again after Finn and that peace was not out of the realm of possibility. And although I take issue with the manner in which Lexa died—a stray bullet from a gun fired by Titus, the one man who literally only cared about protecting Lexa, hit her instead of Clarke—her death scene was very well done. It felt kind of weak in the grand scheme of things, like it was too easy and quiet of a death for a warrior like Lexa, but the callback to Season 2, in particular, was a warm and intimate gesture that showed not just that Lexa had truly loved Clarke, but that Clarke had gotten through to her, that Clarke had changed her for the better, and that Clarke shouldn't give up on what they'd started together. It was a strong and moving farewell for a fan favorite character who maybe would have lived under different behind-the-scenes circumstances (but maybe not, who knows?), and I feel for fans who had just experienced the peak of Clarke and Lexa's relationship only to be plummeted to the lowest point moments later. But death happens to everyone sooner or later, especially on
The 100, and we can either choose to let the pain consume us, or we can focus on the good that came from from the relationship while channeling that pain to do something that can make a difference.
And if Clarke is smart—and she is—she'll use that pain she's feeling to help save her people from Pike's maniacal grip. She'll let it be the fire that fuel's the rest of her actions this season. Prior to Lexa's death she'd already decided to return to Arkadia after being told off by an angry Octavia, but Clarke's heart wasn't really in it. She knew she needed to return because of the blockade Lexa ordered to protect her people and keep Skaikru contained, but she also needed something to spur her into action. It's not fair to say that Lexa had been holding Clarke back this season, and I'd never describe Clarke as a coward, but as long as Lexa was in Polis, she was giving Clarke a reason not to return to her people, she was indirectly helping Clarke ignore the fallout of her actions at Mount Weather. Clarke kept repeating the line that she could do more good from Polis, and maybe that would have been true if Pike hadn't been elected and Arkadia wasn't divided, but he was and it is. It's time she returns to her people, because with Lexa dead, it may (probably will) only get worse. Without Lexa to enforce "blood must not have blood," we can't know what will happen, but we can guess, and it's not pretty.
Clarke will never be completely healed, she will always be a little broken—especially having lost Lexa so soon after losing Finn (even though I still don't believe she loved him like that)—but she's not helping anyone by staying in Polis. Last season Clarke told her mother that she may have been the chancellor, but she was in charge. She wasn't an elected official, but she was respected by her people and she had their best interests at heart—and unlike Pike, she wasn't intent on starting a war, just doing right by her people. It's time for Clarke to find that same fire within, to find that woman again. And so as sad as Lexa's death was, if it pushes Clarke into action, then maybe it won't be for nothing.
Of course, Lexa's death was about so much more than just Lexa and Clarke and pushing Clarke to fight for her people. Her death has far-reaching implications, and it revealed that the Skaikru and the Grounders are tied together in a way that I'm not sure really tracks mathematically, but I'm also willing to overlook because the narrative being woven together to connect Polis and the A.I. storyline is actually intriguing. I think it's interesting the way advanced technology has birthed a religion for the Grounders because of the way it came to them, but when looked at another way, it's an interesting commentary on society today and the way we treat and value technology. But of course I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's back up.
In "Thirteen" it was revealed that Becca had retreated to space to work on A.L.I.E. 2.0, the second, better version of the A.L.I.E. who was locked in the mansion by the lake before breaking free and launching the nuclear missiles that ended the world because there were "too many people." On the space station Polaris, Becca tirelessly worked to create a better A.I., one that understood what it meant to be human, that could interact with humans and understand their emotions, one that would help save the human race after the previous version destroyed it. But after the commander of Polaris discovered that Becca was working on another A.I., he ordered her to float it before the thirteen space stations united to form the Ark because he feared what could happen to the rest of humanity. Becca refused to destroy her creation, and after inserting the A.I. into the back of her neck, escaped to Earth in a pod only moments before the other stations destroyed Polaris for initially refusing to begin maneuvers to unite.
Becca went on to become the first commander of the humans she met upon landing back on Earth, and this is where the math breaks down. If only 97 years had passed between the end of the world and the time the Hundred arrived, then the humans that Becca met would have been survivors of the apocalypse, would have understood her speech, and would have known and understood technology. Their society would have been primitive in the sense that there had been a nuclear holocaust, there was radiation poisoning them, and they were rebuilding, but not in the sense that they were starting over from the beginning. But again, I'm willing to overlook the fact the math doesn't track, because the intersection of science fiction and faith, of Skaikru and Grounder here is interesting. Because the Grounders, or at the very least, the commanders of the Grounders, are descendants of Skaikru, or of the people from the sky. It should be obvious even without this knowledge that the Skaikru and the Grounders are the same—they're all human beings—but now this links them more directly.
But back to the A.I. that Becca had inserted into her own neck. As a result of Lexa's death, we finally have an explanation for why Grounders believed in reincarnation and thought the lives of past commanders chose them and spoke to them. As it turns out, when one commander dies, the A.I. is removed from their body by the Flamekeeper (who happens to be Titus currently) and implanted into the next commander, someone who also has blood the color of ink, which is a trait that was passed down from Becca herself, though I'm still not entirely sure what that is about because we saw her injecting herself with the substance on Polaris, and we saw it dripping on the table after she'd inserted the A.I., but we still haven't received an explanation. I suspect one will be coming soon, though, (my guess is that it has something to do with the radiation) as the show digs into the aftermath of Lexa's death, the conclave, and what it means for Polis and the rest of the 12 clans.
But to think that something as advanced as A.I. and as something as ancient as faith and religion are intertwined here is intriguing to say the least. We'd already seen something similar regarding A.L.I.E. and the City of Light that Jaha preaches about, but now that's been expanded. The Grounders believed that the spirits of the commander were in the A.I. and in a way that's similar to the "spirits" of the people Jaha's given chips to being able to "see" and "travel to" the City of Light, but this A.I. is even more interesting than A.L.I.E.'s city without pain or death, because a life without death is not a life. Death is what makes life worth living and makes our actions all the more important. Eliminating pain and death may sound like a good idea, but pain and death are what make us human, and if you take that away by uploading someone to a virtual reality, what are you left with? The Grounders believe in reincarnation because of the A.I., which is different from eliminating death and different from A.L.I.E.'s City of Light, and so Lexa accepted her death even as Clarke refused to admit she was dying. It was rather heartbreaking, actually. We still don't really know how the A.I. works in regards to taking on the voices of the past commanders, but damn if it isn't cool/freaky.
We've reached what is essentially the middle of
The 100's third season (it's crazy how fast we got here, right?) and everything is starting to come together. In true
The 100 fashion it's terribly complicated, but also fascinating and cool. Linking the Grounders and their commanders to the A.I. that A.L.I.E. is looking for was not something I could have predicted at the start of this season, but this turn of events deepened the show's mythology and provided some much-needed answers. Meanwhile, Octavia and Indra reunited and took off for Arkadia to fight against Pike and Bellamy, which is something I absolutely approve of. I've always liked Octavia's dynamic with Indra, and although I'm not really looking forward to Octavia having to fight Bellamy, especially since we know he's going to try to use her to get confirmation that Kane is feeding information, I can't wait to see where these badass ladies go from here.