Review: The 100 Season 7 Episode 11, “Ethera”

Bellamy is back in an engrossing new episode of The 100. We’ve got more time-jumps and perspective shifts as the show gets closer to the end.

As expected, Bellamy Blake survived, but finds himself stranded on an unknown planet. He is almost instantly attacked by a Disciple who fell into the wormhole with him. Bellamy wins the ensuing fight by breaking the man’s leg and then knocking him unconscious.

Bellamy has only been on screen for five minutes and has already beaten up a bad guy; some things really do never change.

Bellamy then finds a cave and does the noble thing by helping to heal the Disciple, Conductor (Johnathan Scarfe). Weeks go by and we see he and Bellamy go from foes to friends as they work together to find a way to the top of a mountain where the TravelerStone resides.

Like many episodes this season, there are a lot of time jumps. In one scene, the two men discuss the Book of the Shepard. This is the first time Bellamy hears that the planet and mountain they are on is the same one referred to by the Shepard in his own Bible. This suggests that the two men are on the same journey and must use faith to reach their goal, but Bellamy is having none of that, and proceeds to go off on his own in defiance of an oncoming storm. He is rescued by Conductor after failing to get above the clouds and collapsing on the ground. The two enter another cave, this one much higher on the mountain. Naturally, it’s the same one where the Shepard stayed when he made his quest.

For two characters who had never had a direct encounter together before now, the chemistry between Bellamy and Conductor is fantastic. Sure, there’s some head-scratching stuff on their journey, like their clean clothing, abundant firewood on a sheer mountainside, and the strange luminous lifeforms that apparently live in the back of the cave. But it’s easy to forget all of that because the characters genuinely seem like people who’ve been going through hell. We know virtually know nothing about the Conductor, so it’s no small feat to make him someone we genuinely root for in the end. It’s Bellamy whose behavior we question.

After over a year in the same cave with the same storm raging outside, Bellamy is beginning to lose it. With only bugs to eat and the forever praying Conductor for company, Bellemy finally gives in and prays alongside his friend. During his first prayer, he is visited by The Shepard and taken to the area with the weird aliens, where he sees his mother. He gets a quick “I told you so” speech from the Shepard, and awakes to find the storm has finally passed. He and Conductor then scale a sheer vertical wall and barely make it up to the TravelerStone.

When they arrive back in Bardo, they are greeted by Bill himself, and Bellamy sees his friends. Clarke, Echo, Octavia and Gabriel all stare in stunned silence as he walks in. He shows how much he’s changed when he shows no emotion for them, and then instantly betrays them by revealing that Clarke doesn’t have the Flame: it was destroyed. It’s supposed to be a twist, but after seeing what Bellamy saw and what he went through, I may just be on his side now. I mean, he did his own thing and nearly died, then when he listened to the religious guys, everything went great. He had to jump off the top of the mountain to get to the wormhole in a literal leap of faith. I know it’s supposed to shock us that he betrayed his friends, but after everything he went through it’s easy for him to see the Shepard as an actual God.

Besides the many plot holes and inconsistencies, it was still good to finally see Bellamy back and doing Bellamy things, even if that means joining a cult.

Grade: B

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