And so Jason knows… and the truth of his parentage has tipped him over the edge.
Our hero is acting like anything but as he turns on his friends and pushes everyone away, including Ariadne.
While Jason suffers confused dreams about Medea (Amy Manson), Hercules struggles with his friend’s brutal actions and is despondent that Medusa’s sacrifice seems to have changed little.
Still fighting for survival in the forest, the gang take on Pasiphae’s troops. Ariadne uses her bow (where does she get the arrows from?) and Pythagoras handles himself well, but Jason is relentless – even proving capable of cold blooded murder.
In desperation, and with a deliberate echo of the previous episode, Pythagoras sets out to infiltrate the city once again. Hooking up with Icarus, he is smuggled in and manages to see the High Priest Melas. He learns Jason’s father is still alive and holds the key to bringing Jason back from his dark path.
Consequently, Pythagoras totters off to locate Aeson who, somewhat predictably, refuses to help before having a last minute change of heart.
While there was plenty going on, we cannot help but feel the main function of the story was to put pieces in place for the season finale, only three weeks away. The main revelation, which we viewers discovered last year, unfurled infuriatingly slowly.
First Pythagoras’ enjoyed a boggle-eyed reaction to the news that Jason’s dad was alive, a truth hidden by a semantic trick on the part of the Oracle. Then, we struggled all the way to the end, bar the snogging, for Hercules and Ariadne’s boggle-eyed reaction to that very same news, albeit delivered in person by John Hannah.
Most interesting were the actions of Medea (Amy Manson), who clearly has designs on Jason as she stepped in to stop her aunt’s plans for maternal filicide. Medea has remained largely in the background and we are fascinated to see what her agenda is.
It was good to see Pythagoras taking a lead role again and there is clearly heartbreak ahead as his close friend Icarus betrayed him to secure the release of Daedalus. This was a moment that cemented the foolishness we associate with his name, stupid boy!
In the end, despite some frenetic battle scenes, the moment of the episode has to be given to Sarah Parish for Pasiphae’s Darth Vader-style choking of her man Goran. Gripping stuff!
Aired at 7.45pm on Saturday 2 May 2015 on BBC One.
> Buy Season 1 on DVD on Amazon.
> Order Season 2 Part 1 on DVD on Amazon.
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