INCORPORATED SEASON 1: THE FULL COLLECTION, EPISODES 1-10 (7.6 AVERAGE)
Incorporated - 1x01 "Vertical Mobility"
"In 2074 Ben Larson, a manager at giant biotech firm Spiga, juggles his work life and home life with his quest to rescue a woman from his past who is being forced to work as a sex slave for Spiga higher-ups."
One of the biggest criticisms I've seen levelled at Incorporated's premiere is that it is full of sci-fi dystopian future tropes and doesn't have anything new to say. I wouldn't say that's an unfair judgement, but I didn't find it hard to move past the numerous genre clichés (class segregation, self-driving cars, gel healing spray, iPad-like body scanners, holograms etc), and if the story told isn't a new one, then those telling the story definitely are.
And one thing they did right was not make the premise too premise-y. Far too often this season shows have come out with premise-heavy, character-light premiere episodes that haven't quite fit the bill.
Not Incorporated.
The 46-minute premiere episode was necessary world-building: we know Ben Larson's real name is Aaron, he's married and trying to have a baby with the daughter of a Spiga executive, he has unexplained links to a Red Zone cigarette dealer who has just joined the crew of a seeming criminal mastermind, and Ben needs to get a promotion to the 40th floor within Spiga in order to receive access privileges to Spiga's collection of sex slaves so he can rescue someone linked to his past. We needed to see how the worlds of the Green and Red Zones operated and how to move between them - and we did see that. Our characters' starting points come somewhere in the middle of the series mythology, with Ben now about to make his move, as he dethrones his friend and boss to create the 40th-floor vacancy. There's your "vertical mobility".
It's clear there's a lot to come from Incorporated, and its premiere gave everything to the audience that it needed in a year where many haven't, and that transparency fills me with hope for the rest of the 10 (or is it 13? I'm as yet unsure) episode first season.
VIEWERS: 0.523m
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.15
(They look terrible compared to everything else on this list, but for Syfy these, while on the lower side, are acceptable, so a fairly good start for Incorporated.)
(They look terrible compared to everything else on this list, but for Syfy these, while on the lower side, are acceptable, so a fairly good start for Incorporated.)
VERDICT: As aesthetically pleasing as you'd hope from a sci-fi, with raised stakes right from the get-go and an impressive cast. A very promising series. 8.5/10
One thing I love about Incorporated is how tense almost every scene is. If Ben isn't desperately trying to evade detection at every turn, then Laura is self-harming or trying to help someone in peril, or Theo is manipulated by Terrence - and every scene between Spiga exec (and Laura's mum) Elizabeth and the evil security head/torturer Julian is spine-tingling.
In "Downsizing", Ben manages to evade detection by convincing his rival for the 40th floor job to help frame Chad for their trip to the Red Zone - and it works. Unfortunately for Ben, said rival spots him hiding some unathorised tech (a 2074 version of a USB stick on which he's hidden the evidence of his motive - finding Elena) in the interrogation room and when Ben goes back for it it is gone. Throughout the episode Ben has mostly had the upper hand without anyone knowing, but now he's lost the advantage and it's going to set up a tasty season to come. Can he twist this around or was this actually part of his plan? (I doubt the latter, if I'm honest.)
Laura continues to self-harm as Chad's family are disavowed, but she rescues their kids from exile by helping a childless couple adopt them. She's yet to come into her own with a real plot, but a little further down the line I'm sure Laura will get entangled in some way.
Theo's fight didn't go how he planned: his reckless cheating won him the fight, but at the cost of bringing him completely under Terrence's control, Terrence viciously murdering Theo's opponent to prove that losing wasn't an option. With Theo now fighting his way to the executives' club and Ben trying to work his way there, this is starting off nicely.
Finally, flashbacks to 12 years earlier show us how Ben (then Aaron) first met Elena, in a refugee camp for victims of climate change, as he flaunted the system and figured out ways to steal guard rations and help people. He made an ally in a shady guard, Hendrick, who in the present is part of the Spiga HR Department - and Ben's only ally inside the company. Theo hasn't come into the past yet, but I'm liking where practically all of this is going.
VIEWERS: 0.539m (Only a slight tick up)
Incorporated - 1x02 "Downsizing"
"Spiga begin to vet prospects for the job vacated by the framed Chad Peterson, which puts Ben in a reactionary position. Laura tries to help Chad's family, while Theo participates in a caged fight in the Green Zone."
One thing I love about Incorporated is how tense almost every scene is. If Ben isn't desperately trying to evade detection at every turn, then Laura is self-harming or trying to help someone in peril, or Theo is manipulated by Terrence - and every scene between Spiga exec (and Laura's mum) Elizabeth and the evil security head/torturer Julian is spine-tingling.
In "Downsizing", Ben manages to evade detection by convincing his rival for the 40th floor job to help frame Chad for their trip to the Red Zone - and it works. Unfortunately for Ben, said rival spots him hiding some unathorised tech (a 2074 version of a USB stick on which he's hidden the evidence of his motive - finding Elena) in the interrogation room and when Ben goes back for it it is gone. Throughout the episode Ben has mostly had the upper hand without anyone knowing, but now he's lost the advantage and it's going to set up a tasty season to come. Can he twist this around or was this actually part of his plan? (I doubt the latter, if I'm honest.)
 |
| A refugee camp in Milwaukee for climate change victims |
Theo's fight didn't go how he planned: his reckless cheating won him the fight, but at the cost of bringing him completely under Terrence's control, Terrence viciously murdering Theo's opponent to prove that losing wasn't an option. With Theo now fighting his way to the executives' club and Ben trying to work his way there, this is starting off nicely.
Finally, flashbacks to 12 years earlier show us how Ben (then Aaron) first met Elena, in a refugee camp for victims of climate change, as he flaunted the system and figured out ways to steal guard rations and help people. He made an ally in a shady guard, Hendrick, who in the present is part of the Spiga HR Department - and Ben's only ally inside the company. Theo hasn't come into the past yet, but I'm liking where practically all of this is going.
VIEWERS: 0.539m (Only a slight tick up)
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.18 (As predicted, the online release drove down Incorporated's premiere demo share, and with its second week it rises to an even higher, happier figure and gives us a proper baseline for future analysis)
VERDICT: The edge-of-your-seat thriller continues. Ben didn't get the promotion at episode 2's end like I predicted, but that will soon come - and when it does everything else will be nicely aligned. 8.5/10
Incorporated - 1x03 "Human Resources"
"An Executive Vice-President at Spiga's rival, Inazagi, uses a negotiation between the two companies as cover to secretly defect; seeing this as an opportunity to impress, Ben steps up to help. After finding Ben's illegal tech, Roger visits a Red Zone coder to get help bypassing the self-destruct protocols."
The mistake made in "Human Resources" was Ben deciding to curry favour with the Spiga bigwigs rather than cover himself and try to find where his research tech ended up. So while Ben made waves by helping the Inazagi EVP defect to Spiga without being killed by an isotopic killswitch in her bloodstream, his promotion rival Roger Caplan won the upper hand by having a Red Zone coder help him bypass Ben's tech's self-destruct protocols.
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| Roger discovers Ben's secret |
While it was wrong for Ben to divert his attentions after losing key information that could expose his entire gameplan, he was naturally drawn to reports that one of the Arkadia sex slaves had been killed trying to escape. He needed to know if it was Elena, and a risky bait-and-switch with the Inazagi defector was the perfect way to kill two birds with one stone. In the end, the ring that he found amongst the dead sex slave's personal effects suggested it was Elena, but a secret holographic message in the ring played when Theo touched it (through a DNA link) and confirmed Elena was indeed still alive.
Game on.
VIEWERS: 0.572m (The second tick up in viewers in two episodes; fantastic)
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.17 (Slight downtick; hovering early on in a strong area)
VERDICT: As Ben targets the 40th floor, Roger targets Ben. The A-plot to distract Ben seemed a little forced to buy Roger time to learn his secret, but I'm not sure that's too bad a thing. 8.5/10
As the dystopian world in which our characters live expands, so does the amount of story needed to keep up with that growth. For now, Incorporated is managing to keep the balance very well. The Inazagi defector from the episode prior finally kept her end of the bargain (after some plastic surgery), and explained that Inazagi are after some sort of sea water irrigation system which could dethrone Spiga as the world's biggest corporation. This sounds like an interesting battle to be had in the near future.
Meanwhile, the depiction of how babies are "designed" in 2074 is not so detached from the expectations of the current world, but the most disturbing part of it is how "gestators" are used instead of the real mothers. Gestators aged 13-25. My God. That is a horror show! On the upside, Ben's plan doesn't involve getting Laura pregnant, so he takes some male contraceptive behind her back to prevent that, after they outrageously decide to have a baby the normal way.
As for Roger, who has Ben's keyhole, Roger has now lost the upper hand - without knowing it. Ben discovers through his HR contact Hendricks that Roger had the keyhole, and begins to track him immediately. Roger's goal is to find Elena and uses his father's power to do that. Ben follows him to a hotel and who should turn up? Elena! This cliffhanger leads us to the question: how soon will Ben act now Elena is in his sights? And how did she end up as a sex slave in the first place, after flashbacks showed Elena refusing a similar offer years before in the Red Zone?
Incorporated - 1x04 "Cost Containment"
"Ben struggles with Laura's wish to have a baby, while discovering that Roger had his keyhole."
As the dystopian world in which our characters live expands, so does the amount of story needed to keep up with that growth. For now, Incorporated is managing to keep the balance very well. The Inazagi defector from the episode prior finally kept her end of the bargain (after some plastic surgery), and explained that Inazagi are after some sort of sea water irrigation system which could dethrone Spiga as the world's biggest corporation. This sounds like an interesting battle to be had in the near future.
Meanwhile, the depiction of how babies are "designed" in 2074 is not so detached from the expectations of the current world, but the most disturbing part of it is how "gestators" are used instead of the real mothers. Gestators aged 13-25. My God. That is a horror show! On the upside, Ben's plan doesn't involve getting Laura pregnant, so he takes some male contraceptive behind her back to prevent that, after they outrageously decide to have a baby the normal way.
VIEWERS: 0.542
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.13
(Ticks downwards. The result of Christmas? I guess we'll see in the next couple episodes)
(Ticks downwards. The result of Christmas? I guess we'll see in the next couple episodes)
VERDICT: There are a number of cat-and-mouse chases on the go now - Spiga vs Inazagi, Roger vs Ben, Ben vs Roger and more - and the build-up of each is both fast and intense. Theo is a bit of an outside character, however, since his storyline has no impact on Ben's. 8/10
There's a lot of good stuff in this episode, and some weird stuff as well. The weird includes torturer Julian turning around and offering advice to Laura, daughter of his boss Elizabeth, although I suppose he can't be 100% one thing. Still, he's not been in the show much since the first 2 episodes, so it's a good thing that he is now getting some more airtime.
But the best part was following Ben and Roger's game of cat-and-mouse. After the cliffhanger ending where Roger set up a meeting with Elena, he used almost every method - including physical violence - to get her to talk about Ben, but having suffered at the hands of many johns in the past Elena was unmoved by his corkscrew torture. Ben's attempts to rescue Elena there and then fail, so he takes to ensuring that Roger cannot reveal him to Spiga - by killing him. It's a shame the writers went down that story path (I mean, of course Roger was going to end up dead, but so early on? Whether it works or not remains to be seen.)
In flashbacks, we discovered that after Elena's initial refusal to become a Spiga sex slave, she agreed on the condition that the payments would get her father released from the debtor's prison, while the Spiga exec who manipulated her into accepting the job was revealed to have been the person behind the arson attack on Elena's little café business. And the plot thickens.
Also, props to the writers for the hilarious offhand remark about sending Roger's body to the "Mexican wall". We'll expect it built by 2074 then.
Incorporated - 1x05 "Profit Loss"
"Ben improvises to stop Roger from finding out even more about his past."
There's a lot of good stuff in this episode, and some weird stuff as well. The weird includes torturer Julian turning around and offering advice to Laura, daughter of his boss Elizabeth, although I suppose he can't be 100% one thing. Still, he's not been in the show much since the first 2 episodes, so it's a good thing that he is now getting some more airtime.
But the best part was following Ben and Roger's game of cat-and-mouse. After the cliffhanger ending where Roger set up a meeting with Elena, he used almost every method - including physical violence - to get her to talk about Ben, but having suffered at the hands of many johns in the past Elena was unmoved by his corkscrew torture. Ben's attempts to rescue Elena there and then fail, so he takes to ensuring that Roger cannot reveal him to Spiga - by killing him. It's a shame the writers went down that story path (I mean, of course Roger was going to end up dead, but so early on? Whether it works or not remains to be seen.)
In flashbacks, we discovered that after Elena's initial refusal to become a Spiga sex slave, she agreed on the condition that the payments would get her father released from the debtor's prison, while the Spiga exec who manipulated her into accepting the job was revealed to have been the person behind the arson attack on Elena's little café business. And the plot thickens.
Also, props to the writers for the hilarious offhand remark about sending Roger's body to the "Mexican wall". We'll expect it built by 2074 then.
VIEWERS: 0.464m
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.12
(Predicted ticks down over Christmas - but will it rise again? I hope so!)
(Predicted ticks down over Christmas - but will it rise again? I hope so!)
VERDICT: The bubbling battle between Ben and Roger reached a critical point; Elena finally got some major screen time. But where does the show pick up from here? 8/10
The first half of the season has focused on Aaron/Ben's struggles to keep his clandestine motivations under wrap whilst trying to gain promotion, but after an intense episode that concluded with Roger Caplan's murder, Incorporated shifted that focus. To Laura.
We knew a few important details about her: she had been through a traumatic experience in the Red Zone at some point in her past, she was estranged from her mother and she self-harmed regularly, but what "Sweating the Assets" did in an episode that was 90% flashback was explain what happened to her. It was a typical girl-goes-to-bar-against-mother's-wishes storyline, ending with Laura kidnapped for ransom - and when her mother didn't pay the kidnappers cut off her right ear.
Elizabeth refused to pay because Spiga's policy wasn't to pay for the safe return of kidnapped employees, but presumably to wipe them out along with the kidnappers. Which is what happened to Laura's father, while Elizabeth did nothing to save him. This time at least, she sent Julian to rescue Laura, and her duplicity continued when she explained he would not receive his transfer and was instead to be promoted, which also reveals how Julian got to his current position.
Ben/Aaron featured a little at the front and back ends of the episode, where he was shown to be taking steps on a fresh plan to rescue Elena, with Theo's help, but that was about it. This was Laura's episode, and Allison Miller's chance to shine - and she did.
Incorporated - 1x06 "Sweating the Assets"
"Laura's backstory is revealed as she ponders making a house call to her ex-housekeeper in the Red Zone."
The first half of the season has focused on Aaron/Ben's struggles to keep his clandestine motivations under wrap whilst trying to gain promotion, but after an intense episode that concluded with Roger Caplan's murder, Incorporated shifted that focus. To Laura.
We knew a few important details about her: she had been through a traumatic experience in the Red Zone at some point in her past, she was estranged from her mother and she self-harmed regularly, but what "Sweating the Assets" did in an episode that was 90% flashback was explain what happened to her. It was a typical girl-goes-to-bar-against-mother's-wishes storyline, ending with Laura kidnapped for ransom - and when her mother didn't pay the kidnappers cut off her right ear.
Elizabeth refused to pay because Spiga's policy wasn't to pay for the safe return of kidnapped employees, but presumably to wipe them out along with the kidnappers. Which is what happened to Laura's father, while Elizabeth did nothing to save him. This time at least, she sent Julian to rescue Laura, and her duplicity continued when she explained he would not receive his transfer and was instead to be promoted, which also reveals how Julian got to his current position.
Ben/Aaron featured a little at the front and back ends of the episode, where he was shown to be taking steps on a fresh plan to rescue Elena, with Theo's help, but that was about it. This was Laura's episode, and Allison Miller's chance to shine - and she did.
VIEWERS: 0.424m
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.12
(Perhaps the downtick wasn't just Christmas ...)
(Perhaps the downtick wasn't just Christmas ...)
VERDICT: The flashback episode proves just how much you don't need to move a plot forward a whole lot to create something substantive, and the titbits of info on her character in the first five episodes prove how, when done well, you can answer your own questions without feeling like you've taken away the mystery. 9/10
The threads of a well-paced series are coming together slowly. Everclear, Ben's new interrogation technique which effectively reads people's minds, is trialled by Spiga on an Inazagi employee (Mr Brill) who knows the location of Sanjay Mirage, a gene splicer in Inazagi custody who can provide a method of effectively growing crops in deserts. With this technology, Spiga could topple Inazagi. Eventually, the location of Sanjay is uncovered and a team assembled, with Ben using Mr Brill to prepare safe passage for himself and Elena, and Hendrick to help remove any memory of his past as Aaron!
Speaking of Elena though, Julian's investigation into Caplan's disappearance led to two more game-changing moments. Firstly, his belief that all these odd occurrences creating a 40th floor vacancy benefit Ben more than anyone, which puts him at the top of Julian's suspect pool. And secondly, a brief meeting between Ben and Elena, who is now aware Ben is working to free her from her sex slave role.
Laura's conscience led her into trouble: directly after her flashback episode revealing how she was traumatised in the Red Zones, a visit to another Red Zone leads to her kidnap, but a surprise twist has her agreeing to perform duties as a doctor for the bad guy after she sympathises with him.
This was just a well-timed episode: nearly everything that has occurred in the last 6 episodes was strung together in a way that opens up a stunning end to the first season: a Spiga-Inazagi war just as Ben's efforts to rescue Elena begin to crumble. How this will all pan out I cannot predict.
Frustratingly, Theo's plot remains largely on the outside, but whether it will marry up near the end is another question. Props to the guest star from Peter Outerbridge.
Incorporated - 1x07 "Executables"
"Julian investigates Roger Caplan's disappearance. Ben's new interrogation technique is tested on an Inazagi employee in order for Spiga to retrieve the location of a gene splicer crucial to crop-growing in the deserts. Theo is forced deeper into Terrence's organisation."
The threads of a well-paced series are coming together slowly. Everclear, Ben's new interrogation technique which effectively reads people's minds, is trialled by Spiga on an Inazagi employee (Mr Brill) who knows the location of Sanjay Mirage, a gene splicer in Inazagi custody who can provide a method of effectively growing crops in deserts. With this technology, Spiga could topple Inazagi. Eventually, the location of Sanjay is uncovered and a team assembled, with Ben using Mr Brill to prepare safe passage for himself and Elena, and Hendrick to help remove any memory of his past as Aaron!
Speaking of Elena though, Julian's investigation into Caplan's disappearance led to two more game-changing moments. Firstly, his belief that all these odd occurrences creating a 40th floor vacancy benefit Ben more than anyone, which puts him at the top of Julian's suspect pool. And secondly, a brief meeting between Ben and Elena, who is now aware Ben is working to free her from her sex slave role.
Laura's conscience led her into trouble: directly after her flashback episode revealing how she was traumatised in the Red Zones, a visit to another Red Zone leads to her kidnap, but a surprise twist has her agreeing to perform duties as a doctor for the bad guy after she sympathises with him.
This was just a well-timed episode: nearly everything that has occurred in the last 6 episodes was strung together in a way that opens up a stunning end to the first season: a Spiga-Inazagi war just as Ben's efforts to rescue Elena begin to crumble. How this will all pan out I cannot predict.
Frustratingly, Theo's plot remains largely on the outside, but whether it will marry up near the end is another question. Props to the guest star from Peter Outerbridge.
VIEWERS: 0.499m
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.14
(Solid ticks upwards - great for the show)
(Solid ticks upwards - great for the show)
VERDICT: This was just very, very good writing, bringing together everything so far in what will be looked back on as the game-changing episode of the season. 9/10
As things heat up in Incorporated, it's becoming every man for themselves. I've referred to Aaron as his alias Ben for most of these write-ups, but today it really was Ben and Ben alone. With Hendrick's help, the Aaron personality, the one set on rescuing Elena from the company he infiltrated, was removed, leaving the fake Ben. And without the purpose, without the at least understandable goal of rescuing his loved one at any cost, the shell that is Ben becomes another boring character on the outside of this main storyline, although it was fun seeing him discover that he was the one to have killed Roger. The alias becomes the reality, and the alias is not actually that nice of a person.
But neither is Aaron. He's already killed Roger, and now, in order to ensure Hendrick returns his original Aaron personality, he blackmails him, giving him just days to return him to Aaron before Hendrick's real identity is leaked to Spiga.
And in another shocking twist, following Laura's continued work at her clinic and Julian's lingering suspicions about Ben, we learn that Julian and Goran know each other when Julian turns to him for help. Suddenly Laura is in a very vulnerable position - just as Aaron's endgame is approaching, Spiga are about to go to war with Inazagi and Theo is heading into the Green Zone after impressing with his fighting skills.
Colour me very, very excited.
VIEWERS: 0.409m
Incorporated - 1x08 "Operational Realignment"
"With his real Aaron personality removed, Ben passes the Everclear test but Julian remains suspicious and turns to an old friend for help. Laura continues her work with her clinic. Theo continues to fight to get into the Green Zone."
As things heat up in Incorporated, it's becoming every man for themselves. I've referred to Aaron as his alias Ben for most of these write-ups, but today it really was Ben and Ben alone. With Hendrick's help, the Aaron personality, the one set on rescuing Elena from the company he infiltrated, was removed, leaving the fake Ben. And without the purpose, without the at least understandable goal of rescuing his loved one at any cost, the shell that is Ben becomes another boring character on the outside of this main storyline, although it was fun seeing him discover that he was the one to have killed Roger. The alias becomes the reality, and the alias is not actually that nice of a person.
But neither is Aaron. He's already killed Roger, and now, in order to ensure Hendrick returns his original Aaron personality, he blackmails him, giving him just days to return him to Aaron before Hendrick's real identity is leaked to Spiga.
And in another shocking twist, following Laura's continued work at her clinic and Julian's lingering suspicions about Ben, we learn that Julian and Goran know each other when Julian turns to him for help. Suddenly Laura is in a very vulnerable position - just as Aaron's endgame is approaching, Spiga are about to go to war with Inazagi and Theo is heading into the Green Zone after impressing with his fighting skills.
Colour me very, very excited.
VIEWERS: 0.409m
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.15
(A significant loss in viewers is offset by an improved demo share.)
(A significant loss in viewers is offset by an improved demo share.)
VERDICT: After a game-changing episode, the pieces are moved into place ready for all-out war. Some surprises add to the suspense. 8/10
In the first of Incorporated's two-part finale, the payoff we've all been waiting for finally occurs as Ben is promoted to the fortieth floor. That's not for lack of suspicion on Julian's part, and the episode ended with Ben being ambushed in his home - by Spiga? This after a lengthy journey, internally and literally, to show Ben that he is really Aaron, leading to him re-uploading his original identity.
Laura is rocked by the truth that her mother Elizabeth killed her father because he defected, not because he was kidnapped, and is ordered to shut down her Red Zone clinic. This after Spiga's failed attempt to retrieve Dr. Maraj forced Elizabeth to order a drone strike that wiped out Maraj, the Spiga retrieval team and the Inazagi forces trying to recover their asset. Daaaaaamn.
But that's not all. After all the security breaches, Spiga are cleaning house in Arkadia, meaning Ben/Aaron's promotion could not have come at a better time: it's now or never if he wants to save Elena, and with Theo about to head to a Green Zone fight a feisty ending is in sight.
Unfortunately, that loyalty didn't quite translate into real-life, as Ben used his extraction deal with Inazagi man Phillip Brill to secure a future for Hendrick and his daughter in exchange for the Everclear technology.
The surprisingly low-intensity finale then did away with the current threads and introduced new ones: Elena refused to escape with Ben/Aaron because she and a "maid" were trying to bring down Spiga themselves and considered using Ben as an asset (a very cool and unexpected twist, although Elena has not once been made out to be the damsel in distress Ben/Aaron has imagined, and now I don't trust her at all); Theo's Green Zone fight (aesthetically pleasing having taken place in a shallow pool) went wrong and led to him giving up Ben Larson as an asset to Terrence in order to save his boyfriend's life; and Laura defied Elizabeth by warning her not to interfere with her Red Zone clinic; whilst as Ben and Laura moved into their new home, Laura was revealed to be finally pregnant.
The episode did well in setting Ben and Laura up into a new life that will span a potential second season, whilst muddying the relationships between Red and Green Zone characters enough that the second season will have plenty to fight for.
VIEWERS: 0.547m (1x09) & 0.409m (1x10)
Incorporated - 1x09 "Burning Platform" & 1x10 "Golden Parachute"
"Ben struggles to comprehend that he is really Aaron. Spiga's hand is forced when extracting Dr. Sanjay Maraj doesn't go according to plan. "
In the first of Incorporated's two-part finale, the payoff we've all been waiting for finally occurs as Ben is promoted to the fortieth floor. That's not for lack of suspicion on Julian's part, and the episode ended with Ben being ambushed in his home - by Spiga? This after a lengthy journey, internally and literally, to show Ben that he is really Aaron, leading to him re-uploading his original identity.
Laura is rocked by the truth that her mother Elizabeth killed her father because he defected, not because he was kidnapped, and is ordered to shut down her Red Zone clinic. This after Spiga's failed attempt to retrieve Dr. Maraj forced Elizabeth to order a drone strike that wiped out Maraj, the Spiga retrieval team and the Inazagi forces trying to recover their asset. Daaaaaamn.
But that's not all. After all the security breaches, Spiga are cleaning house in Arkadia, meaning Ben/Aaron's promotion could not have come at a better time: it's now or never if he wants to save Elena, and with Theo about to head to a Green Zone fight a feisty ending is in sight.
*
Dream fake-outs are a bit lame, but simulation fake-outs can be terrific. As it is, "Burning Platform" wrapped up its lead-in cliffhanger of Ben being kidnapped in his own home by revealing it to be a Spiga simulation designed to test his loyalty, a test Ben passed after allowing Inazagi to shoot Laura dead before him rather than give up Everclear.Unfortunately, that loyalty didn't quite translate into real-life, as Ben used his extraction deal with Inazagi man Phillip Brill to secure a future for Hendrick and his daughter in exchange for the Everclear technology.
The surprisingly low-intensity finale then did away with the current threads and introduced new ones: Elena refused to escape with Ben/Aaron because she and a "maid" were trying to bring down Spiga themselves and considered using Ben as an asset (a very cool and unexpected twist, although Elena has not once been made out to be the damsel in distress Ben/Aaron has imagined, and now I don't trust her at all); Theo's Green Zone fight (aesthetically pleasing having taken place in a shallow pool) went wrong and led to him giving up Ben Larson as an asset to Terrence in order to save his boyfriend's life; and Laura defied Elizabeth by warning her not to interfere with her Red Zone clinic; whilst as Ben and Laura moved into their new home, Laura was revealed to be finally pregnant.
The episode did well in setting Ben and Laura up into a new life that will span a potential second season, whilst muddying the relationships between Red and Green Zone characters enough that the second season will have plenty to fight for.
VIEWERS: 0.547m (1x09) & 0.409m (1x10)
DEMOGRAPHIC SHARE: 0.23 (1x09) & 0.16 (1x10)
(A vast difference from penultimate to finale, but those ratings bring Incorporated's season average up to a 0.16 demo share. Fingers crossed that will be enough for a season two!)
(A vast difference from penultimate to finale, but those ratings bring Incorporated's season average up to a 0.16 demo share. Fingers crossed that will be enough for a season two!)
VERDICT: Low-intensity (there was no Spiga-Inazagi war, unfortunately), but what a set-up if we get season 2. Finally we saw a significant amount of Elena beyond her service to the primary plotline. 8.5/10
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
N/A
Final thoughts
There we have it: the conclusion of Incorporated's ten-episode first season. Unfortunately, its ratings were a tad too low for a renewal, thus Incorporated is officially cancelled.
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