Spoilers

War comes to the Halo.

The final fleshy piece of the puzzle drops into place in this barnstorming season finale. The Flood, the parasitic networked lifeform who are the secondary villains in the game series, arrive and do so with gristly, barbed style. Dennie Gordon’s direction is shot through with some delightful moments of black humour, none more so than the opening sequence. A chirpy musical interlude traces the Flood infection from the artefact Keyes, Halsey and Kwan Ha recovered last episode as it spreads across the ship. It’s a brutal sequence, and cleverly cuts between the microscopic spread of the Flood and the macroscopic violence it’s causing and Keyes realising just how much trouble everyone is in. The genius of it is even subtler though, when the action shifts to the bridge and you realise Parangosky doesn’t know. Yet.

This ticking time bomb drives the episode along and Shabana Azmi, always great, gets some incredible work to do as the Admiral complacently throws wave after wave of Spartan-IIIs to their deaths from what she thinks is a position of safety.

That rotten core is orbited by three stories which are Halo to their bones. Kwan Ha, Ackerson, Soren and Laera make their way through the guts of Parangosky’s ship,  fleeing from the Flood but also slowly realising what it is. Kwan Ha as a character has taken constant fire from some elements of the fandom but this episode gives her inarguable context and agency while adding something fascinating. The episode implies, heavily, that either humanity has faced the Flood before or that there’s another intelligence in the field, working through her. It’s a huge mystery, but it’s one that feels defined and explored here and I’d love to see more of it in season 3. Soren, Laera and Kessler too get major developments, and while I’m not thrilled about Laera being killed, it leaves Soren in a fascinating place. A Spartan. A father. But unsure if he can be both.

Halsey and Keyes’ plot also explores this family dynamic and is one of the episode’s most poignant beats. Halsey’s fascination, and admiration for, the Flood is as sincere as it is frightening and McElhone does great work here. But this plot is Olive Gray’s all the way as Miranda Keyes. Grieving her father, horrified by what she and her mother have done and horrified still further by how callously Halsey treats her. There’s a moment here where we, and she, realise Halsey has been infected that breaks you in two. The last words her mother says to Keyes are how disappointed she is in her, and then Keyes gathers herself and sets to work saving her mother’s life. It’s incredibly powerful stuff and again something I’d love to see more of in season 3.

Cristina Rodlo and Kate Kennedy, up next, get even more meaty stuff to play with. The orbital boarding assault is a catastrophe from the jump, because Parangosky always knew it would be. The fact they go anyway speaks to how trapped they feel, how brave they are, how little they matter. The fight that follows is brutal, relentless and gives Rodlo’s Perez arguably the most badass moment of the season. Dragged backways by Kai, a needler in each hand, a wound in her chest, buying her and her troops a second more. This episode is crammed full of action but this sequence is by far the best.

It’s also the one with the most emotional weight. Kai’s apparent sacrifice is some of Kate Kennedy’s best work. The bleak glacial calm she gives ‘This is gonna hurt’ as Kai drives a Covenant vessel through their capital ship is fantastic and tells us everything about where Kai is. One of the last Spartan-IIs left standing, comfortable, at last, doing the one thing she knows she’s best at. Not war, but saving the lives of her friends. I don’t believe for a second she’s dead. I hope she isn’t. But if she is, this is a hell of a way to go out.

Which brings us, at last, to the Master Chief. Pablo Schreiber has been doing great work all season as Chief but this episode he puts it all on the line. Betrayed, used and alone, the Chief is put in an impossible position and just refuses to lose. His rescue of Kai and Perez, seen as little more than an active energy blade as he slices his way through the literal fog of war is incredible. His pursuit and rescue of the ship Cortana is on is pure video game action hero. His brutal fight with Arbiter Var’Gatanai is a violent debate of ideas between two soldiers who’ve accepted their job is nowhere near as simple as they’ve been conditioned to believe. Schreiber’s soft-spoken, scarred cynic is revealed this episode to be a soft-spoken, scarred idealist. Chief isn’t fighting for his cause. He’s fighting for his friends, dead and alive and seeing him driven by that compassion is deeply powerful. Plus, his relationship with Cortana, played by Jen Taylor and Christina Bennington, is now one of equal partners. Likewise, Charlie Murphy’s Makee, still immensely compelling but frustratingly out of reach. In season 3, that looks set to change. She, Cortana and the Chief are the first three on the Halo and as the season closes and the colossal machine wakes up, we and they realise they aren’t alone. Guilty Spark 343, played by genre stalwart Harry Lloyd, steps across from the games to the show with soft-spoken charm very much intact. An AI Monitor, left behind by the creators of the Halo, Guilty Spark 343 isn’t on anyone’s side. Yet.

Verdict: This show has been a lightning rod for criticism from the get go and it finishes its second run, to my mind, answering every single one of those criticisms. This entire season has been confident, assured, often clever storytelling. It’s balanced Powered Armour Action with character and a welcome expansion of the mythos. If, as so many seem to have sometimes, you wrote this off early then consider coming back. If you didn’t, I hope you enjoyed the ride as much as I did and are looking forward to season 3 as much as I am. 10/10

Alasdair Stuart