Run continues to struggle keeping the rest of the pack in line. Xander’s plan isn’t going quite how he pictured it, as it turns out controlling a mermaid is harder than he thought. Maddie tries to reconnect with her mother.

So, after last week’s episode ended the way that I’d been expecting things to go for a while, it almost feels like that’s one whole section of the plot wrapped up, right? Well, yes and no. The awkward love triangle/rivalry-ish between Maddie and Ryn for Ben’s affections may have been put to bed (as it were) by the free-love solution they seem to have adopted, but there are complications. Turns out they didn’t ‘go all the way’ and whereas the idea is one they all find appealing, Ben is only too aware of the differences between mermaid mating and human mating, and that’s another obstacle they’re going to have to traverse together (though one suspects one they won’t mind so much). Of course, before that they have more pressing issues to deal with.

The pack are getting restless – more the females than the males, who seem happy to do as they’re told. Ryn’s struggle to control them is complicated by her increasing fondness for Ben and Maddie and – more important – the pack’s perception of this. Add in the ex-leader – now dubbed ‘Katrina’ by Xander – returning to throw her own brand of interference into the mix, and it’s all a powder keg just waiting for a match.

Speaking of Xander, turns out that he’s finding the hard way that striking a bargain with a mermaid isn’t all that easy, though in fairness it probably doesn’t help when you start from a position of having imprisoned them in the hold of your boat. At any rate, it’s fascinating to watch him and Ben working together on finding out exactly what the oil company is up to and how much damage they’re doing while knowing that each is holding back so much from the other. Ben especially is treading the fine line between protecting ‘Levi’ and looking out for his friend. One suspects this is another situation that won’t end well.

And Maddie goes to see her mother again and have a heart-to-heart. This leads to several revelations and Maddie doing something which has ‘ill-advised’ practically pulsating from it. Meanwhile her mother gets chance to become acquainted with Ryn, with all the comedy that brings as the show takes another opportunity at fish-out-of-water humour in a more obvious way than normal.

There’s a contrast of tones laced throughout which somewhat jar against one another – the light-hearted comedy and free-love scraping dissonantly against the threat and violence elsewhere. It’s certain a show that runs the full gamut and for an idea as apparently simple as ‘mermaids in the modern day’ it’s certainly showing no signs of running out of ideas anytime soon.

Verdict: As slippery as the creatures on which it’s based – every time you think maybe you have the show pinned down, it shoots off in another direction. 8/10

Greg D. Smith