The Frost triplets have a proposition for the Underground – grab Doctor Campbell and end the Hound programme for good. Campbell’s presence at an anti-mutant summit presents the perfect opportunity, but how much havoc will the triplets wreak in the Underground’s ranks on the way?

As the show moves towards its conclusion, you might be forgiven for thinking that the writers have run out of stakes to raise – our heroes have engaged in increasingly difficult and dangerous operations and already one of them lies dead as a result of their tangles with Sentinel Services and Doctor Campbell. But the introduction of the Frost triplets and their agenda has radically altered the game, and this episode shows it.

The plan – such as it is – revolves around grabbing an attendee of the convention and inserting several of the team as his security detail to get inside and grab Campbell. It’s an audacious scheme, and it involves the use of not just the triplets, but the considerable resources at their disposal. From the first introduction of Esme, it’s been clear that there are layers to the character (and by extension that of her sisters) and that she and they will use any and all means to pursue their goals. For some of the mutants, this is as simple as stoking their anger, or poking at secrets they thought to hide. For others, it’s impressing the Underground members with the quality of resources and depth of pockets that might be available to them should they follow a different path. Sometimes, it’s a combination, but one by one, the triplets are always testing the boundaries of those around them, making for tension in every shot in which they appear.

The convention itself gives the show another opportunity to not-so-subtly take a swipe at real life and current events – watching the attendees, some of them very young, the Mutants are struck by how happy and normal these people all seem to be as they gather in their little symposium of hatred.

Meanwhile, the Struckers have their own issues to address – firstly, that Reed’s mother is being targeted by Sentinel as a possible link to Otto and his research (or rather the gaps in what Campbell has recovered of it). Secondly, the increasing divide between Andy and Lauren, the former far more sympathetic to the aims and methods of the Frosts than the latter. It’s a confrontation that’s been threatening for a while, and with two such powerful individuals, it’s one that could be explosive.

Of course, it’s the exploitations in the heist part of the episode that are the meat of it – there are too many holes in the heist plan itself (not the least of which being why go so elaborate in the way in which security is avoided when it’s already been demonstrated that the triplets together are capable of serious feats of mind control) and Campbell’s own actions at certain points undermine the point the episode tries to make elsewhere about the character being more three-dimensional than he at first appeared. Then again, this shouldn’t be a surprise – this show is always at its strongest when dealing with interpersonal conflict and small-scale divide between people, but generally it gets the big set pieces right too – here, not so much.

Verdict: There’s nothing to fault here by the general standards of comic book TV – we get good, tense interplay between various characters and excellent use of different viewpoints. It’s just a shame that by the loft standards of this show in particular, certain elements of the plotting are a little sub-par. That said, this is still a strong penultimate episode, and sets things up nicely for the finale. 8/10

Greg D. Smith