Summary
The most horrifying episode yet, “The Calling,” is cinematic and expansive. This is a real game changer of an installment, opening up the series to endless possibilities and a much greater story at play, one we are merely scratching the surface of to date.
We recap the Netflix series 1899 season 1, episode 5, “The Calling,” which contains spoilers.
Fans may be quietly gathering their own theories on what all this madness could mean, but in episode 5, “The Calling,” the writers open up this insanity even further, teasing an array of possibilities and ever-expanding mythology. This is the best episode yet, offering endless new mysteries while providing snippets of clues at the same time. There is a lot to unpack in this one, so let’s dive straight in.
1899 season 1, episode 5 recap
Maura wakes in the mountains. She heads towards an ominous looking building that we first saw in the show’s opening montage. Maura comes across a grave and a cross that has the words ‘wake up’ written across it. Next, Maura is dragged through the asylum and placed in a chair, where she is injected, just like in her previous nightmares. She awakens in the Kerberos‘ dining room, with Daniel beside her. He explains how they’ve locked the boy in a cabinet. This is exactly like when they originally found the boy on the Prometheus. History repeats itself once again. Maura goes to free him, but Eyk interjects, demanding to know why her name is on the Prometheus passenger list.
On the lower decks, Franz considers the gang’s options going forward. They may be three or four days away from New York. The act of mutiny carries the death penalty, and they might need to formulate a cover story for when they dock in America. Iben steps up, inferring that they must become the only survivors on the boat, so that their story is the only one that the authorities will hear. Tove fears her mother has lost the plot and she walks off. Talking to Krester, it is revealed that they planned to ditch their parents in America anyway. Tove thinks her mother is sick, hearing voices and killing boys. Krester won’t defect though, so the pregnant lady decides to switch sides on her own.
Tove visits Eyk’s army to help them stop her mother. She hears the boy banging from inside the cabinet. Maura goes to free the boy and is shot at. Daniel dives into the air to intercept the bullet. Suddenly time freezes. She takes the bullet out of the air and then frees the boy. Maura believes that the boy used the pyramid device to stop time. She flees the room with the boy and time begins once again. Eyk and his team look on in shock as Maura and the boy vanish in the blink of an eye. A siren comes to life on the ship. They worry what that perilous sound could indicate. But Eyk has more pressing matters, the Kerberos will run out of coal in the next two days, stranding them in the middle of the ocean. Daniel agrees, they need to take back control.
All the cabin doors are unlocked and the guests exit their rooms. The siren stops and a ticking noise takes its place. Certain guests seem hypnotized by this sound and march in unison out into the corridors. Yuk Je is mesmerized by the sound, as is Krester. The passengers march in a zombie-like state and begin to jump overboard. The guests that are not hypnotized try to stop the others, but it is no use. Yuk Je and Krester jump overboard, plummeting into the relentless sea. It’s a horrifying, yet cinematic sight to behold, endless passengers flinging themselves into the sea and the distraught onlookers watching as their loved ones perish.
Maura asks the boy for answers and he finally complies. He writes on a piece of paper ‘they are listening’ and whispers in her ear that he cannot tell her anything, she will have to ask the Creator. This opens up the possibilities for the whole journey being a game or a simulation, or even some The Truman Show type experiment. Your guess is as good as mine at this point. The first mate taps in more triangle buttons and Daniel runs off. These two characters both seem to know more about the setup than they are letting on.
The boy guides Maura into the tiled shaft, where he opens up a gateway using the magical beetle. Maura crawls through the shaft, bringing to mind those claustrophobic tunnels in Dark. She exits the portal and finds herself staring at that mysterious building once again. Looking back, the portal appears to be just a hole in the sky. She passes the grave and heads towards the building. Daniel chases after them and unlocks the gateway using his nifty device. He finds the boy in this mountainous world and states that he ‘shouldn’t have done this. It knows we’re here now.’ The boy retorts that ‘we’ve never made it this far. Maybe it will work this time.’ Daniel leaves the boy in this odd simulation and heads back to the ship to stop them from sinking it.
The remaining passengers fear that the hypnotic spell is contagious and begin to tie themselves up so that they won’t commit suicide like the other guests. We see Angel and Ramiro together, and the three French passengers gathering too. Olek is with Ling, whilst Franz sticks with the Danes. Another telegraph message comes through from the shipping company, stating that they need to sink the ship, like Daniel predicted.
Daniel heads for the futuristic machine room and starts tinkering with the cables. He pulls out a modern-day torch and tries to fix the machine, pressing buttons and keying in demands. He is spotted by a laborer, who grows suspicious of Daniel and his futuristic technology. They get into a fight and Daniel pleads with the stranger to let him go. He says that if he doesn’t stop the machine, everything will start all over again. Was the Prometheus just another test? Is each boat a separate simulation? Daniel manages to key in the right information and his attacker keels over.
1899 season 1, episode 5 ending – who is the Creator?
Maura enters the building, which appears to be an abandoned mental hospital. She comes face to face with her father in a replica of the room from her dreams. Maura asks her father a lot of questions, but he replies, stating that she is asking the wrong ones. Maura asks where her brother Ciaran is, before she is tied up and injected again. The vision ends and she wakes back on the Kerberos. She finds Eyk and reveals that Maura Franklin isn’t her birth name. She is actually a Singleton and the man who owns the fleet is Henry Singleton, her father. She thinks this is all some kind of experiment, created by her father.
Whilst explaining her attempts to find her missing brother four months earlier, the scarab beetle scurries into view. She traps it and uses it to open the portal, showing Eyk the gateway to another world. This time they are in Eyk’s vision. They head towards his burnt down house. Maura’s theory is that this is all just a dream or some experiment, it cannot be real. She questions her own memories and believes her father tampered with them to make her forget the truth. Eyk confesses to his own uncertainties. His name is down as the Captain of the Prometheus, but he doesn’t remember that either.
Daniel powers down the magical machine and the ticking stops. All the survivors gather on the deck. The first mate passes Eyk the message about sinking the ship. Daniel thinks they are ordering them to sink the Kerberos this time around, not the Prometheus.
In the final scene, Maura’s father is handed an encrypted message about Project Kerberos. He tells his subordinate to pass on a message: ‘he doesn’t have much more time. Bring me the boy.’ The father then walks around his fancy office, which is full of technological devices. He opens a curtain and looks over at a black pyramid in the distance. Black Sabbath’s The Wizard starts to play. Is Maura’s father the creator of this experiment? Is he The Wizard we should all fear?
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