Summary
An action-packed Episode 3 gets Gus a little closer to his destination, but not without some sacrifices.
Episode 3 of Sweet Tooth Season 3 is fittingly titled “The Pack”, which is just as well since it gives us some necessary backstory on Rosie Zhang and her wolf-hybrid babies.
Rosie is a new character in this season of Sweet Tooth and Kelly Marie Tran has thus far portrayed her in a rather inscrutable manner. As we see, she has a pretty good reason to be annoyed with her circumstances.
Mother Pupper
The early portions of “The Pack” are set in the past, approximately 132 days since the Crumble, at least according to a radio broadcast. Rosie is living in a trailer with her four hybrid children, all wolf pups who are closer to Bobby in terms of the balance between animal and human.
Rosie didn’t have a clue that children born after the Crumble would be hybrids. But she devoted herself to motherhood, allowing her dreams of being an artist to slip away. Clearly ostracized from the rest of the Zhang clan, she remains alone, which makes her susceptible to Helen’s manipulations.
When Helen arrives to tell Rosie her father is dead, she reveals herself to be an extremely callous woman. The glimmer of sentiment she shows the pups when she holds one of them immediately disappears when the kid bites her finger, drawing blood. Rosie can return to the family, but only if her children are muzzled, and the next thing we see they’re being loaded into the back of a truck in pet carriers.
Rosie is desperate enough to be accepted back into the family that she endures this. Being a bad mother evidently runs in the Zhang family.
A Ticking Clock
In the present day, Rosie and her brother-in-law, Tex, are on the hunt for Gus, Jepp, Wendy, Bear, and Singh, who’re all on their way to Nag’s Reef to procure a boat. Singh, proving himself a useful source of exposition in this season of Sweet Tooth, explains that Helen Zhang is using her complete control of the Southern territories to start a maternity ranch and recreate human births – ideally, before her daughter gives birth to another family hybrid.
Singh also cautions that the Doomsday strain of the Sick has massively reduced humanity’s potential lifespan. If Gus doesn’t get to the cave Thacker discovered in the next few days, there won’t be anybody left to save.
A Search Party
Up in Alaska, things aren’t going especially well. Birdie is still missing, and Siana can’t drum up enough support to mount a search party.
Birdie wasn’t especially well-liked thanks to her obsessive tendencies, and Alaska is about to enter a months-long night. Nobody wants to risk it. This is despite passionate pleas from Siana and Nuka, who reminds everyone that if they were missing, Birdie would be the first to look for them.
Everyone remains unmoved, though. Everyone, that is, except for Odell, who offers to help.
The Whale Song
The gang’s initial objective in Episode 3 is to get on a boat called Whale Song, which is leaving Nag’s Reef for Canada on its final voyage. When they get there, though, they discover the ship has already set sail, with the crammed-in passengers leaving only wreckage behind on the beach.
Luckily, a hippie type named Coral spots them and invites them to her place on the beach, where she has a radio they can use to contact the Whale Song, ultimately unsuccessfully. But she also has some plants potted in a rickety old rowboat outside, and the gang decides to fix the vessel up. It only needs to get them far enough into the water that they can catch the Whale Song.
The problem is that the boat is too small for everyone to fit in. This doesn’t occur to the kids, but it does occur to Jepp and Bear, who both think that it should be Singh who is left behind. Bear volunteers to distract the kids while Jepp “takes care” of Singh, but Singh knows what’s happening and is entirely unbothered. He reminds Jepp that in his vision, he and Gus are in the cave together, and Jepp is nowhere to be seen.
Sacrifices
Luckily the decision of who to leave behind is made for the group. Rosie and Tex arrive and open fire on Gus while everyone tries to get to the boat. It’s Bear and Wendy who’re willingly left behind, essentially sacrificing themselves to allow Gus, Jepp, and Singh to escape.
Rosie isn’t thrilled about losing Gus again, and she’s even less thrilled when she sets one of her dogs on Bear, who stabs it in the side to save herself. As the pupper bleeds out on the ground, Rosie knocks out Bear and takes her captive. Wendy is able to get away.
Episode 3 of Sweet Tooth Season 3 ends with the Whale Song coming into view, as Jepperd and Singh row enthusiastically toward it.
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