Summary
More about the nature of the Sick is explained in “Here, There Be Monsters”, and a compelling conundrum is beginning to present itself.
Episode 5 of Sweet Tooth Season 3 ended with the bombshell revelation that the Caribou Man was a hybrid – one much older than Gus. That means, of course, that Gus was not the first hybrid at all, contrary to popular belief, and Episode 6, “Here, There Be Monsters”, opens with a brief flashback about this new wrinkle.
The Caribou Man, whose Iñupiaq name is Munaqsriri, is the son of Ikiaq and Thacker’s First Mate, Burke. He has been in Alaska since Thacker’s expedition, the first hybrid created from the Blood of the Earth. For a long time, he was the only one. “The world is not ready for you yet,” his mother coos to him. Talk about an understatement – they’re not ready for him a century later either.
The Reunion
In the present day, the injured Munaq takes Gus back to the church where Birdie is, and finally, after almost three full seasons, Gus is reunited with his mother.
The only issue is that Munaq warns Gus away from the cave, and when he later explains his logic, Birdie thinks he might be right.
Ticking Clock
In the meantime, the countdown to the polar night is causing all kinds of stress among the survivors back at the outpost. Bear and Wendy are trying to navigate the storm, while Jepp and Siana are hiding from Zhang’s men. Thanks to her kids, Rosie has a lead on Gus’s location, but the ticking clock means that if they don’t find him soon, months-long night will descend over everything, making the search almost impossible.
Oh, and Ginger is liable to give birth at any moment.
But Dr. Singh believes he has the solution. The one detail of his shared dream with Gus that he has kept very close to his chest is him wielding a knife covered in blood. Based on Thacker’s journal, he has deduced that sacrificing Gus in the cave will undo what Thacker did, cure the Sick, and eradicate the hybrids.
Humanity is the Disease, The Sick is the Cure
Munaq has a pretty compelling case for humanity being the problem rather than the Sick.
Munaq, as the only hybrid, has been ostracised his entire life. Through a brief biography tattooed by Ikiaq on a walrus tusk, Gus and Birdie are able to get a sense of what Munaq’s life has looked like, and it wasn’t pleasant. Thacker’s greed gave birth to the Sick, and to him. After his mother’s death, he was treated like an animal. His antlers were shorn. Humanity showed him the worst of itself.
Thacker violated the Earth, drank its blood, and people vilified the outgrowth of his ambition. Munaq understandably believes that humanity is a blight on the Earth and that its extinction is not just inevitable but desirable. Human beings are the disease. The Sick is the cure.
Gus doesn’t believe this, but then again he wouldn’t. He’s a child. He’s hopelessly naïve and idealistic. Birdie, though, sees the logic. Munaq dies holding her, imagining she’s his mother.
Jepp Gives A Speech
Jepp hasn’t been much of a talker throughout Sweet Tooth, but he gets his big moment in Episode 5.
The people who live in the outpost are furious with him, and with Siana for inviting him into their midst and, by their logic, bringing Zhang and her cronies with him. They refuse to work together to prevent Zhang from using the outpost’s remaining power to charge up an old oil driller nicknamed “The Beast”, which she will use to drain whatever she finds in the cave.
But Jepp sees himself in the people who want him gone. He recalls how he isolated himself after the Crumble, and began to fight only for himself. But he also recounts how Gus has changed his viewpoint and showed him that the real value is in fighting alongside others, for others. That’s what a better world looks like. The speech is a hit.
At that moment Bear and Wendy arrive, so the gang is almost back together at this point. They’re ready to take the fight to Zhang to stop her from reaching the cave.
Sweet Tooth Season 3 Episode 6 ends with Birdie and Gus realizing that the tusk is also a map to the cave, so they set out together to find the place once and for all. But just as they’re about to leave, someone starts knocking on the door.
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