Summary
Dark Matter finally picks up some pace in the penultimate episode, with several Jasons coming face to face and the stakes finally rising.
Okay, fine, I’ll give Dark Matter this – Episode 8, “Jupiter”, is pretty decent. It feels like the chickens coming home to roost on a narrative level and the show finally making good on its concept of multiple realities and versions of the same person. With Jason having made it back home in Episode 7, he finally comes face to face with Jason2, who might not be the only Jason he has to worry about after all.
It still isn’t perfect, of course. I still don’t care very much about any of it, but on a superficial entertainment level, I started to see the appeal here. A little bit, anyway.
Jason-on-Jason Violence
“Jupiter” begins with some Jason-on-Jason violence, which introduces the idea that there aren’t just two of them to worry about. While it should have been obvious to anyone who has thought about the concept a little, there are infinite Jasons, and they all think they’re the original. Nobody wants to be Jason2, do they?
Episode 8 does an okay job of relaying this idea to the audience by having Jason2 and another Jason discuss it outright. It reiterates that Jason2 is the villain by having him kill versions of himself without really paying it much mind. We already knew he was a crazy narcissist, but this is taking it to something of an extreme.
Daniela and Jason Reunite
One person who definitely knew Jason2 was a crazy narcissist is Daniela, who has been putting the pieces together for quite some time that her husband isn’t who he says he is. When the sudden arrival of a new mechanic Ryan only adds a new layer of suspiciousness to the whole thing, Daniela returns to the storage unit.
Inside, she finds pictures of her, Charlie, and Jason, and money in various currencies. It’s not looking good when she gets a call from jail to bail Jason out of custody. The real Jason deliberately got himself arrested by smoking a cigar indoors (a baller move, to be fair) so that he could have a one-on-one with Daniela without Jason2 getting involved.
Daniela is understandably suspicious, but Jason proves his point by having her call his doppelganger and set him up with a fake memory. Jason2 tries to dutifully play along with his wife’s desire to revisit an old holiday destination, not realizing that they’ve never actually been there.
Daniela and Jason agree to meet later, and the episode’s title, “Jupiter”, is the code phrase they agree on so that Jason can identify himself as the “real” version.
On the Run
By the end of Dark Matter Episode 8, Daniela, Charlie, and Jason are all on the run from several other Jasons, including Jason2, who Daniela has pushed down the basement stairs.
To tell you the truth, I have no idea how many Jasons there are at this point. I suspect nobody does, and I also suspect that the finale will utilize this gimmick to its fullest extent. But at least the show’s finally exciting!
Well, maybe exciting is a strong word, but it’s at least better and pacier than it has been for several episodes. That feels about right as we head into the finale, and hopefully, it can sustain this newfound momentum and stick the landing.
Fingers crossed, anyway.
Read More: Dark Matter Ending Explained
