Dark Matter Season 2 Episode 2 Review: A Perfect World

Critic’s Rating: 4.1 / 5.0

4.1

If you’ve always wondered how this all began, today is your day. Dark Matter Season 2 Episode 2 gives us our first glimpse of the day Jason2 and pals discovered the box was reality. 

We were there for the celebration and to discover that Blair volunteered to be the first to take the trip, never to return.

And for those who wondered how in the heck people survive in new worlds, we got a taste of that when Jason and Daniela pawned their possessions to do it.

So, overall, we’re getting a much grander picture of the mechanics behind the story, and I think that’s a lot of fun.

But Dark Matter Season 2 Episode 1 didn’t spark much excitement around here, and I wonder if the time between seasons took you out of the equation. If so, that’s a shame. Creatively and philosophically, the series is firing on all cylinders. I’m all in.

So, if you have dropped by and made it this far, please consider saying hello. It would be nice to know I’m not just entertaining myself.

And, on with the show!

Daniela is still crashing out about what she did to one of the Jasons. Again, who can blame her? But keeping it bottled inside could be a death sentence. We saw the effects of mood on opening doors in the box, and it’s unpleasant.

Her family loves her. They have been through hell together. Who better to share how much it hurts to kill another version of a man you love? 

Everyone is always so careful to mind their feelings before choosing a door. And as the number of alternates expands, it becomes even more important to the story.

Lilac Wings Trumps Lavender Wings

Amanda believes the differences in the drug Ryan has created might make it easier to target worlds by tempering some brain activity that makes it particularly difficult. My guess is she’s speaking directly to things like what Daniela experienced in the box. 

Honestly, trying to keep up with all the scientific speak they drop makes my head spin. As much as I want to understand quantum theory and all of that juicy stuff, I can’t always grasp it.

For example, if the drug turns off the part of the pre-frontal cortex that generates consciousness, then how can you make a conscious decision to enter a world? See what I mean? Totally beyond me.

The ever-moving box as an art installation or whatever in the world Amanda and Ryan are in puts Ryan into overdrive. He’s unwilling to wait for more testing. He can’t trust the box will be available.

The reason? Because when Jason stepped out of the box and realized where he was, he was filmed. Seeing him makes Amanda believe that Jason never made it home. It’s both an incentive to try harder and a fear of being left behind again.

Amanda decided that sticking around by herself doesn’t work for her anymore, and she’s taking off with Ryan. Am I the only one who thinks they’re great together? They understand each other very well and have already built a mutual trust.

They don’t seem to have anything other than friendship on their minds, but I wouldn’t be opposed to it if they did. Part of that is because Jimmi Simpson and Alice Braga are just so damn appealing, full stop.

Two (or Three) Leighton Vances Are Better than One

The two Leightons are working together, and Leighton2 has come a long way since Leighton recruited him as a guru to help him recenter.

I would have expected it might take a little longer for Leighton2 to get up to speed. Instead, they are two halves of the same coin by the time they recruit Ryan2.

Leightons are popping up all over the damn place. As are Ryans. While the duo recruited Ryan in one world, Ryan was working with another to recreate Lavender Wings. He was pretty laid back and not in tune with Leighton2. 

Leighton3 isn’t interested in some “God-level shit,” aka building a technology treaty across worlds to create the perfect world. 

The logic there escapes me. Creating the perfect world? OK, I get it. But if Leighton3 thinks it’s God-level, would it impact the other worlds? What’s the point of creating a perfect world if you can still get to the other not-perfect worlds? And how does the technology treaty come into play?

It was weird that they chose to enact their plan in worlds that were on the brink, or already experiencing utter disaster. Does anybody have any ideas as to why that might be?

The Dessens Find a New World, and It’s Carissa’s Perfect World (Go Figure)

Time has marched on in the world Charlie asked for, but it has not advanced like our world or any of the others they’ve encountered so far.

If you told me I could have a world that held onto some of the things I loved from the past, I’d be running to get through that door. Oh, the irony that I make my living entirely online and the majority of my relationships are here, too, but if I had the chance, I’d change all that in a second.

In this world, JFK lost to Nixon, and Nixon defunded NASA; as we’ve seen on Apple’s other alternate-reality series, For All Mankind, humanity is spurred on by competition. Technology advances when we’re achieving something. And without space, computer technology didn’t follow.

It made me laugh to see Charlie process how he’s going to live without the tech he had hoped not to find. If we hadn’t visited the moon (and what a strange place to have gone to utterly change the trajectory of humanity on Earth), the physical world mattered more.

Until Daniela explained it to Charlie, it had never hit me how much of the physical world, the tactile world, has left us. When you visit a physical store to make a purchase, quality matters. You’re less likely to walk out with something made poorly than you are online.

Books, music… it all required effort. Did that make it more meaningful? What makes something intrinsically valuable is an age-old debate. But it seems like younger kids might be reaching for that, having never seen it before. 

Anyway, I digress, but it’s so easy to do with Dark Matter. Every door opens an entirely different world, and that’s not much different than life itself. Every choice leads you down a different path. It’s just fascinating to imagine.

Their new world brought back so many memories. Newspapers, searching for jobs in the classified ads. It was an entirely different world. It wasn’t easy to do anything, so, as mentioned above, achievements just felt more special.

Charlie asked if you could get any job without ID, and Jason’s first thought was, well, probably not a good one. But we never carried ID back in the day. It just wasn’t as important. Not because identity didn’t matter, but because there was less doubt in the fact that you were who you said you were.

That could be both good and bad for a family like the Dessens, who, for reasons I don’t fully understand, refuse to leave Chicago. Every character on this series stays put, knowing full well they are walking on the same path as others with their names and faces.

After Daniela was recognized, it made even less sense for Jason to ask for a background check for the family’s “new start.” We already know that dude is hunting for them from their world, and now Jason is using this new Mitchel MacNamara for PI-type work. 

You just know the worlds are going to collide at some point. It’s in his DNA to investigate, just like it’s in Jason’s to explore and Daniela’s to pursue art. 

Of course, Jason doesn’t know that, but the ease with which they are willing to share things about themselves in a town that has already housed a Dessen family drives me nuts!

He unwittingly set into motion the very thing he was hoping to avoid. MacNamara has questions, and he’ll look for answers.

It would have been a whole lot easier if Jason had not bothered to give any details about the family. If he had just requested new names and paperwork and hoped for the best. 

But Jason’s belief that things were going to be OK at least allowed him to tune into Daniela and ask how she was doing. Their plans to destroy the box were even better incentive to stay low and plan on getting out of Chicago once they no longer had that hanging over their heads.

With Daniela’s state of mind, it’s probably not the best time to take her away from everything that’s even a little bit familiar, but my own sense of dread is also on high alert.

Jason’s question, “Can we be us?” was more existential than simple. They are losing track of who they are. When you see the possibilities and encounter a constant barrage of where different choices led you, how could you not lose your sense of self?

Will Everyone Wind Up in the Perfect World?

Even though Ryan and Amanda only spent the night down the hall from Jason and Daniela and didn’t stick around to run into them, I get the feeling that world will be a magnet. 

It’s familiar but not too much, and it’s easier to disappear into it without technology. 

Ryan is still on the move, looking for home, but will he be satisfied there even when he finds his home again? As a scientist, once you see what’s out there, how easy would it be to turn back the clock?

Jason isn’t hoping to destroy the box because he doesn’t have that itch, but because he loves Daniela more than the itch and wants her to feel safe and secure (again, get the hell out of Chicago!). 

They cannot go home again. So the story must proceed in this world, especially if they destroy the box. Wherever Jason and Daniel are will be home base. So, it’s only a matter of time before others gather there long-term, right?

I’ve gone on far longer than anticipated. As I said, I love the possibilities now that Jason isn’t lost to his family and there aren’t 25 nefarious Jasons afoot.

But what about you? Digging the season so far? Was Dark Matter Season 2 too long after Dark Matter Season 1 for you to care?

If you do still care, what do you think about the possibilities ahead? What would “A Perfect World” look like to you? 

Drop your thoughts below!

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