Debris S01E06: Supernova

© NBC

Bryan and Finola realize something is up.
by Chuck Duncan

Guest Cast: Paloma Kwiatkowski, Dylan Colton, Cardi Wong, Siddhartha Minhas

There was a lot going on in this week's episode of Debris, so let's get right in to it.

The Debris

Bryan and Finola uncover a new debris phenomena -- reverse aging. A young couple was spotted leaving a cabin and inside were the desiccated bodies of three missing elderly people. Oddly, the bodies are surrounded by an electrostatic field with enough power to charge a cell phone. When another elderly man goes missing, the team must spring into action but they still don't know exactly what they're looking for.

The young couple are now accompanied by two other young men and they are doing something that involves the young woman Hula Hooping as her partner backs away from her. But at 237 feet, she tells him to stop and she drops the hoop. Her partner says they need more people but for what we don't yet know. He then spies an old man on a bench and chats him up, learning the man feels deserted by his kids, left there to die alone. The young man says he can help so the man, Subash, goes with him.

In the woods, the young man gives Subash a piece of the debris and he instantly becomes young again. But it's not long before Bryan, Finola and the team find them. They see the two other young men going to a car but a chase ensues with Bryan tackling one of the men, asking what he's done with Caspian and the other missing elderly people. The man says he is Caspian and Bryan has to let him go or he'll die. Finola chases the other man but he suddenly drops to the ground and ages rapidly, looking like one of the corpses back at the cabin.

It's clear now that the debris reverses the aging process but only if you are within a certain radius of the debris. What the young couple, identified as Kurt and Clara, have learned is that the more people they can change, the farther away from the debris they can be so they want to revert all the old people back to their younger selves. Bryan and Finola learn that Kurt took his wife of more than 50 years from a nursing home. She was in the end stages of dementia. He just wanted her back because he didn't feel it was fair that right at the time you are just figuring out how to enjoy life, you're in no condition to enjoy it.

A scientist with the team believes he can forward the aging process again at a slower pace to the proper ages of those affected by the debris, but he needs the debris. Bryan reaches out to Kurt, and Kurt tells him that they are going to turn themselves in, but when they get to the location all they find is the debris and a walkie talkie that Kurt has rigged to pass the signal to his own. Not wanting to face their true present, Kurt and Clara walk off into the forest to die together.

Bryan & Finola

© NBC

On their plane, Bryan and Finola have a chat and she brings up her father, telling Bryan how he was in Greece the year before he died, and how he'd buy himself a birthday present he wanted and then give it to her to give to him, acting surprised when he opened it. But she never knew what the last gift was. After their chat, Finola called her boss Ferris who instructed Finola to feed Bryan more information about her father if he asked. Meanwhile, Bryan talks to his boss Maddox who wants to know if Finola's father was in Malta or Cyprus. Bryan reveals what Finola has told him so far, and Maddox wants more.

Later, Bryan gets a call from a team ... inside Finola's apartment going through her emails. They want more specific information from her about her father as well, on Maddox's orders. Bryan is not thrilled he's being used like this but later he tries to casually bring up Finola's father again which raises some red flags with her. She finally asks why Bryan wants to know why he's asking these questions and he finally admits to her that George is alive. She says she knows. And she knows that he and Maddox have known for some time, but why bring it up now? Bryan tells her about the security footage he saw of George at the airport with an Influx agent, and then he admits Maddox wanted him to get as much information from her as he could. But can he trust her with this information?

Before Bryan talked to Kurt about surrendering themselves, he was given something to inject into his arm. What was it? After failing to find Kurt and Clara, Finola tells Bryan she can trust him. It took her quite a while to finally reach that conclusion for herself. She also reveals to him that Ferris ordered her to feed Bryan the information about her father in Greece, and Bryan feels that Ferris is leaving a trail of breadcrumbs for Maddox to find something, but what? Finola says she can't trust Ferris, and Bryan can't trust Maddox because MI6 suspects he's been working against the coalition, most likely with the Chinese. This upsets Bryan and he says she's wrong because Maddox saved his life (from what we don't know but could it have something to do with that injection?). And then Bryan tells her that the CIA is surveilling her apartment.

Maddox

Maddox has Anson Ash in a cell after his capture in New York, and now gets to interrogate him. Ash isn't all that cooperative but he tells Maddox that the debris is meant to free the world, not entrap it. Maddox doesn't seem thrilled that Ash and Influx just want to put all of this alien technology out into the world for anyone to use. Because what could go wrong? Maddox tries to get information about George Jones, asking if Ash used the debris to reanimate George's body. And do they have him, and is he being tortured? Ash refuses to answer.

Maddox learns that several calls have come in to Ash's cell phone, all from Maine. Now they just have to find out who is calling. Meanwhile, Maddox has another secret meeting with Tarkolov who tells him they will give him what he wants later that night. Maddox is taken to a hotel where he meets a Russian woman -- obviously someone he's done business with in the past -- and she shows him some pieces of debris. He tells her to turn it on, and he drops an Inception spinny top above the debris and it hovers, spinning in place. He's happy. The woman says she knows Maddox has stronger pieces of debris than these to access communication frequencies -- huh?! -- so why does he want these pieces? Because they work, he says. She says this whole transaction method is unusual for him, working with Tarkolov, and she hopes he knows what he's doing. Maddox tells her she worries too much.

So another good episode this week that deepens the mystery with Maddox, but finally gets Bryan and Finola on the same page. The debris phenomena storyline was fine but it really took a back seat to what seems to be a deep conspiracy within both the CIA and MI6. And while Ferris may at least be within the jurisdiction of MI6, Maddox definitely seems like a lone wolf at this point, his actions definitely not sanctioned by the CIA. So what is he up to? We'll have to stay tuned to find out.