Powers: "Level 13" Review

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April 22, 2015

Warning: Full spoilers for the episode follow…

Penned by Powers creator Brian Michael Bendis himself, “Level 13” brought the show back to where it previously displayed its best work – creeping around The Shaft with the sole focus of dealing, one way or another, with Wolfe. And to make this episode even more appealing, it was all spread out over a week – with time jumps back and forth between the planning stages of the sting/heist and the execution.

Walker had to balance on a thin rope here, purposefully giving Royalle enough “honest” information so as to earn his trust. But then he went and did the same exact over-sharing thing with his own team. Coming “clean” about wanting to get his powers back in order to throw them off his actual side plan of…getting his powers back. Something that his own team was wise to, causing them to drop in a Wolfe decoy at the last second. A nice twist.

Was it predictable that the entire thing went sideways? Sure. Just like last week’s big, deadly PR debacle. Despite the fact that Walker told Krispin that he had “no idea it would go sideways.” But us viewers knowing that everything was most likely going to go to s*** added suspense. Plus, this was the penultimate Season 1 episode. There was no way Wolfe wasn’t going to somehow get set free. Even though doing so made this show feel like it sort of only has one exciting card to pull.

Still, this was Royalle’s best/most interesting stuff to date. He and Walker both had to come together just enough to make their scheme work, while still keeping enough secrets so they could betray each other right at the end. And it’s fitting that both of them wound up failing. Walker wound up “click click”ing the drainer beam onto Royalle, but Simons wound up freeing Wolfe down on the ominously-named Level 13.

And a much more civilized Wolfe emerged this time around. Complete with wonky-looking “Sway-sucking” effects. No, there were no blood baths this time. Just cold stare downs. Enough to make Pilgrim lower her weapon and back off while Wolfe siphoned Walker. Is Wolfe the “Black Swan” scenario that Triphammer fears (and that the show danced around again right when it was on the cusp of fully explaining the scenario)? Or will it be Calsita, who’s now out of jail but still null and void on the superpower front? There’s now only one more episode left to answer that, as well as the proper reveal of whoever killed Jumpstriker.