The Big O Showtime: Day of the Advent

Today's episode begins with something crashing into Paradigm City. Given all the weird science we've seen on this show it could be anything, but the first theory that pops up is that it's an angel. Yes, an angel. At least that that's what the people outside the domes think, Paradigm Group showed up and Roswelled the thing away before anybody could get a good look at it. Roger is hired by an old Irishman with an albino granddaughter to go get it back because he believes it will bring them salvation from their memory-less hell. Roger, atheist that he is, doesn't believe for a second that what fell is actually an angel, much less that it'll bring anyone salvation. But he's a sucker for cute little girls so he takes the case anyway.

It was an angel!
Or my name isn't Seamus O'Reilly McFinnegan O'Brien!

This idea of the fallen object being an angel is fascinating. It was established back in Episode 11 that the Event wiped out religion in Paradigm, so there is this spiritual emptiness to the city. It makes sense that the people outside the domes, the poor and homeless, would start a spiritual cult. The lower class is traditionally the first to turn religion in times of crisis because their lives already suck. And start a cult they do with people dressing in angel robes, creating effigies, holding sermons, the whole shebang. They eagerly await the rest of the angel to descend. This is nice worldbuilding, because it reminds us of the wealth disparity in Paradigm and emphasizes what a miserable place it is outside the domes.

On top of that, it's also fascinating because of the religious symbolism the show likes to occasionally indulge in. We already have megadeus and titan as names for giant robots and kaiju, each with their own religious connotations, so what could the angel be? I wonder too if the choice to make Roger's client Irish (in the dub at least) was deliberate given the stereotype of the Irish as zealous Catholics. Because there is no Catholicism in Paradigm, his faith had to be transferred to something else and the fallen object was the first thing because Paradigm offered no alternative. Just thinking out loud there. The Irishman says the fallen object revealed a Memory to him and that's how he knows it's angel but we'll get back to that.

More after the jump,
Roger investigates one of Paradigm's facilities with Angel (she just showed up as usual) and discovers the Lovecraftian divers from Episode 7. Man, Episode 7 keeps coming back a lot. He and Angel infiltrate the facility to find the three foreign megadeuses Roger destroyed back in the season opener. We also learn the divers work for Paradigm Group and therefore Rosewater the Younger. Wanting to know what's up, they head to Paradigm HQ to find the only people there are Rosewater and Alan Gabriel. Rosewater confirms that Angel was fired. Hey, I'm good at guessing here.

Yep, totally an angel.

Now this is where things get interesting. Rosewater villain monologues to Roger and says he knew the angel would fall because of the Memory disc Alan Gabriel stole last episode. He also shows Roger the fallen object, calling it a man-made star. We would call this a satellite. And the rest of it is about to fall annihilating everything outside the domes. The fact that the characters don't know what a satellite is would be strange enough but a phrase has been heard throughout this episode has been stranger. The phrase "Memory of the future". This really confused me at first, it sounds like an oxymoron, but thankfully Rosewater explains. Using the Memory disc as an example, he says he knew the satellite would fall because some event in the past allowed to him to extrapolate future events. Like Asimov's psychohistory I guess. Or, going back to my theory that Paradigm is a giant unknowing performance piece, Rosewater has the script.

Let's see Roger read at the table after whip this out!

Brief digression. The Irishman said the fallen object revealed a Memory to him and Roger also used that phrase "Memory of the future" to describe what he saw. So if he too saw the satellite falling out of the sky, it would verify that the Memories were of future events and ad credence to my script idea above. And knowing that these people don't what satellites are, it would also explain why he thought it was an angel. With no frame of reference for what it actually was, the Irishman correlated the burning hunk of the satellite to something else aflame falling out of the sky.

Anyway, Rosewater mocks Roger as impotent in stopping the falling satellite and sits back to watch the show, knowing it's too late to evacuate all the people who'd be killed by the impact. To which Roger responds by getting in Big O and punching the falling satellite so hard it explodes. Rosewater, defeated, compliments Roger on defying the Memory but it's clear his plan is undeterred. He also questions what makes Roger worthy of being a Dominus. Right now I'm assuming that just means Pilot of a Big megadeus, which we've seen have degrees of sapience, but it sounds important enough to mean more.

The Anime version of The Andromeda Strain is much cuter.

Dorothy also has a bit of a subplot this Episode that ties in with the theme of the show. Remember how I said the Irishman had an albino granddaughter? Well being albino means she can't go outside without getting sick, so she's forced to play inside in the dark by herself. Dorothy comes in later during the Irishman's sermon and is the only one to notice the albino girl. They bond over their pale skin and after Roger explodes the satellite, they play outside (it's the middle of the night) in it's warm glowing, raining debris. Debris which is probably radioactive and covered in space bacteria, but that'd ruin the moment. Seeing Dorothy and his granddaughter playing, the Irishman says to himself that this moment of playing outside in the golden snow is the actual angel. This plays into the theme because it reflects the same attitude Roger accepted back in Episode 15. Which is that it doesn't matter what happened in the past or where you're going, who you are now is all that matters. We can see that here when the Irishman realizes that they didn't need salvation from outside to give them a better future, they can find purpose now from within by living in the moment. Or maybe I'm just talking out of my ass.

That's all I've got for this episode. The thing I most want to see is what Rosewater is going to do now that Roger's dealt him a tangible defeat. As I said, it's clear his mysterious plan is still moving forward but perhaps now he'll be more aggressive or try to hamper Roger and Angel in some way. Only time will tell.