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Paramount Plus

Season One Episode Eight

Allegiance

John and Makee come to terms with their shared vision. Halsey has one last chance to save her mission, and herself. As things come to a head, everyone must choose a side.

After their rendezvous in the mindspace, Master Chief returns to Makee and takes her away from her room to bring her somewhere else on Reach. At the same time, Cortana and Halsey are watching his movements. After displaying violent behavior and a hidden Covenant weapon on her, the fact that she is not in a guarded cell is beyond rational thought.

At the same time, Parangosky and Keyes continue to conspire behind the scenes as they watch as well. It’s a nonsensical scene that attempts a level of tension that it hasn’t earned because there has been no stakes created for the release of their secret. As Chief continues to connect with Makee, another Covenant attack prompts him to attempt to get Makee to help them. Everything about this feels rushed for no reason other than to get to the action.

Makee’s motivations have not changed and there is no indication that they should. In order to this sequence of events to work, both veteran intelligence and military officers have to shut down any part of their brain that utilizes logic. Kai is embracing her newfound emotions and seems to be one of the only characters on the series that is having some development and growth that is interesting.

Master Chief goes to visit Makee in her room again and what follows is something both bizarre and completely unnecessary to the point of being creepy. There is literally nothing that leads up to this moment, no dialogue or anything that would or should indicate any kind of intimacy that would justify it. It’s more cringe inducing than anything else.

The show finally deals with the true motivations of Halsey in her argument with Keyes and the moment didn’t come soon enough. There’s some good acting in the scene between McElhone and Sapani. Halsey decides to implore Makee to help her by using her relationship with John and her ability to manipulate him. We’ve been seeing Halsey’s villain arc the entire season and we finally get to see her in action. The sequence is executed well and has some great tension throughout.

Things come to a head when Cortana does something unexpected and changes Halsey’s plans just as she was about to get everything she wanted. What follows is some great action as Chief faces off against his fellow Spartans, Kai looks for a way out and a means of stopping Halsey and Makee makes a decision about humanity.

The first half of episode eight had some huge character motivation issues and cringe worthy character choices. The second half makes up for it with some great action and a buildup of tension that makes me curious about what comes next.