httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7lpi3bdPlU

We got some answers to questions, a rarity for this show, and also set up some new conflicts, and it all really comes courtesy of Nora and Erika.

In the best scene of the season so far, Nora uses stolen questions from a Department of Sudden Departures employee, a secret new algorithm that is supposed to verify the possibility of second departure, and asks them to Erika.

Nora wants to believe that she isn’t responsible for what has happened to her departed family members, but new scientists and theories suggest otherwise.

When Nora learns about the “Lens” theory, that a person can radiate the negative energy associated with making people disappear, she runs through her normal range of rage, denial, introspection, and curiosity until she ultimately settles on a “Let the mystery be” attitude and determines that a person can’t be responsible for someone else’s disappearance.

She then coldly relays these opinions to Erika, because as we’ve learned, Nora has to force these opinions on others to help her further convince herself.

She tells Erika that it’s “Pathetic” to make the departure about herself as a part of some self-hating hypocrisy.

Erika truly believes that she could be responsible for Evie’s disappearance, because of a wish she made involving the burial of a bird in a box, an old folk tale told by her grandmother that eerily came true.

Evie is gone and now Erika is stuck as an almost unwilling enabler to John’s actions, because how could she possibly leave now that her daughter is missing? Nora resents Erika and the disappearance of Evie because this was the exact thing that she was trying to put behind her, and Erika can’t understand how Nora could be so steadfast and callous in the face of such bizarre circumstance.

Will the wake up call help Nora realize that she’s just playing pretend with Kevin?

Regina King