‘1899’ Episode 3 Recap: Vanishing Act

We’re on the third episode of 1899, and I have concerns. Not overwhelming concerns, not dealbreakers, but still, concerns.

For example, I’m not sure I need every episode to being with a nightmarish flashback to a different character’s traumatic backstory, which will be further explored with various visions and dreams and memories throughout the episode. This time around, it’s not Maura and her institutionalization at her father’s hands, nor is it the murder-suicide that claimed Eyk’s family — it’s Ling Yi remembering how she accidentally poisoned a prostitute friend of her and her prostitute mother to death while trying to knock her out in order to steal her place on the voyage to England and thence to America. 

It’s an ugly bit of business, it’s a compelling backstory, it explains a lot about Ling Yi and her faux-servant mom and their relationship with the pimp Mrs. Virginia Wilson. It’s also way, way, way closer to Lost’s single-character-centric flashbacks/flashforwards than I’ve ever wanted to see a show get since Lost ended. It was fine on Lost, Lost was really entertaining, but Lost did it already, and once was enough.

I’m concerned that we’re going to discover that all the main characters are on some kind of rendezvous with destiny as dictated by their possession of one of those mysterious “What was lost, will be found” letters. In addition to Maura and Eyk, whose letters were previously established, we learn in this episode (“The Fog”) that Virginia and Lucien received ones as well. It’s a matter of personal preference, I know, but I’d enjoy it if some of the people on this ship just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, not summoned to a fateful voyage by a mysterious correspondent. Destiny can make things less interesting, paradoxically. Gimme the chaos of real-life happenstance, baby.

I’m concerned that the show’s grip on its tertiary characters may be a little slack. Consider Dr. Reginald Murray (Richard Hope), a first-class passenger called in to consult on the mysterious death of the Danish immigrant child Ada. In approximately thirty seconds he dismisses medically trained Maura’s diagnosis, lambastes the entire female gender, proclaims the death of a poor immigrant a case of Darwinian natural selection, and complains about being kept from his breakfast while feet away from the corpse of a child. Do I have any doubt at all that such people existed, and indeed still exist? Nope! Does that necessarily make them an interesting part of a drama? Also nope! As I’m fond of saying, there’s really no excuse for treating minor characters as styrofoam packing peanuts who exist to get the main players from Point A to Point B. You’re not obligated to trot out a villain straight from central casting in such roles, so why do it?

And I’m concerned about the climactic classic-rock needledrops that end every episode. Jefferson Airplane, Deep Purple, Echo and the Bunnymen — fine songs all, but boy do they land with a thud in a period piece otherwise soundtracked by menacing synths and clattering percussion. It doesn’t help that “White Rabbit” and “The Killing Moon” are two of the most shopworn pop music syncs in the biz. 

Be all that as it may, the show remains an engaging, and increasingly outlandish, mystery, with a welcome focus on the emotional states of the characters, who are shown by co-creator/director Baran bo Odar in closeups that do much of the storytelling. This is particularly true of Ling Yi, our focal-point character, whom we learn is not just not a sex worker, but also not a sex haver. Even when she’s pimped out to Lucien by Mrs. Wilson, who practically salivates over the “rare bird” she’s unwittingly collected, Lucien simply wants to watch her dance and spend a little time with her. That time is complicated by a seizure, apparently the reason he’s been trying — and failing — to sneak little vials of some kind of drug throughout the show so far.

Meanwhile, word travels fast about the unexplained death of poor little Ada, particularly via the crew member Franz, the leading voice against the captain’s plan to tow the Prometheus back to Europe. Before long, fully six other bodies are discovered around the ship, leading everyone to the (correct!) conclusion that there’s something very bad going on with the Prometheus. A full-fledged mutiny ensues, led by Franz and most of the crew. A large contingent of furious and frightened third-class passengers led by Ada’s furious sister Tove joins in.

And where is the captain during most this? He’s back on the Prometheus with Maura, looking for the captain’s logbook in hopes it will explain what happened on the ship, what the hell is going on with the secret passages he keeps discovering, et cetera. 

During this sojourn we learn several key things. First, the ships’ new owner is an Englishman named Henry Singleton; you’ll note that Maura’s letter is, in fact, addressed to someone named Henry. Second, Singleton recalled the line’s three vessels to dry dock after purchasing them, for a three-month period of upgrades and refurbishments. Eyk assumes this is when the passages were installed, along with a newfangled communication system that never seems to work, about which more later.

And third, Eyk discovers a passenger list in one of the coal furnaces, which he and Maura are combing through in order to see if bodies were cremated in them. And who should turn up on that list but Maura herself? Eyk, for understandable reasons, keeps this a secret from Maura. 

Anyway, not everyone participates in the mutiny against him. There’s the genteel first mate, who insists on following his captain’s offers — but also inputs some kind of secret code transmitted to the ship into some kind of panel near the lifeboat dock. There’s Olek from the furnace room, who gets caught by the mutineers and thrown into the same locked room as stowaway Jérôme. And there’s Ramiro, Ángel’s erstwhile boyfriend — Ángel gets jerked off by Krester earlier in the episode, and Ramiro is suspicious. By the way, Ramiro turns out to have killed the priest whose frock he’s wearing, though he feels bad about it.

There’s other puzzles scattered throughout the episode. Eyk reveals that a ribbon he found aboard the Prometheus belonged to his dead daughter. (I was almost positive it was her he found on the passenger list.) Ling Yi’s kimono, stolen from her dead friend, has the crossed triangle logo on the back. Daniel portentously tells Maura that he’s lost someone too. And a strange out-of-nowhere fog surrounds the entire affair, stopping the ships in their tracks, triggering a time-traveling flashback for Ling Yi, and generally being spooky.

And oh, Daniel takes out some kind of device that interacts with the Kerberos’s instrument panel and makes the entire ship vanish. Poof!

One thing 1899 has going for it, despite my present reservations, is its apparent determination to barrel full speed ahead into the weird. I mean, this is only the third episode, and already entire steam ships are disappearing into ruptures in the spacetime continuum opened by strange machinery. It took Lost years to get there; it took 1899 three hours. That’s storytelling confidence, is what that is. Let’s just hope it’s warranted.

Sean T. Collins (@theseantcollins) writes about TV for Rolling Stone, Vulture, The New York Times, and anyplace that will have him, really. He and his family live on Long Island.