'HALO' Episode 4: "Homecoming" Recap and Review
WARNING: Contains Minor Spoilers
Episode 4, “Homecoming” takes the audience back in time to John aka Master Chief as a young boy (Casper Knopf) training to be a Spartan. He’s gotten in trouble for numerous escape attempts and a younger Dr. Halsey (Natascha McElhone) encourages John to continue with Spartan training. He wants to go back home to Eridanus II where he vaguely remembers growing up. Dr. Halsey tells him that John is not just a Spartan, that he is the key to saving humanity and that he belongs here in training.
Present-day John (Pablo Schreiber) is en route to Eridanus II with Dr. Halsey and Cortana (Jen Taylor). He believes that the artifact on Madrigal is only one piece of the puzzle and there is a larger relic on his home planet. In the disjointed memories that are returning to him, he sees himself as a young boy drawing both the recovered Madrigal talisman and something much larger.
Kwan (Yerin Ha) and Soren (Bokeem Woodbine) have returned to Madrigal to save Kwan’s planet from the tyrant Vinsher (Burn Gorman). This new Madrigal under the rule of Vinsher is a stark contrast to what was shown in the pilot episode before the Covenant invasion. Before, the planet was very democratic and there was a sense of community, but Vinsher is commanding the planet with fear and brutality.
The people of Madrigal hold a vigil for Kwan’s father and Kwan uses it as an opportunity to seek out the generals who served alongside her father. Kwan learns that Vinsher executed all of the generals except for Agatha (Nila Aalia), so Kwan believes Agatha is now leading the rebellion. The vigil is interrupted by Vinsher’s security forces and they begin to attack the crowd.
Kwan and Soren are able to escape the crowd, but their presence did not go unnoticed. Vinsher calls upon his associate Franco (Angie Cepeda) to quietly assassinate Kwan so as to not turn her into a martyr. Kwan is able to find refuge with her aunt and learns new information about her father that ruins the idealized version of him that Kwan held onto. Her father met with mystics in the desert many years ago that told him there was a reason the Ha family was put on Madrigal. The meeting with her aunt is cut short as Franco attacks, but Soren is able to fight her off.
Back at the United Nations Space Command (UNSC) headquarters, Spartan Silver Team member Kai (Kate Kennedy) has followed in Master Chief’s footsteps and removed the pellet from her back. Kai and the rest of the Silver Team have been called in to see Miranda Keyes (Olive Gray). She wants to know if any of the other Spartans can elicit the same response as John when they touch the Madrigal artifact. Kai and the other Silver Team members are unable to make the relic glow.
However, they do prove to be an unexpected source of information about the Covenant for Miranda. She has been attempting to create a dictionary of the Covenant language for years, but never asked the Spartans for help despite them being the people who have interacted the most with the Covenant. Kai and Miranda are able to rewatch the footage from the initial expedition on Madrigal and translate the Covenant’s words to mean “sacred ring” in reference to the relic. Kai calls it a “halo.”
On Eridanus II, John digs up his past both literally and metaphorically. Buried in the woods by his childhood home is a box full of drawings he made when he was young. The team ventures into John’s now decrepit childhood home. Cortana is able to recreate an image of what the house used to look like from John’s memories.
Through these recreated memories, John is able to piece together some of the more mysterious drawings. He sees himself as a young boy walking through the woods toward a cave. Young John touches an unseen artifact that glows a bright green before returning back to his home in his memories. There, he sees his younger self playing a game with Dr. Halsey. As she’s about to leave, she asks if she can see John again and if their meetings can stay a secret between the two of them.
Over the course of the first four episodes, HALO has posed a lot of questions, but given very few answers. While some mysteries are necessary to keep the suspense alive, the sheer number of unknowns is becoming overwhelming. Even without seeing Makee (Charlie Murphy) and the Covenant this episode, the show wasn’t able to move forward in a meaningful way. The audience now knows that the Madrigal relic is a “halo,” but for those who didn’t come into the show with prior knowledge, it’s essentially meaningless.
The show’s decision to have Kai also start the journey of freedom from the UNSC like Master Chief feels unnecessary. What started as a show with a seemingly central dynamic of Kwan and John is now spinning out and introducing new characters every episode. While their attempt at developing all of these new characters is noble, it’s getting to be too burdensome. Before introducing new characters, planets, and conflicts, the audience needs to feel that progress is being made with the characters they started the show with.