‘Pantheon’ Recap: ‘Reign of Winter’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode Three of ‘Pantheon’. To revisit the series premiere, click here.
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When we last settled in to discuss the fascinating and wondrous new AMC+ series, Pantheon, we talked at length about how the show posed some supremely important questions about death and the afterlife. Specifically, what will both concepts look like years down the line as technology continues to evolve in ways that none of us have ever remotely imagined it could, and of course… how corporations and capitalism might play into that. Questions that the series was quick to answer, in part because it was easy to point out that the cloud would be a perfect place to the store the human mind and that corporations and greed would work to fund such matters… but also because… there is so much more to explore regarding this concept, as evidenced by this week’s episode.
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For ‘Reign of Winter’ is a story that focused heavily on what life after death in the digital frontier might look like and well, this series postulates that it could be Heaven or Hell, depending on who is keeping the server running. For instance, Chanda experienced the equivalent of Hell. Since he was tasked with doing busy work in his digital afterlife. In fact, he was in essence… living the same day over and over again within the server and spent his many hours coding away without an ounce of knowledge of his death or his new expectations and that’s about as hellish as it gets, and his journey was definitely far more harrowing than David’s.

Because he in essence… lived through a taste of Heaven. For he was able to play in the game world all day and enjoy adventures abound and of course… he still had contact with his family. To the point where Maddie was determined to figure out how to get her mother and father to either reconnect or communicate and well, the freedom that David enjoyed in the digital afterlife, allowed for him to poke the bear so to speak through some shenanigans while Ellen was on a date, which in turn brought forth that long awaited conversation. Obviously, no romance was to be found… but the important thing is that peace was made, closure happened, and they agreed to be friends and that is definitely a wonderful afterlife to thrive within and both of these plot lines made for some fascinating explorations for certain.

However, while it was indeed wonderful to ponder upon what digital afterlife might look like, this is a dramatic series through and through and this episode had more fascinating tidbits to offer the audience. For instance, Chanda’s personal Hell may not last for the lifespan of a server, since echoes of the failed mental maps that came before him asked for his help and managed to free him. Not to mention, the plot with Caspian continued to thicken here. Since his ‘parents’ made a point to push him to the edge with their troubling fake domestic violence routine. To the point where he’s become violent and bold and different really, and while we have little to go upon regarding the strange plan Logorhythms has in store for Caspian, it is only a matter of time before it is revealed, and it will undoubtedly be both fascinating and horrifying.

Not to mention, we’d be foolish to not express concern over the fact that Logorhythms and Alliance Telecom are having off the cuff discussions about that digital afterlife and well, all of those moments, definitely set the stage for more fascinating storytelling. The kind that is clearly going to explore what happens when those trapped within a digital afterlife take charge of their new lives and potentially go on the offensive against those who locked them away. But while we wait to see how that will play out, we can bask in the wonder of a truly top-notch story. One that explored concepts that honestly, we need to start thinking about now since we are on the cusp of a new digital frontier and this show deserves a round of applause for going there in such a compelling and powerful manner, and it will be incredible to see where this refreshing and unique story is going to take us next.

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