Signal Horizon

See Beyond

La Brea Season 2 Episode 2 The Cave Recap And Review- Who Are Gavin’s Parents?

La Brea Season 2 Episode 2
LA BREA — “The Cave” Episode 202 — Pictured: (l-r) Veronica St. Clair as Riley, Jack Martin as Josh — (Photo by: Sarah Enticknap/NBC)

The ever-expanding cast grew again this week with the addition of academics in 1988 and violent medieval miners in the Ice Age. Much like Lost constantly gave us a new danger to worry about and a new group of people to discern, La Brea has consistently added and subtracted from the cast to keep things fresh while maintaining the essential core elements. As a result, La Brea Season 2 Episode 2 was filled with possibilities for the remainder of the season.

The writers love to layer the mysteries. This isn’t just a puzzle box series. It is a puzzle you must put together with your fingers in a finger trap while navigating a mirror maze. Every twist reminds you of where you have come and how much further you have to go. La Brea Season 2 Episode 2 reminded us of the children who have returned to the Ice Age as adults while piquing our interest in all the things we have yet to figure out.

It’s a huge task. How can this series possibly keep the reveals coming this fast? Between the characters who are much more important than we thought, time travel shenanigans, and possible paradoxes, everything should collapse in on itself. It should be a black hole of too many ideas and overstuffed plot beats. Yet, against all odds, the plates keep spinning, and we keep watching, if for no other reason than to see what happens when they all crash down.

The groups are still divided into several camps. Josh and Riley are in 1988, enjoying corndogs and INXS. Josh is still acting impulsively, and Riley continues to have to pull him back. The only significant advancement in their story comes from the addition of Cal Tech Professor Franklin Marsh. He has been tracking the sinkholes and thought Riley and Josh might know more than their age implied. He has studied the sinkholes and knows another is coming in just a few days, and it will wipe out huge portions of the California coastline.

The problem is he is ignored like a modern-day Cassandra. No one is willing to listen. Finally, the trio agrees to team up and share information. Josh and Riley will now have access to the information they need to hopefully get back home, but they also want to try to save people in 1988. I wouldn’t be surprised if Professor Marsh finds himself in the Ice Age at some point down the road.

Gavin’s group makes it to the base camp only to find their family gone. It’s a bizarre welcome with people remembering him as a blond little boy named Isaiah just a few days earlier. Maybe it’s the strange circumstances they find themselves in, but no one seems all that surprised by his appearance. The encampment led by Sam, Ty, and Lucas prepares fields for crops and continues business as usual.

They tell them Eve and Levi were captured, and Josh is in 1988 with Lily. Hearing the description of the men who took Levi and Eve, he thinks it is the Exiles he was warned about as a child. When he says he wished he could talk to his grandfather because he knew more about them, Sam takes him to Silas.

Against everyone’s better judgment, they let Gavin take off alone with Silas, who promised to show him where the Exiles live. Silas is an enigma who you can’t ever trust. He is as slippery as an eel with just as murky motivations. Silas constantly speaks in half-truths and riddles, stingily doling out information. He knows what to say to get Gavin to trust him enough to drug him eventually. Before he drugged and left him to be discovered by the Exiles with a map in his pocket, he dropped the bombshell that his parents are alive. According to Silas, they are dangerous, though.

Gavin’s first instincts were right. He shouldn’t have trusted Silas from the beginning. He should never have ventured off on his own with him and certainly shouldn’t have trusted him enough to drink his water. The only thing we know for sure is that Silas likes to couch his truths in lies. It is almost certain Gavin’s parents are alive. With so many camps in the Ice Age and nearly endless points of time that sinkholes could have taken people, they could be anywhere. If Silas is telling the truth, Gavin should avoid them at all costs. But, are they the reason for the sinkholes to begin with? Are they part of the think tank that works in the tower that Rebecca was so eager to show Scott?

If La Brea is good at anything, it is laying the groundwork for future twists. The tower’s implications are enormous, which would dovetail nicely with Gavin and Silas’s story. Gavin’s parents might be scientists who are more concerned with their experiments than humanity. Dangerous can mean many different things. It doesn’t have to be violent like so many of the people we have seen so far. An argument could be made that intellectually dangerous is far worse. They could easily be part of the Exiles, which is why Silas knew they wouldn’t kill Gavin. In any case, it does raise the question, why did Silas leave Gavin with the Exiles if they are so dangerous, and what are they mining for?

Eve and Levi were taken into a cave and forced to mine for a black rock. No one knows what the stone is, but it is vital to the Exiles, and they seem pinched for time. Are they preparing for something big? Are they working with another group, like the tower people, to build something? A new potential ally Virgil tells them to keep their heads down and later agrees to try to help them overpower the guards. Unfortunately, that does not go according to plan, and while Virgil gets beat for resting, Levi intervenes and is taken for his own beating.

The Gavin, Levi, and Eve love triangle is heating up. Gavin was admittedly an absentee father and spouse. It isn’t entirely his fault, having been flung forward in time alone as a little kid where he continued to have visions. Regardless of what he did then, he still loves her now. He risks everything to save her, including leaving his daughter alone with strangers on a planet covered in deadly predators and relegating his son’s disappearance to the back burner. It’s a messy situation that will only get messier now that Eve remembers how Levi made her feel. Levi loves her and was there for her when she desperately needed someone.

Now that they will all be back together, things could get tense. Eve will have to make a choice sooner rather than later, and someone will get hurt. But, hopefully, they can keep things under control until they escape. The biggest question surrounding these three isn’t who Eve will pick, but where did Silas get the cave map? How does he have such a detailed layout of the Exiles space? Was he once a prisoner there, too, and why did the man in charge take a long look at Gavin? Does he recognize him?

The last thread to pull is Veronica and Lily/Ella’s. Veronica feels tremendous guilt for having done something that can’t ever be forgiven. Likely she was instrumental in Lily’s kidnapping. Veronica fails to realize that she was a child and that Stolkholm Syndrome is real. Hopefully, Ella’s sweet nature can help her overcome her regret and let them reconnect. If for no other reason, Veronica needs stability. When she is cornered, she lashes out. She has already proven she can be violent.

A nifty little tie-in to the kid Izzy went to the vigil with in Episode 1 keeps everything intertwined, and Sam’s abilities continue to come in handy. The man has endless knowledge, and the group would be lost without him.

Lastly, what happened to Rebecca and Scott? He returned, saying, “You will never believe what happened.” Where is Rebecca and what did Scott see to make him so freaked out? La Brea Season 2 Episode 2 isn’t giving away all the secrets just yet. Find all our La Brea coverage here.