The 100 "Remember Me" Review: Love Is a Battlefield

The 100 S02E09: "Remember Me"

From the moment she stepped off the drop ship in The 100's series premiere, Clarke has attempted to be a fair and just leader for her people. Driven by her own inherent goodness and the desire to see that same goodness reflected back at her in other people, she lived and fought by an honorable moral code, never settling but always searching for the outcome that would benefit the most people and cause the fewest casualties. The harsh environment of the ground has been eating away at Clarke's resolve since that first day, and she's been readjusting her tactics in order to survive, but everyone has a breaking point.

In the wake of Finn's death, Clarke tried desperately to hold on to the last shreds of her humanity, even as she was haunted by a Finn-shaped manifestation of her guilty conscience. She attempted to stay strong for her people, for herself, and for Raven, who was angry and grieving the loss of her best friend. But by the end of "Remember Me," and with the lives of her friends still trapped inside Mount Weather on the line, Clarke had all but given up on everything that made her a successful leader and accepted Lexa's cynical idea that to love is to be weak.

This idea that great leaders can't love or be loved because it puts people in danger is one of popular culture's most frustrating and overused tropes. Arrow also embarked on a similar storyline this season after a character was killed, but to love is to be human, and all of the heroes who push away love because they think they don't deserve it or they think it makes them weak—even if it's for honorable reasons—all eventually come to realize that it's a bunch of bullshit. Because love might be a weakness, but it's also a strength.

Right now Clarke thinks her love puts the people she cares about at risk, but what she is failing to realize is that it's her ability to love and feel empathy for others that makes her a good leader and separates her from the violent and primal existence of the Grounders. If it weren't for Clarke's fierce determination to save her friend and Octavia's love for him, Lincoln would still be a mindless, flesh-eating, soldier for the Mountain Men. Instead, he's embarking on a road trip with Bellamy to break into the mountain so they have someone on the inside. What makes this decision of Clarke's more frustrating, is the simple fact that everyone is at risk on the ground, whether Clarke loves them or not. Leaders who are willing to put their lives on the line on a daily basis but push away the people who love them are failing not only their loved ones, but themselves. And Clarke Griffin is not a failure.

Right now Clarke looks at Lexa and sees a young woman leading her people, one who wants to be stronger and better, but is limited by her ability to enforce change into an environment that's built on bloody traditions. Lexa isn't burdened by her feelings, which Clarke mistakenly believes to be a strength. But Lexa is alone—she has warriors who will fight for her because she's the commander, but they do it out of duty, not necessarily because they're loyal or because they care about her. Gustus had wanted to protect her, because that was his job, but now he's dead by her hand after trying to break the alliance by pulling a Mags Bennett. Lexa rules by fear and violence, whereas Clarke is followed because she's strong, capable, and intelligent. There's a difference between the two.

But Clarke also sees a lot of herself in Lexa. She might not subscribe to the eye-for-an-eye school of justice that the Grounders do—I have to believe that her deep fundamental beliefs in justice haven't just been chucked out the window because she's given up on love—but she respects Lexa for what she does. And on some basic level, she recognizes that her people dealt with problems in exactly the same way during those 97 years on the Ark. Floating people for even the smallest crime was the Sky People's version of justice. It was quicker than the torture the Grounders use, but the principle was the same. Abby and Kane realize this, too, but the ground is a clean slate for the Sky People and Clarke should want to be better, not adapt to the Grounder way of thinking. Especially when that way of thinking involves torture.

Lexa is a woman who was brought up to make difficult decisions look easy, but she's afraid to love because once upon a time it got someone she cared for killed. The difference here is that Lexa's girlfriend was innocent (we're supposed to assume she was, anyway), and Finn was not. Finn was his own man, he made his own decisions, and his actions were his and his alone. Furthermore, loving Clarke (and Clarke loving him in return) was not what got him killed; His desperation, impulsiveness, and likely psychotic break is what made him pull the trigger that day in the village. But because she's Clarke and she's already carrying the fate of her people and the weight of the world on her shoulders, she's blaming herself for this too. She may have killed him so he didn't have to suffer like Gustus, but she didn't force him to slaughter 18 people.

Perhaps even worse than Clarke blaming herself for all of this, is that Clarke actually thinks she's dealing with Finn's death, but really she's living in denial and postponing her own grieving process, which will likely result in her own breakdown in the future. Refusing to deal with things ends horribly 100 percent of the time. Women, am I right?

While all of this was going on outside, Monty, Jasper, Miller, and Maya were plotting to hack into Mount Weather's radio to send out an SOS to their eventual rescuers. Of course, upon doing so, Monty discovered what Raven had a few weeks ago: the Mountain Men were jamming all the frequencies to prevent communication between the Ark survivors (and to keep the knowledge that they crashed the dropship a secret). But because he's Monty (and perfect) he decided to break into the main control room disguised as a worker who was there to decontaminate the room. He was successful in unscrambling the frequency, which means his SOS transmission is now being heard by everyone, but was discovered as he made his exit. Now he's trapped in a cage, like their friend who went missing and who's name I cannot for the life of me remember. There are 47 identical cages, all for the their friends, and now the Mountain Men are suspicious. Here's hoping Bellamy and Lincoln make it in and the alliance with the Grounders holds until they can be freed.

If the first half of this season was Finn's journey, the fire that consumed his body in "Remember Me," which was a strong follow up to "Spacewalker," acted as a cleanse and the second half of this season will be Clarke's own rise from his ashes. The world Clarke inhabits is different from the one we were first introduced to a season-and-a-half ago, and the time has come for Clarke to figure out what kind of a leader she's going to be. Will she be like her mother? Will she be like Lexa? Or will she pave her own path? She's still angry with her mother for allowing her father to be floated—and I did my own version of Monty's victory dance when the show revisited this crack in their relationship, because I was worried it had been washed away by Clarke's relief to see that her mother was alive—but can she forgive her? Can Clarke be the leader that her people need? Kane appears to be fully on board with Clarke leading their people—at least out here in the wilderness, anyway—which is a monumental step forward. Now we just need to see what Clarke as a leader in this new chapter actually means.

VITAL STATS

– Lexa name dropped the Ice Nation this week. This is the first we've heard of them. I'm going to just assume they live in Minnesota (get it? Because it's cold there. Nevermind). Still, that's more subtle world-building that's slowly happening. Now we now about the Dead Zone, the City of Light, and the Ice Nation. I don't know if we'll ever see these places, but knowing they're out there shows us just how insular this world that's been presented to us still is. There are so many other territories and cities we don't know about. The show was recently renewed for Season 3, and I hope we get to explore more of these places as time goes on.

– Lincoln is no longer welcome with his people, with Indra telling him he was one of "them." That has to hurt, but it's been a long time coming. He hasn't been a Grounder since the moment he saved Octavia. Hell, Octavia hasn't been the same either. They're building a new hybrid civilization between the two of them. Progress!

– Abby totally called Kane out for her shocking her in the premiere when he said they couldn't keep Jaha locked up forever. OH SNAP. YOU GO, GIRL. (Please pretend I didn't say that.)

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