'Orphan Black' Recap: We Need to Talk About Kira

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Warning: This recap for the “The Stigmata of Progress” episode of Orphan Black contains spoilers.

O Kira! Poor Kira! Your fearful trip is far from done. For three seasons now, Sarah Manning’s young daughter has served as a pawn in the ongoing chess match between the Clone Club and various shadowy groups working against them, from Dyad to the Castor Clones to their current foe, the Neolutionists. Kira has been kidnapped, left with various guardians and dispatched to Iceland with a dad she just recently met. So far, she’s rolled with the punches, but the rapidly growing girl is entering a rebellious phase. Case in point from tonight’s episode, “The Stigmata of Progress”: That scowl that crossed her face when Sarah left their comic book shop hideout with the vague promise that she’d be back sometime soon. Just a few moments before that, she swept the role-playing game she and the shop’s geeky employee had been playing off the table, making it clear she wasn’t in the mood for childish distractions.

Related: Watch the ‘Orphan Black’ Cast in a Charades Showdown

And who can blame her when she has visions of her mother being burned alive by her clone sisters dancing through her mind? That’s the confession Kira makes to Aunt Cosmia, along with the premonition that Sarah would be “changing” in some way. “They never tell me when things are bad, but I always know,” the precocious child says early on in the episode, referencing the extra-sensory prowess she’s displayed in the past. Where Kira was sidelined early on last season, it appears that she’s going to play a major role this year, and her discontent with the status quo is presumably going to become more pronounced. Kudos to young Skyler Wexler, who is approaching the tween years herself, for highlighting Kira’s growing frustration with her mother without tipping over into “obnoxious kid” territory.

Kira’s increased prominence this season coincides with pronounced mother/daughter theme that’s set in motion with the return of long-awaited return of Rachel, the Leda clone who went to work for the opposition, a.k.a. Dyad. Having pulled a switcheroo on her Clone Club captors at the end Season 3, Rachel is now hiding out under the watchful eye of her adopted mother, Susan Duncan. To say the two aren’t getting along well is an understatement. On the other hand, Rachel has hit it off with Charlotte, the littlest Leda clone.

That sets up a Grandmother/Mother/Daughter triangle, where two of the points (Charlotte and Rachel) launch a stealth campaign to undermine the third (Susan). And let’s not forget about the other Mom-in-Waiting, Helena, who continues to gestate her unborn twins in Donnie and Alison’s suburban home, while her hosts are out in the garage exhuming a dead body and a buried plot thread from way back in Season 2, when Donnie accidentally offed Dr. Leekie. A “Sins of the Mother and/or Grandmother” storyline is an exciting prospect for Orphan Black, especially after the sibling-based Season 3 conflict of Leda vs. Castor fizzled for some fans.

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Amidst all the Terms of Endearment-esque mama drama, “Stigmata” also set aside time for an extended Marathon Man homage spotlighting the medieval horrors of dentistry. Pursuing another one of Beth’s leads, Sarah enters a seemingly ordinary dentist’s office, and inadvertently makes an appointment with a Neolutionist-affiliated hygienist to get the “robot maggot” in her mouth extracted. In the process, we learn a little bit more about said worm, namely that once it’s been detected and penetrated, the slightest movement will result in tendrils bursting out of your face that deliver a fatal burst of Tetrodotoxin. Sarah’s would-be helper also reveals that the presence of this critter in her cheek means that she’s been fortunate enough to be “chosen.” Unfortunately, her throat is slit by Topside’s ace cleaner, Ferdinand (James Frain), before she can reveal what exactly she’s been chosen for. Dollars to donuts, it has something to do for the transformation that Kira foresees in that busy, brilliant mind of hers.

Onto this week’s Clone Power Rankings! And isn’t it about time you made an appointment for your next teeth cleaning?

1) Rachel
Sure, Rachel and her newly acquired bionic eye are essentially prisoners in her mother’s house. But past experience has shown that this particular clone is at her most devious when held in captivity. Her tentative alliance with Charlotte is particularly compelling, giving the relentlessly self-focused corporate creature another human being to care about.

2) Alison
Digging up Dr. Leekie unearthed one of our favorite longstanding elements of Orphan Black: Alison and Donnie’s bumbling brushes with crime. After two Alison-light weeks, it was great fun to watch her get her hands — and her clothes — dirty.

3) Sarah
Sarah may (temporarily) be an absent mother, but let’s never forget that she’s not an uncaring mother. Her ultimate goal is to raise Kira in safety, after all, and for now that quest requires piecing together the Neolutionist plot…and taking care of the worm in her mouth. Less defensible, perhaps, is her anger at Felix for declining to join another mission. Like Kira, Felix has put up with a lot over the past three years, but he’s also an adult with desires beyond being a perpetual “sidekick.” His declaration of independence may have sounded harsh, but it was definitely overdue.

4) Helena
Where the other clones go to elaborate lengths to impersonate each other, Helena is always staunchly herself — even when she’s supposed to be, say, Alison. That interrogation scene with the suspicious cops showcases how unflappable she is under fire.

5) Cosima
We’re still waiting for the Clone Club’s resident Big Brain to become more integral to this season’s action. For now, she’s holding down their comic book clubhouse, watching Kira while her mom is going undercover at dentists’ clinics.

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Non-Clone MVP: Adele
Felix’s biological sister makes an immediate impression in her maiden appearance, bringing the fun, rather than the body horror-tinged gloom his foster sister, Sarah, has been providing of late. Since this is Orphan Black, there’s almost certainly more to Adele than meets the eye, but for Felix’s sake, we hope she remains “bloody cool.”

Orphan Black airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. on BBC America.