Into the Badlands Season 3, Episode 12 recap: Cobra Fang, Panther Claw

Last night’s Into the Badlands was one of the bloodiest episodes for major characters. Who lived, who died, and whose lives are hanging in the balance?

I’m still recovering from the shocking events of this episode as I write this. The pace of the show has been amazing for the past few episodes but this one took it to a completely new level. Into the Badlands has never shied away from killing major characters but this episode was still shocking on a lot of fronts.

Let’s dive in.

The Monastery

The tone was set from scene one. Pilgrim and his Harbingers arrived at the Monastery with murder on their minds and wasted no time getting down to business. The Harbingers make short work of the Abbots, including a scene where MK shows off how far his skills have come and takes down a handful at once.

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The Master is meditating in her temple when Pilgrim arrives. He asks where she’s hidden the dark ones but she, of course, refuses to tell him. The fight begins and he surprised by how strong she is but he likes the challenge. They both go dark and the battle continues.

It’s a slugfest but at some point Pilgrim hits her in the pressure points to turn off her gift. She’s caught off guard by this and tries to flee but he’s not going to let her. He moves in for the kill, but uses the moment to preach to her people about how she’s a liar and that he’s there to set them free.

The Widow, Sunny, Bajie, and Nix

This unlikely group is making their way back to the Monastery, hoping to arrive in time to fight Pilgrim for The Master. The needle from the previous episode knocked the witch Ankara out but she’s starting to wake up and uses her abilities to disable the car. The don’t have another needle so The Widow knocks her out.

Meanwhile, the Black Lotus have made it to the market where The Widow and Sunny fought and are still tracking them. Later, when The Widow and Sunny are alone he tells her that when this is all over he will be coming for her.

After The Widow leaves, Nix joins Sunny and asks who Veil was. When he tells her she asks if it’s safe to have The Widow around. He tells her that they need her for the fight and for the fight alone. Of course The Widow overhears this conversation.

Tilda and Gaius

Along the road to the place where Baron Chau is hiding, Tilda and Gaius share a moment where she gives him his props for being willing to face his family in this way.

Later in the episode Tilda and Gaius walk right into a trap that Baron Chau has set and they’re captured.

Baron Chau is using an abandoned circus as her hideout and she has Gaius and Tilda tied up. Chau tells them that The Master took The Widow and then asks if The Master is working for Pilgrim (there’s still a lot of confusion in The Badlands). When she gets her answers she proceeds to burn her brother with a blowtorch. She’s going to slowly torture them both so later she brands Tilda.

Wake up the sleepers

Pilgrim has chosen to keep The Master alive. He has taken her to where she has the dark ones who strayed from her path. If you recall, she has them all sleeping in a room, unable to move. He shows them to his followers to prove that The Master has been lying and is a bad person. He tells them to reclaim their destiny.

Pilgrim begins to search the Monastery for the key to waking up the sleeping dark ones and catches The Master trying to heal herself. He stops her and she tells him not to wake up the sleepers. He tells her he’s making them Gods, still self-righteous. The Master tells him that he wasn’t born with the gift, he stole it and it’s killing him. She tells him that the darkness will consume him from within. Some of which we’ve already started to see.

Eventually, MK and Pilgrim find the secret to waking up the sleepers.

The Widow vs. Baron Chau

Ankara has been subdued with needles in pressure points and she convinces the group to pull one out. She then gives The Widow a vision of what’s happening at the circus and while they don’t trust it, The Widow feels like she has to go. Sunny sends Nix with her just in case.

The Widow and Nix take off in the direction of Chau’s hideout and arrive to the scene of Tilda and Gaius being tortured. Just moments before, Chau was about to kill her brother for killing their mother but Tilda stops her by saying that she did it.

The Black Lotus arrive

Back at the barn Bajie and Sunny have been left with Ankara. She tells them that the Monastery has fallen and tells Bajie to leave now, while he still has time to escape. She tells them that she is the reason that the Black Lotus attacked Azra. The leader of the group, Magnus, was a scribe at the Monastery but she got too comfortable and he betrayed her before destroying the city. Bajie isn’t believing her but she says she has nothing left to hide because she’s dying.

She goes on to explain that only Sunny, Pilgrim, and Sunny’s sister survived the attack on the city.

Pilgrim vs The Darkness

Back in the Monastery, Pilgrim begins waking up the sleepers. MK has a conversation with one where his feelings about The Master are affirmed. The guy tells MK that being asleep felt like being buried alive. He was trapped inside his body with no way to escape. He tells MK that he’ll do whatever Pilgrim needs.

As he works his way around the room Pilgrim starts to collapse when MK catches him. He asks Pilgrim if he’s ok and Pilgrim says he is but he’s bleeding black ink from his eyes. The Master appears to be right.

Big conclusions

Nix and The Widow make short work of Chau’s men before The Widow tells Nix to free Tilda and Gaius while she handles Chau. The fight choreography in this scene was amazing and ended in an amazing fashion with Minerva slicing Chau’s head clean off.

Back at the cabin, The Black Lotus arrive and Sunny begins drilling Ankara for answers. He first asks how he can defeat Pilgrim and she tells him he can’t because his power has been buried deep within him. She tells him that only his sister could unlock it but she’s dead.

Magnus finally barges in and they subdue Ankara before she can do anything to stop them. Sunny and Bajie have been incapacitated with flash bangs but they wake up before Ankara is killed. Magnus has said that he wants Sunny alive but when Bajie steps up to him he quickly stabs him through his abdomen, deep. Ankara wails and he mocks her before giving her the same fate.

They capture Sunny and leave. The show ends with us watching Bajie breathing his last breaths.

Into the Badlands returns next Monday at 10/9 Central on AMC.