‘Timeless’ Season 2 premiere reaction: Rittenhouse is scarier than we realized

Clockblockers, you already know how deeply I love “The War to End All Wars,” from my advance review. Now that you’ve all seen the episode, we can dive into the nitt-gritty details and start theorizing. Let’s break things down, shall we?

Season 2’s Big Bad

We knew going into the episode that Nicholas Keynes (Michael Rady) is a soldier from WWI who Carol and Emma go back to save. They didn’t tell Lucy until the last minute that the plan is to bring him to future. Once Carol has him all settled at Rittenhouse headquarters, we discover two shocking facts:

1. Keynes is Carol’s grandfather, hence Lucy’s great-grandfather. (Can you believe they actually put that in the synopsis?!? I was so peeved.)
2. He wrote the manifesto that shaped Rittenhouse and became the organization’s playbook. (As Carol points out, he was right about time travel.)

WHAT?!? No wonder Lucy is Rittenhouse royalty. When Emma calls her “princess” she really isn’t kidding. You can understand why she resents Lucy so much. Emma paid her dues for the cause and Lucy is fighting against it, despite it literally being “in her blood.”

Emma seems like she will be just as threatening as Keynes. She was even tasked with overriding Carol’s instructions just in case she couldn’t go through with eliminating Lucy as a threat. When Carol hesitated, Emma had no problem aiming her gun at Lucy. Sadly, I think we can expect that to be a recurring problem.

Carol, on the other hand, may just give us hope. She genuinely enjoyed working together with her daughter. They have a shared history. Keynes may be her grandfather, but he’s still a stranger to her. He’s just been a mission, a rule-book, an abstract set of guidelines that she was raised to follow. She doesn’t know him the way she knows Lucy. What if he’s more than Carol can handle? What if his vision for Rittenhouse is more extreme than she expects? It would be very interesting if Carol ends up on the Time Team.

Although, I don’t think Lucy could ever forgive Carol for ordering Emma to make sure her sister, Amy, is never born. Did she do it to save herself? She was dying when Amy existed. Maybe it’s a life-for-a-life scenario. Hopefully we’ll find out and Lucy can eventually get her sister back.

In the meantime, stopping Rittenhouse comes first and the Time Team just fell a step behind. Judging by the devastated look on poor Lucy’s face when Wyatt tells her that Nicholas wrote the manifesto, you can’t help but wonder: Did she regret not being able to kill him back in 1918?

Which brings us to our next point.

Lucy’s sacrifice

The Season 2 premiere showed us a whole new side to Lucy. She was willing to die or be stranded in the past to protect history. Especially after she thought Wyatt, Rufus and the rest of the team were dead. She felt like there was nothing to go back home to. All had been sacrificed to defeat Rittenhouse, so there was nothing else left to lose.

Quick tally of the lives Lucy was willing to take for the sake of stopping Rittenhouse: 4 + ?Lucy, Carol, Emma, Nicholas and any by-stander in the Mothership’s blast radius. Yikes!

Number of people Lucy shot: 1
The poor soldier witnessed their technology and couldn’t live to tell his story. Emma would’ve killed him anyway, so as Wyatt said, that guy’s blood isn’t really on Lucy’s hands.

Given everything they’ve faced, members of the Time Team are really beginning to live each day like it may be their last. Tomorrow can’t be certain with Rittenhouse on their tails, which is why the more passive/peaceful ones are even starting to act more aggressively and turn to violence while out in the field.

I mean, Lucy shot a guy who was going to be killed anyway…it’s not like she set a guy on fire. Yeah, Rufus has also changed since last season…

Our Hero in a Hoodie isn’t playing around

Rufus means business and he’s trying to keep the peace. We weren’t surprised to see him get the Lifeboat up and running again. He pulled that impossible task off in “Stranded,” so this challenge paled in comparison.

We see him take initiative and try to help the team focus, while voicing the truth about their legitimate doubts. He tries calming Wyatt down, but also agrees that bunker life isn’t the best. Everyone is worried about Lucy, but Rufus is equally concerned about Jiya. The others see her having headaches, but they don’t know about the vision she had at the hospital.

Rufus’ behavior in the field has come a long way too. He always has his team’s back, but he’s never taken action like that before. He set a dude on fire! It was to save Wyatt, but still…FIRE. Ouch! Rufus even shocked himself with that one. Love the way Malcolm Barrett played that scene.

We also love the way he called Wyatt out on his BS: “You love Lucy. You idiot.” Rufus kept Wyatt in check throughout the episode. He’s starting to take charge, which can be hard to do around a military man like Wyatt. We dig Rufus’ style.

Except for when he snapped at Connor Mason. We know Rufus didn’t mean it. Wyatt had been belittling him too, but you could tell Rufus’ one comment was the one that pushed his mentor over. Now Mason has become the grasshopper and he feels inept.

Mason has the yips

Poor Mason built this technological empire and now he feels like the clueless rookie. He tries helping Rufus with technical stuff, but he seems to be a step behind. He lost his reputation, his business, his money, his employees and now he starting to feel like he’s lost his engineering prowess. You can’t help but feel bad for him.

This season will clearly feature the theme of rebuilding. Mason needs to re-establish himself and Keynes wants to recreate the world according to his manifesto. Let’s hope Mason doesn’t lose his groove and keeps his head in the game for the Time Team. They need all hands and heads on deck to take out Rittenhouse.

LYATT!!!!!

Wyatt is full of angst without Lucy. He won’t even entertain the thought of her having died. He already lost his first love and he’ll be damned if he loses Lucy too. When others try to be practical, he has faith in her. He tries to act like its just because the team needs their historian, but everybody sees right through him.

It is such a relief to hear Rufus say it out loud. Wyatt loves Lucy. She clearly feels the same way. Why can’t they just admit it? Maybe nearly losing each other is just the kind of motivation they need to be honest with each other.

Once they bring Lucy back home, she finds herself feeling vulnerable and safe in Wyatt’s arms. As they hold each other, we hold our breath. Their lips grow closer together and we inch towards the edge of our seats….

Squee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dammit Jiya! Alas, we must wait a little longer for a kiss. But, trust me, when it finally happens, it is so worth waiting for. We’re just happy to see these love birds owning up to their feelings from the start of the season. They way things ended between them after their mission, you knew they would only grow closer.

Plus, it’s not like they could find understanding partners outside of the Time Team. All the secrets and last second disappearances would make look shady to civilians. Lyatt is meant to be on multiple levels and we can’t wait to see them officially be together like Riya.

Flynn

Last, but definitely not least, we finally end the episode with Garcia Flynn. He’s locked up for the crimes he committed. Although he blamed Lucy while being dragged away in the finale, it seems like he may have realized that she isn’t to blame.

When Agent Christopher needs his help, he says he will talk to Lucy. They still have a special connection, one that we hope will be explored throughout the course of Season 2. We are still dying to learn how Future Lucy gave him the journal. It’ll be very fascinating to see what the dynamic will be like when he starts working with the Time Team. Maybe he’ll be an alternate who rotates in and out of the Lifeboat based on what’s happening with Rufus, Lucy and Wyatt.

What did you think of the premiere? Were you shocked by that Keynes revelation (if you avoided the spoiler synopsis)? Do you think Carol might come around and join Lucy? Are you surprised by Rufus and Lucy’s newfound boldness in the field? Did you swoon over all the Lyatt interactions? Do you have any theories on Flynn’s role within the team? Share your thoughts below!

Check out a preview of the next episode: ‘Timeless’ Season 2 Episode 2 preview: Time travel can be a drag

Enjoy more teasers from upcoming episodes in my video review:

‘Timeless’ airs Sundays at 10 p.m. on NBC.

*Image credit: NBC Universal

*Screencaps provided by @simymonna  at  TimelessFans.com.