‘Pennyworth’ S02 E09 Review: ‘Paradise Lost’

Happy endings are great for season finales. They’re ominous in a penultimate episode, yet Pennyworth didn’t earn a happy ending this week, which is why the possible backlash feels frustrating.

To name just a few of the reasons the League’s plan to steal Stormcloud shouldn’t have worked:

• While the show went to the trouble of reminding fans that Alfie had been injured by Gully in episode eight, it didn’t seem to affect him at all during the job.
• Why would Stormcloud be conveniently packaged in a small, portable vial, and why, given it is so small (and apparently singular) wouldn’t someone have thought to bring a better container to transport it in than a tin?
• Because the series didn’t get Casablanca out of its system already, the whole “Of all the jail cells at Raven HQ” routine with Bet seemed convenient and overconfident (Pennyworth and Bet may be a great team, like Penguin and Gordon on Gotham, but that doesn’t mean Bet would help Alfie escape).
• Unless it comes back later that Lucius’ speech made some of the scientists rethink getting involved with Stormcloud there’s no way he should’ve been allowed to take so much time to scold them.

And then there’s the deus ex machina of having Mr. P. be alive so he can provide Alfie with a gun for his escape. Mr. P. was a fan of Harwood’s, so maybe he found out how he died and turned against Salt. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t believe in the Raven Union and wouldn’t back Frances. Then again Lucius seemed pretty concerned that Mr. P. and/or Salt were up to something, and what did Salt mean when he said Plan B? Could Mr. P be planning a double cross of Alfie? It would explain why Salt was willing to leave the room so easily.

The bottom line is while the League have Stormcloud, it will always be dangerous. Will Aziz be willing to destroy such a powerful weapon, or will he be the antagonist in the season finale?

Other thoughts on this week’s episode:

• Where’s Martha? After her conversation with Aziz about surrendering she seemed to disappear, but Martha doesn’t usually go down without a fight or at least she would appear for the surrender.
• Not to be a broken record (and this has nothing to do with the actress who plays Sandra, Harriet Slater) but Pennyworth could’ve spent his “final” night with his mom or Dave Boy (who’s been taken for granted ever since Bazza’s death). Sandra deserves a clean break, but the show keeps pulling her back in.
• Instead of some superfluous romance scenes between Sandra and Alfie, it would’ve been great to see more of Katie and Bet together (who’s been paired up with her sister more in this latter half of the season). While Katie seemed to accept that Bet needed to kill Salt, she said nothing about prison guards (and Bet didn’t seem to struggle with the decision at all).
• Mrs. P. answering the door was pretty awesome, but this week’s MVP might be either Jack Bannon (for how he played the reunion scene with his dad with so much anger) or Anna Chancellor (for not forgetting Frances’ history with the Skykes sisters when they appeared to rescue her).

Pennyworth airs Sundays at 9 PM EST on EPIX.