Hi Clone Clubbers, happy new year! Things were moving right along in Canada (love that) with Sarah and her 7,456 clones and then the holidays happened. We’re back! Let’s see what happens in S1:E8 of Orphan Black.

So last time I found out three important things: there are 9 Clones, Paul (Dylan Bruce) is DEFINITELY on Team Sarah (Tatiana Maslany) and tails are super, super gross.

Art (Kevin Hanchard) has just found out that Beth Childs (Tatiana Maslany with combed hair) and Sarah Manning (Tatiana Maslany as a punk-rock-ho) look exactly the same and share fingerprints; now they think Sarah’s who was dead in the gravel pit and not Katja (Tatiana Maslany with short hair and a German accent). Does Det. Angela DeAngelis (Inga Cadranel) believe in doppelgangers? How about twins?

Sarah and Paul wake up slightly differently

He’s worried about where to go, they can’t go back to their “flat”, or as they call them in Toronto: REALLY EXPENSIVE. She wants to cuddle, but he wants to talk about Dr. Leekie (Matt Frewer – Max Headroom!!!!) coming to town, the doctor thinks Sarah’s been the one killing all his clones.

Fe (Jordan Gavaris) comes in and spoils whatever mood is left, we get a long-range shot of Sarah’s adorable bum. I’m of two minds re: the casual nudity on shows like this. One on hand, it’s gratuitous, there was no reason to show her adorable bum just then. On the other hand, it is reasonable, plot-wise, that a couple that just boned like frantic monkeys staring at their last banana would be still naked in the morning. It bugs me when they sorta kinda try to show sex without any of the actual sex-related stuff, like nudity, See: The Magicians S1:E1 when there was a blanket, bra and nothing that looked like sex. ANYWAY. Nice bum!

Allison (Tatiana Maslany with bangs and anxiety) calls just then, she’s back early from marriage counseling but doesn’t want to talk to Sarah or Cosima (Tatiana Maslany with dreadlocks and AWESOMENESS) as she gets her house in order. She and Donnie are getting a divorce and yeah: saw that coming! She HATED him and I have been trying to find out when I last did this show, because I just recently myself asked for a divorce. I kinda knew I was Allison but now I KNOW it, you know? Just nicer, trust.

Sarah’s worried because they don’t know yet for sure who Allison’s monitor is, Allison is busy, “reclaiming my life, Sarah. Please respect that.” Just then Aynsley (Natalie Lisinka) lets herself in, you know, LIKE YOU DO, and starts checking the mail. By checking, I mean holding up to the light: who does that???? Allison thinks that’s weird too.

Art and Angie have found Mrs. S (Maria Doyle Kennedy); is she the legal guardian of Sarah Manning? Really? Still? They tell her that Sarah’s dead and Siobhan is shaken until she asks when: two weeks ago? Pfft. “You’re sure it’s her?” They ask if Sarah had problems with women specifically and that confused both Mrs. S and I. Why would they ask that? Because she looks like a bunch of other women? 8, to be exact?

Damnit, Cosima is on the screen finally, but she’s on Team Leekie all of a sudden! She’s blaming SARAH for protecting herself by bringing the wrath of Helena down on Leekie’s henchmen, I can’t even believe that. Felix can’t either, jumping in to say that the real problem was that Cosima got the science wrong, how did Olivier know that Sarah wasn’t Beth?

Felix makes me laugh; Sarah needs to look after Allison right now! She’s not fine, she’s divorcing and it does weird things to Normals. They lose all their fake happiness and come downtown to find themselves. I would absolutely go find myself in downtown Toronto if I could, werd.

I love Felix

He thinks Aynsley is Allison’s monitor for sure, I don’t know…Aynsley is asking more questions, though, yay! Allison is just the slightest bit more brittle today and there’s a tense standoff showing how women fight in Scarberia. Allison gets her keys back, anyway; that’s all that matters.

Oh. Dang it, Olivier (David Richmond-Peck) lived through his unorthodox tail amputation, performed sans anesthetic by Helena. He can’t get his tail back, either, awwww. The doctor tried, but…no chance, he tells Paul. Er. How is Paul allowed near Olivier after he clearly showed his Team Sarah stripes last time? Maybe because Olivier is under heavy sedation.

Dr. Leekie is not happy with Delphine’s (Evelyne Brochu) status update on Cosima; he needs her to “dig deeper and faster” for Cosima’s sake, of course. Was that a reference… sorry, sorry, I saw something like that on the weekend on Josh Marshall’s twitter feed: I think he wants Delphine to “target close associates.”

Helena (Tatiana Maslany with a blonde perm, Ukranian accent, back carvings and homicidal urges) is wearing Sarah’s jacket, as Sarah is wearing hers, it’s full of letters from Kira (Skyler Wexler) and pictures, too. Erp.

Sarah and Felix are having some quality sibling time (someone’s foot has to be in someone else’s face or it doesn’t count) when Mrs. S pops in to make sure Sarah’s alive. She seems tense; Felix tries to help

Mrs. S isn’t having any levity OR any champers with her breakfast; Sarah needs to tell her right now if Kira is in danger. If she is, Sarah needs to yell “Fire” and they will burn this created life to the ground.

Oh noooo I think our clones are about to run into some extra complication; Art has matched Sarah to Beth’s death as well, so now they have her walking in front of a train then being shot two days later. They’re struggling, but don’t quite have the shape of it yet, they think Beth will be able to clear it up for them. Look who just walked in!

Sarah as Beth pulls off a “who the hell is this??” fairly well in front of Art and Angie when shown her own mugshot, they seem to accept but I doubt it…

Allison is coaching at figure skating practice (because it’s on her SCHEDULE, AYNSLEY) when another friend runs up and offers condolences. I mean this in the best way, I’m going to try to not interject too much on Allison’s situation, but you might want to skip any passages with her name because I can’t seem to help myself.

TANGENT: In my experience, people don’t want to talk in person about an ongoing divorce unless YOU do, and then they mostly just wanna be nice, which is the death of any normal conversation. Say someone just wants to have a chat, impart some knowledge about something, not dissolve into a puddle of tears at the sound of “ohmigod, are you okay???” Because nothing good happens after that, just a lot of re-living and crying and trying to explain without being too explicit and then more crying and then you never even get to to the point of the conversation anyway. Divorce sucks.

Oh look, Aynsley’s there anyway at the rink! Even though she’s not a coach or anything, look, she’s brought her cheating husband Chad (Eric Johnson! From The Knick AND Edmonton, woo hoo!) who is on Team Singlehood – free at last! Allison’s had enough of Aynsley messing with her life, she’s gonna mess right back.

Art and Angie are holding Sarah as Beth’s feet to the fire; they know she buried Katja’s fingerprint results; they want to know why. Art’s at least trying to stay friendly, but after Sarah as Beth stomps out, they grab everything she touched and send it for print analysis.

Chad’s enjoying the demon reefer out in the parking lot when Allison’s bloodhound nose picks up the scent. Instead of ratting him out to Ayns, she takes a deep drag. He doesn’t know what’s going on. If ever a woman needed to relax, it’s our Allison.

Olivier’s awake and but not quite ready to chat with Paul, even with being facedown to protect his hurt… area. Paul’s been digging, though, Olivier Duvall is actually Kevin from Wenatchee with a bunch of “unsavory sex warrants” and now he’s going to listen to Paul. There are savory sex warrants?

Allison and Chad are getting along famously, I never knew weed was an aphrodisiac, but now I want to know what this looks like.

Now the sex! Yay!!!

Delphine has come to see Cosima, who’s almost spinning trying to explain away her pass the last time they saw each other. Let’s just make crazy science together!

FELIX: I agree, I think Cosima’s boobs are bigger

Lots of lip biting and then Delphine makes her move.

and then REALLY makes her move!

Yay! Now the sex! Everyone’s humping this episode! Well. Probably not Olivier, I mean, Kevin.

Chad and Allison didn’t put a LOT of thought into what they were doing, clearly, shagging in the back of a minivan in broad daylight at the local recreation centre.

Allison drives home after scream-singing along to “Bitch” by Meredith Brooks (so many wasted nights watching drunk women try to seductively get down to their knees and back up again); stopped by Aynsley freaking out in the middle of the street. Anysley moves it to physical by bouncing Allison’s head against the steering wheel and it is ON. Super entertaining suburban slapfight on aisle one!

Art and Angie have made it to see Colin (Nicholas Rose) at the morgue. One look at Beth’s face sends them asking for Felix’s name and number, what with him identifying her as Sarah.

Back at Felix’s apartment (I HAVE SEEN THE PENI!!! JS, I saw them!!), he’s freaking out and hiding the Clone Club Series of Portraits but er: what to do about Sarah? Allison shows up then, drunk, bottle of wine in hand.

Sarah drives to Allison’s place, she had no idea Allison had that in her! Props. With everything going crazy, Sarah suggests they tell everyone they’re clones. Or maybe just Art and Angie, I’m not sure.

Helena is creepy AF

Paul is going through the last of the details with Olivier when Dr. Leekie shows up; does the doctor know Paul is blown? Olivier’s had weightier things on his mind

Delphine is crying after sex with Cosima, that’s totally normal for her (?) but she’s never been this hungry! In a completely non-farfetched scenario, Cosima jumps out of bed (Delphine fully dressed and she in full bra and panty set. After exhausting ravenous-making sex) to go grab Eskimo Pies at a nearby store, leaving Delphine alone in her apartment.

I mean

Delphine tosses the place while I sincerely hope that Cosima is not that dumb. Delphine finds everything, now she has to die, right?

Olivier is covering for Paul after all; explaining that it was Helena who is the danger to them and the clones; Dr. Leekie welcomes Paul to the Big Picture. They get kicked out of the hospital, Dr. Leekie taking a second to put the fear of anti-God into Olivier then praising Paul for “proving his mettle.”

Delphine calls then, she wants assurances that Cosima is safe before imparting what she’s found out. He sort of does (it’s PROTECTING Cosima!), then presses for names. She gives them all, Sarah Manning tweaks Dr. Leekie the most, but at least Delphine isn’t honest about how much information there is on her, like the fact that Kira is mentioned in her file.

Sarah’s decided to start coming clean close to home, at Mrs. S’s house. A drunken Allison tries to make nice while Siobhan stares. Allison went to university! And got married! Siobhan wants to know what happened to Sarah, then, what? The other penny drops for Mrs. S, she recognises Allison from when she impersonated Sarah before.

Allison is distraught, she just wanted to say “eff it!” Why couldn’t she just say “eff it!”? Well, since she can’t say it…Bed time!

Felix is holding court for the detectives, I laugh-snorted when he said Sarah had no other sisters, except him. Art finds the clone paintings, Felix explains those as part of his Twisted Sister series. It’s just a shame that Felix is too young to know the BAND Twisted Sister. They leave, but Art has a hunch. When Sarah had gone inside Leekie’s club to find Paul, Felix called Art’s cell and said he wanted to talk about Beth Childs, then hung up when Sarah appeared. Art calls back outside Felix’s door: soooo busted, Felix.

A strange doctor is in tending to on-his-belly Olivier; he jabs a needle’s worth of something into Olivier’s foot but doesn’t explain, so I’m guessing he’s not a real doctor. Dr. Leekie sends his regards as Olivier dies.

Sarah and Siobhan are poring over the past again; it seems every other ones of the clones’ mothers used in-vitro fertilization to conceive but Sarah’s origins are still a mystery. She came in off the books, down Carlton’s pipeline. Kira is listening to them talk but edging towards the door, is Helena out there? She IS! And so bloody creepy. Kira lets her in, what??! You are SO in timeout, young lady! They disappear into the night.

Sarah chases after them as Helena explains that she’s taking Kira to meet someone. Kira is mostly concerned that Helena looks like her Mommy, but sick. She gives Helena a hug, which completely undoes her.

Kira hears Sarah calling for her, she should go now. Helena lets her AND THEN KIRA GETS HIT BY A CAR. Come ON!! And we’re out.

Child-abusing aside, you can see how the Clones’ lives are disintegrating. The police, Helena and Leekie all getting closer and the net closing in. I’m disappointed that Cosima was unable to see how disingenuous the lovely Delphine is. It’s believable, just… typical. It looks to me as though Dr. Leekie is tying up loose ends, so I would be very wary, Paul, now that Olivier has been disposed of. I have to wonder where Sarah AND Helena came from, were they implanted as embryos in an unsuspecting woman? That’s very hard to believe that someone would have a baby implanted and then give them up to an orphanage, but that brings up something else entirely for me. Allison’s mother and others had in-vitro fertilization to get pregnant, did they all go see Dr. Leekie? Did he have a fertility clinic? Can the Clones trace things through there? But everyone was so spread out! Need more information! Who’s the OGC?

Until next time, which won’t be quite so long: promise! Cheers