‘The Last Ship’ 1.05 Recap: Monkey Huntin’

New on ‘The Last Ship’: Costa Rica! Vaccines! Monkeys! All the important upcoming plot points are laid out for us this week. Well, except maybe it’s Nicaragua instead of Costa Rica. I’m still not sure.

Now that the Last Ship is loaded with supplies and completely repaired, the writers high-five and take this episode off. Fortunately, that doesn’t matter because 90% of the characters with names, including a random Red Shirt, assemble for a jungle Away Mission. This mission includes boxes that were built to store vaccine “test subjects” for the good doctor. Hey, it’s the end of the world; we’re not above animal testing.

Right off the bat, I have to say that anything that happens on the ship in this episode is totally lame. ESPECIALLY Tactical Beard. Man, I hope a Sumatran rat monkey bites him.

The next scene opens on the captain and his tablet. “Stardate, Wednesday O-something hours. We are headed to Costa Rica to find Dr. Scott some monkeys… Uh, I mean Nicaragua because the river to Costa Rica is bad, but we’re gonna go up that river anyway. I dunno, it’s all very confusing.”

FAST BOATS! Tremendous slo-mo we-should-have-brought-water-skis-and-Larry-Fishburne. FAST BOATS! The awesome is put on pause as we join the only two people left on the ship outlining what will be dreadfully important during today’s monkey hunt. The cell service in Nicaragarica is really crappy so they have a flare gun communication plan. Green flare = Good. Red flare = Bad. “I hope we don’t see any of them bad flares…” Wink, wink. “…but if we do, we’ll be prepared!” FIVE-INCH!

Speaking of FIVE-INCH, the lack of it has Jack Bender filling a producer role for this episode.

The FAST BOATS land and Boyfriend announces that they are “going in.” This means a hot jungle hike in HVAC suits followed by: Nicaragarican Bamboo! Monkeys! Sick people moaning like zombies! Quick, back to the FAST BOATS! The team decides to split up. Just then, they lose radio contact and send up a Green/Good flare. Just as the green blaze arcs back down to Earth, our Away Team spots a luxury yacht partially sunk and emblazoned with this episode’s title (also the name of main baddie): El Toro. These events lead to this episode’s ominous plot timer! (Whew! I didn’t think we’d get one!) Ok, here’s how the timer works: 48 hours after a Green/Good flare, something happens. But if a Red/Bad flare goes up, something different happens. Got it?

More on that later. Now it’s time to bag us some test subjects. With Jurassic Park monkey hunting music and the bass dialed up, the Red Shirt finds a booby trap. With his leg. Ouch. The Nicaragaricans come flooding out of the woodwork, and just like that, the Away Team is captured. They take Team Last Ship to their leader, that actor who looks like the Hispanic Tony Shalhoub. His first line? “Hello. Welcome to my jungle.” You’re gonna DIIIIEEEEEE!!!!

We interrupt the plot to bring you more Tactical Beard and Dr. Red, who gave up the monkey hunt and went back to the ship to quote Mark Twain. BARF.

Back to the jungle! Latino Mr. Monk has donned the Wonderful Ice Cream Suit and forces the Americans to eat foreign food.

“Why are you here?”
“Uh, we think the monkey may have caused the sickness.”
“I don’t think so.”
“No, we really think so.”
“How’s your dinner?”
“Mmmm, just like mom use to make.”
“You just ate monkey.”

Monk sends up a Green/Good flare to buy him some time to boss around the Last Ship’s Away Team. Ultimately, he decides he’s going to keep the Away Team’s gear, but give them some monkeys. He’s in a hurry, because he needs to go be super creepy with the ex-mayor of Nicaragarica’s underage daughters. Our heroes are boxing up monkeys when they witness lots of inhumane treatment in Monk’s camp. There’s a tussle and the Away Team is sent packing.

Now it’s decision time. The FAST BOAT is halfway back to the ship. They have what they came for and the keg has been tapped when Team USA decides maybe some bad guys need their asses kicked. Everyone wants to go put the hurt on El Toro. Everyone but the Master Chief. “What do you say we head back to the Last Ship? You know, spin up the tomahawks, and maybe load a giant round in the FIVE-INCH?” Nope. The world is just not worth saving if this tiny part of it is oppressed. Plus, there’s only like ten minutes left in the episode and we haven’t fired any MACHINE GUNS or had any silent commando murdering yet.

They split up. Boyfriend attacks the kitchen tent. Jayne is BADASS. The Captain goes right to Monk’s tent. Evil Nicaragaricas are killed. Monk is captured and then stabbed to death by the ex-mayor.

The episode closes with a final slo-mo FAST BOAT scene cruising by dozens of infected Nicaragaricas on the beaches. I guess when 80% of the world is dead or dying, we are TOTALLY against unethical human vaccine trials. Those poor monkeys.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *