tears in the rain<\/a>\u201d monologue in Blade Runner. Batty, having reached the end of his four-year life cycle (and subsequent run from the law as a fugitive of planet Earth), recalls his journeys through space and mourns these memories being lost more than his own death. Similarly, Peg\u2019s experience as a human was truncated and exaggerated, making her \u201cmore human than human\u201d in the process. En route to their pit stop at the diner \u2014 Peg\u2019s last meal \u2014 she describes the joys of finger painting as a kindergarten teacher with an air of profundity and excitement to match Roy Batty\u2019s visions of fiery ships and attack beams glittering through the darkness of space. Then the life slowly drains from her voice as she recalls catching the financial-trading bug and leaving the kindergarten-teacher life behind, burned out on the sheer extremity of Earth\u2019s financial games.<\/p>\nWe know enough about John Sugar by now to know the call to \u201cprotect and serve\u201d is certainly one thing about being a police officer that appeals to him, but it\u2019s not the main thing. \u201cThe sheer variety of experience kind of excites me,\u201d he adds sheepishly as Peg wolfs down her last cheeseburger. \u201cThere\u2019s some violence in that,\u201d she replies, to which Sugar assures her he\u2019ll be careful. Besides, the violence isn\u2019t part of the \u201cvariety of experience\u201d that he\u2019s interested in. In Sugar\u2019s universe, Earth is an exceptionally vibrant place \u2014 a vast microcosm of conscious exuberance. But, as Peg\u2019s story makes clear, with that exuberance comes a fractal of malice, greed, and destruction that feels more natural, sometimes even good, the deeper you weave yourself into the greater human tapestry. Peg\u2019s initial spark for human life eventually erupted into an all-consuming runaway flame \u2014 her story ends as she sets herself on fire inside a gas-drenched car.<\/p>\n
When we cut back to the present. John Sugar has snuck into Ray Vega\u2019s home and stands behind his adversary with a gun aimed at his head. Ever since he found out his friend Henry Thorpe had become a serial killer (or serial killer\u2019s assistant, to be precise), our hero has been worried about \u201cassimilation,\u201d which sounds like a woo-woo sci-fi concept when it\u2019s introduced, like a metaphysical side effect of assuming a different physical body. But maybe assimilation is just what happens to anyone \u2014 spaceman or otherwise \u2014 who really enters the fray of humanity. You learn that the game polite society plays on the surface of its table is a distraction from the real game being played underneath it. Your stated role of protector is just a pretense for your actual role in serving the machinations of power. \u201cPoliceman\u201d is just a shadow role for the hired gun.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s how John Sugar goes from conscientious private eye to would-be assassin. It\u2019s not in the first cheeseburger he ate last episode, or the sex he\u2019ll have with Charlotte later on (both violations of the Provided Rules of Behavior that Sugar wouldn\u2019t have even considered not long ago). The true \u201cslippery slope\u201d of which Peg warned is in the na\u00efvet\u00e9 of believing the rules themselves offer sufficient protection from humanity\u2019s snares. Of thinking there was any other path but the slippery slope to begin with.<\/p>\n
The path to Ji Moon\u2019s safety turns slippery just as Vega\u2019s fire-sale plan becomes clearer. Having received confirmation that Vega visited Tyler Ko for information on Ji \u2014 to which Tyler claims to have lied like a champ, just as instructed \u2014 Sugar knows his adversary is suspicious, and it\u2019s only a matter of time until he tracks down Ji. While checking in on Ji at rehab and getting a better idea of the facility\u2019s minimal-security measures, Sugar comes across a mysterious second cell phone in Ji\u2019s backpack. As fate would have it, the phone is the late Chuy\u2019s, swiped from his hospital room during the run-in with Vega, complete with footage of Vega explaining the fire sale to Chuy until he becomes suspicious of all the questions.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou identify the clientele, you stake out the territory, and you flood it,\u201d says Vega. Unfortunately, he stops short of saying why and for whom. As Flybjerg explains later, Vega is being just careful enough with his words for a good lawyer to concoct an alternate explanation down the road. As it stands, the video only gets them close to making an actual case. A corrupt cop should be easier to get than your average citizen, not harder, Sugar argues, still unable to accept that Vega\u2019s scheme shows the L.A. Sheriff\u2019s Department functioning as intended, not corrupted by one bad apple. Flybjerg, on the other hand, understands the field all too well, and suggests taking care of Vega for good, outside the law.<\/p>\n
Sugar tries to escape the violent path before him by going on a cute movie date with Charlotte. Roman Holiday on the silver screen of the Vista gives way to the primordial flicker of the stars, and he\u2019s waxing poetically about the Triangulum galaxy 2.9 million light-years away. They kiss, and Sugar even manages to turn down an invitation to take the night further, before a phone call from Tammy, the funeral-home insider, brings him back down to earth. Vega has visited her and intimidated her into divulging Ji\u2019s fake death certificate. No choice but to get Ji back to Korea immediately.<\/p>\n
Danny Moon takes the news hard. Even as all his professional boxing dreams are about to be realized, his brother is all he has left. Sugar\u2019s purpose in this earthly life \u2014 to reunite lost families in the City of Angels \u2014 is crumbling under the maddening impossibility of convicting a policeman of a crime in a world where the crime is the point.<\/p>\n
And boy, what a crime it is. Sugar puts the pieces together in a classic case-review montage: Those federal-grant apartments where Sugar\u2019s unhoused friends now live are mostly empty because Vega\u2019s contact at the morgue is listing the excess fentanyl deaths from the fire sale as living success stories, then billing the government for millions in housing contracts. The only way to keep Ji safe is to stop the whole operation with one extrajudicial shot to the head.<\/p>\n
Hats off to Sugar for ultimately choosing sex over violence, retreating from Vega\u2019s house, bullet still in the chamber, straight to Charlotte\u2019s hotel room. Not against my Provided Rules of Behavior, am I right? But for Sugar, the slippery slope to the heart of the human condition, darkness and all, began the moment he set foot on this strange, vibrant planet of stoned, violent apes. His meeting with Vega at the hotel bar later on confirms he\u2019s only postponed and reshaped the violence on the horizon, not prevented it. Vega has Danny Moon in custody for the robbery he took part in a few episodes back, and implies Danny will meet an unfortunate end if Sugar doesn\u2019t bring him Ji Moon in time. There\u2019s no entering Earth\u2019s arena if you don\u2019t expect to get your hands bloody.<\/p>\n
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