Episode 3 begins with several brief interviews where Concordia’s residents discuss what’s most important to them and what they enjoy most about life in the city. Safety, openness, and cultural acceptance appear to be amongst the most cherished.
Juliane Ericksen spends several seconds outside in deep thought before attending a board meeting with Hanna Bremer (Karoline Eichhorn) and several key Concordia staff members. Hanna wastes little time pointing out how she’s staked her career on Concordia and they haven’t even been honest with her. The meeting ends with Hanna giving them until then of tomorrow to prove there is no longer a threat or she’ll postpone the launch.
The Concordia staff catches a lucky break when they realize that only the higher-ups and employees with NDAs were privy to the security breach. Mathilde (Josephine Jobert) also adds that all the footage was at least a month or older, indicating that the threat is no longer current. Juliane ends the meeting by agreeing that they were wrong for not involving Hanna and ensuring them that they won’t be repeating that mistake. If the team can’t prove that the system is secure by tomorrow, they will share the threat with the residents.
With Juliane gone the remaining members debate how to proceed. Thea Ryan (Ruth Bradley) is the first to take cooperate espionage off the table because the hackers would have probably chosen to remain undetected within the system. AJ Oba (Kento Nakajima) suggests that although Oliver Miller (Louis Landau) hasn’t received a payoff, he could have been killed for that very reason.
Tessa Vogel (Maeve Metelka) is texting feverishly with someone when Elodie Cailleux (Alba Gaia Bellugi) points out that they are almost out of provisions. Being that they are parked near a lake, Tessa sarcastically jokes that they are in no immediate danger of starving. An argument soon breaks out as Elodie appears to blame Tess for possibly making her father think she is a killer. Tessa attempts to assure her this isn’t the case but it helps little. Elodie also appears to blame herself for Oliver’s death, but their little dispute is soon interrupted by a fisherman approaching in the distance.
Thea checks in with Marco Vieri (Niccolo Senni) to only learn that he has nothing new to report. He does mention hearing rumblings of some buzz but doesn’t know enough about it yet. She practically ends the call by telling him to focus on groups opposed to the Concordia expansion as well as anti-surveillance groups.
Isabelle Larsson (Nanna Blondell) enlists the help of Oskar Eklund (Set Sjostrand) to interrogate Ole (Benjamin Stender). This goes about as expected, with Ole claiming that he had nothing to do with the breach, despite the malware coming from his system. Oskar may believe him because he asks about leaving his computer unattended while Isabelle continually threatens that they will find a connection to Oliver if there is one.
AJ approaches Noah Ericksen (Steven Sowah) with the idea of shutting down the system to suss out the hackers. Noah not only tells him that this isn’t an option but he insults him by practically blaming the breach on him since he designed the system.
Azeem Mahmoud (Mohamed Achour) shares his fears with Juliane about people finding out that his daughter was adopted from his Syrian cousin who was involved in an unplanned pregnancy and refused to abort. Juliane assures him that his secret will remain a secret, although she couldn’t possibly know that for sure.
By this time, Isabelle has not only cleared Ole but has managed to uncover Tessa’s identity and link here to a far-left anti-surveillance known as ‘The Faceless.’ After Thea learns of this, she does a complete background on the Faceless Group and presents it to the higher-ups at Concordia. Everyone appears pleased with the discovery until Juliane brings up the ultimate question, are they still in the system? This is when AJ proposes his system shutdown theory again. Much to everyone’s surprise, Juliane agrees and already has a strategy to use the shutdown to Concordia’s advantage. Isabelle agrees and adds that the news of the shutdown should come from the community officers.
Azeem delivers an inspiring speech, announcing the shutdown and earlier breach before Juliane takes the system offline. With the system shutdown, Noah and Isabelle spend some time together, discussing similar fears of Concordia’s potential failure.
After Alexandre (Hugo Becker) puts Talon (Edward Wray) down for the evening, he tends to the laundry and shares a few words with Veronica Ryan (Cara Kelly), who is still mistaking him for her husband, John. While working late at Concordia, Mathilda receives a visit from Elias (Eros Emmanuil Papadakis) with a book of Greek poems and one particular marked verse. After his brief visit, Thea learns that Mathilda learned to speak Greek in school, which eventually segues into a brief debate about the downsides of an expensive education. While this takes place, AJ appears to have linked Dr. Peter Blom (Duncan Green) to the manipulated image Oscar was using.
Alexandre is whipped into a frenzy later that evening when Veronica has an episode and leaves the apartment with Talon in tow. He not only manages to remain calm but locates downstairs within minutes of realizing their absence. The mysterious young Oriental girl (Yuho Yamashita) appears to still be monitoring the apartment.
AJ’s discovery of Peter leads him to a clip of a meeting with Juliane where Peter appears to be struggling with some decision he’s made or will have to make in the future. Juliane pleads with him but he responds that there must be a way to reveal the truth without sinking the entire projection. While Thea excuses herself in the adjunct room to speak with Alexandre, Elodie wakes in the middle of the night and tries to make send a text without waking Tessa. Alexandre is carefully attempting to broach Veronica’s lapse but Thea immediately becomes distracted upon learning Marco just received a ping on Elodie’s phone.
Just as quickly as Thea and Mathilda notify the local police of Elodie’s location, Tessa realizes what Elodie has done. It takes a bit of pleading, convincing, and promising to introduce her to Leon (Jonas Nay) but Tessa and Elodie manage to escape before a team of locals arrive. After learning of the failure, Thea tells Mathilda to go home and return to the fight tomorrow.
While on a jog by the lake the following morning, Peter runs into Thea who explains her presence as an all-night crisis. Peter explains his presence by saying he had problems sleeping. It’s not long before the conversation turns into a bit of a verbal sparring match, with him accusing her of not fully believing in Concordia. She tells him it’s certainly an aspiring idea before abruptly departing.
When Isabelle finds herself besieged with nightmares, she decides to wake early and return to the investigation. As she combs through footage of the scene where Oliver’s body was discovered, Noah reaches out to Adrian Grant (Peter Seaton-Clark). Noah briefly gives Tessa and Elodie’s name as well as the far-left anti-surveillance group, The Faceless.
Mathilda and Thea share their discovery of Ole with the rest of the Concordia higher-ups and assure them that the system is secure and no longer breached. AJ doesn’t share his discovery but appears to be struggling with it, as he continually replays Peter’s and Juliane’s meeting over in his head while staring at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. Sometime later, when Juliane learns that Marco has gained an ‘in’ with the Faceless Group, she asks Thea if he can deliver a message.
Elodie is finally introduced to Leon but the meeting quickly spins out of control when Tessa gets an alert on her phone with Juliane’s message. Julian’s message appears to be her simply bragging about taking Concordia offline for 24 hours and not experiencing a single incident. She says that for her this means that it isn’t the cameras or security that keeps the town safe but the lives they’ve built together. She ends the message by offering the invitation to sit down with her. An outraged Leon not only tells the girls to not believe the lies but promises that new damning information will be brought to light.
The episode ends with Isabelle arriving at Concordia and finding Azeem, along with several other communications officers, gathered around a computer with an article titled, ‘Concordia Data Leak: Utopia Built On Blood Money?’
Concordia Review
The episode played out pretty much as one would expect, except for the ending. I may have missed something along the lines, but I am not sure whether the article is a reference to the school shooting or something else entirely. Either way, I certainly cannot wait to find out. Although the series isn’t great, it certainly is intriguing and suspenseful. Although the episodes are shorter, they still seem a bit overlong at times. I think it is the constant ping-ponging between the characters in which many scenes are no more than a few minutes long and basically filler.
I can’t help but wonder if taking Concordia offline was an expected or even a hoped reaction and if someone cleverly used the downtime to do something nefarious that just hasn’t been revealed yet. I also like how each episode usually opens with realistic interviews of Concordia residents. I’d give the episode a 5.7 out of 10.
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