Review: Dead Pixels “Flanks/Yams”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Meg’s life is in shambles. Her favorite online game is a bust and she’s been dumped by the world’s most interesting boiler man. Her downward spiral leads her to revisit the very first release of Kingdom Scrolls. It takes her back to her childhood, and she finds a NPC child that she and Nicky adopted.

Meanwhile, Nicky is dealing with the arrival of Daisy, his maybe girlfriend. Their real life meeting is a bit awkward, as she’s kind of a third wheel on Nicky and Meg’s questing. She winds up going home early, but a surprising new player takes her place: Alison!

Our Take:

It’s only felt like a few short weeks since Dead Pixels returned on the CW  for its second season, but the time for the finale is already here! Flanks/Yams is an episode that tries to wrap up the season’s multiple arcs in a matter of twenty minutes or so. And it does a good job for the most part, but boy, does it seem a little rushed in places.

The episode picks up where we left things last week, with Meg’s life going down the tubes. She’s been dumped by her ‘boyfriend’ because, let’s be honest, she was not emotionally ready for a relationship. In the aftermath, she retreats back to her childhood by going home and playing an old Kingdom Scrolls 1.0 server that she and Nicky used to call home. It’s one of the best scenes in the episode for sure, getting at that nostalgia factor we all have for youthful games and reminiscing about the past. It’s also really funny, because Meg finds a NPC kid named Tobias who she and Nicky ‘adopted’. And by ‘adopted’, I mean they bricked him up in a house so he couldn’t escape.

It leads to what is maybe the highlight of this season, where Meg breaks the news to Nicky in a very dramatic fashion while Alison looks on in confusion. Tobias has been bricked up for eight years now, and Nicky and Meg become fascinated with reliving their glory days. Daisy has come to visit Nicky (thanks to Alison’s actions in the last episode) and at first she happily joins them on their quests, but she soon becomes dispirited when she realizes that she seems to be getting in the way of Nicky and Meg. That’s right, going back to the olden days when they adopted a kid together seems to have reawakened… something. I’m still not sure if it’s romance, especially after how that ended in season one, but they definitely share a very strong connection regardless, and Daisy decides she’s not mature enough to be involved in all that right now. Her scene where she quickly exits via Uber is also a big highlight.

But the biggest shocker of the night comes from Alison. All season long she’s been trying to ‘reform’ her flatmates in a way, in order to get them outside and reacquainted with the real world. However, when Alison’s iffy boyfriend breaks up with her, she’s the one who craves mindless distractions, and Nicky and Meg offer her help the only way they know how—by inviting her to join their Kingdom Scrolls group. Finally, after so many episodes of complaining about it, Alison joins the game. And due to her emotionally fragile state, she really seems to enjoy destroying things in the virtual world. It’s a pretty out there ending but it feels right for the show.

Flanks/Yams has a lot to do in a short amount of time. Nicky, Meg, and Alison all have storylines that need tying up. Heck, even Usman gets some time to shine in the hospital when he is told to quit the game to help his wife deliver their child. It’s a little chaotic and there may be a few rushed parts, especially surrounding Meg and Nicky’s significant others, but that ending scene where they return Tobias to his real family really capped things off in a nice way, and in the end, I think it’s a successful game over from me.