Shorts Review: Red vs. Blue Season 13, Episode 12 ‘Off-Key’

Spoilers Below:

“Off-Key”? Was anyone else expecting this week to be a musical version of Red vs. Blue?

Nah, me either. Though that probably could have helped.

The installment began with Felix and a cornered, sword-carrying Doyle. With no other option, Doyle hurled the object over a cliff, but Felix managed to catch it, just as Tucker, Caboose, Donut, and Lopez arrived. However, Locus swooped in via helicopter just in time, picked up Felix, and flew off. It was then revealed that the sword would not actually work unless Doyle is dead.

The dejected good guys reconvened to strategize, and Kimbal got incredibly frustrated, blaming Doyle by saying, “You should have thrown that sword off the mountain and taken the fucking bullet, but you’re too much of a stupid, selfish coward to see that.” They both left, and the remaining soldiers decided their only option was to unite the two armies together and press on.

In Case You Missed It:

1) “No one steals from the North Pole and gets away with it!”

2) Simmons, upon hearing Carolina will be okay, and so will Doc: “Eh, tough luck. Can’t win ‘em all.”

3) Doyle: “I’m a failure of a general, and apparently a failure of a human being. Should any of you actually need me, you know where to find me. / Simmons: “Actually, I don’t think you ever told us where your quarters are.” / Doyle: “Then I’m a failure at leaving too!”

There’s not much to say about this episode, because not much happened. The sword was turned over to the bad guys, and the good guys fought amongst each other and began to strategize. Oh, and Carolina is fine.

That’s it.

Sure, this is all important and necessary to the plot, but with a six-minute runtime and very little humor (see above) there wasn’t much to write home about this week. The episode served as what I can only assume to be the rock bottom point of the season (Jeebus help us if it’s not) and will likely set up whatever action comes next week.

There is still a bit of a mystery as to why Epsilon failed in a crucial moment too, so we’re likely to get a lot of answers in episode 13, and that’s some consolation. But if you were looking for any sort of answers this week, you’re probably disappointed, and will face a long seven days until the next time around.