Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 6 recap: Yes, the team go to space

Jane isn’t the same in Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 6.

Dorothy’s imaginary friend, the Candlemaker had evidently killed two of Jane’s personalities in the Underground and left Jane in a coma in the manor. We find out in Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 6 that there’s a possibility that these personalities can be mended.

While Hammerhead and the rest of the Underground mourn their fallen and take them to the well for their ultimate resting place, it turns out that the well has healing properties. In the first season, viewers learned that one personality named Miranda had jumped into the well to end her life.

Now, she resurfaces (played by Samantha Marie Ware), informing the others that Baby Doll and Flaming Katy will eventually mend in the well. As their bodies are thrown in, Miranda commands Jane to step aside as the primary host of Kay’s body. Miranda knows what Kay really wants and how to protect her. When Jane rises from her coma in the real world, she’s been taken over by Miranda.

Related Story: Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 5 recap

Elsewhere, Rita turns up for the first rehearsal of the Cloverton theatre’s play. To her horror, she realizes it’s a dramatic retelling of the first season finale of the show. The girl playing the ‘Blob’, a.k.a. Rita herself is shockingly astute in profiling her character. Suffice to say, Rita has mommy issues that she must work out sooner rather than later.

Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 6: Pioneers of the Uncharted

Among Niles’ many accomplishments was the invention of space travel (we’re not kidding). He sent three astronauts into space 65 years before and now the Pioneers of the Uncharted return to Earth to meet the great man himself.

Instead, they’re intercepted by Larry, because Niles can’t find Dorothy. Specs (Jason Burkey) and Zip (Derek Evans) are childish and uninterested in conversing with Larry, which we later learn is because they’re dead and their bodies are being controlled by alien spores. The spores eventually die in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The third member of the team, Valentina Vostok (Mariana Klaveno) is far more professional. When she recognizes Larry’s name from his military days, Valentina shakes his hand and the two characters immediately radiate at the same frequency.

Valentina has a Negative Spirit inside her, much like Larry’s. In fact, it was one of the Pioneers’ cosmic missions that successfully led to Larry’s ‘accident’. Unlike Larry, Valentina has formed a perfect symbiotic relationship with her Spirit. It took her five years of isolation to find this harmony. This means Valentina gets to look young and make contact with others.

You can imagine Larry’s heartache. He’s spent decades battling with his Spirit, being unable to connect with anyone outside of Doom Patrol. Every time he’s attempted to make a connection, it’s ended badly. He reached out to his family – his son sold him out and his grandson was shot.

While Valentina has disassociated herself from family matters, Larry isn’t willing to give up on his family yet. Does that mean he and the Spirit won’t find harmony?

I am very curious to know if Valentina will play a bigger role in Doom Patrol Season 2, or later in the series. In the comics, she was introduced as a romantic foil for Larry (Larry wasn’t gay in the original comics). In the early runs of the team, Larry and Valentina fused together to create an intersex character called Rebis.

I don’t know how far the showrunners want to go with this story, but if they want to phase Larry out, it’s possible they could introduce Rebis and add to the gender diversity on the show.

Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 6: Space, the Final Frontier

While Cyborg is in Detroit, busy revealing the craziness with Doom Patrol to Roni and trying to figure out what technical issues are causing her pain, Cliff excitedly hands Niles the detached finger he stole from one of the thieves outside Roni’s building. Niles has no time for him since Dorothy is missing.

A distraught Dorothy takes off into space on the Pioneers’ space ship. She wants to leave Earth because she’s afraid of hurting anyone else the way she hurt Jane. Niles goes after her on his secret rocket ship, bringing Cliff with him. Niles is worried but also angry about his daughter acting out without realizing the consequences of her actions.

Cliff is utterly horrified by how many restrictions Niles imposes on Dorothy. When he finds the girl on the moon, building a grave for the imaginary friend that Flaming Katy destroyed, Cliff takes her under his wing and explains that Jane will forgive her. They’re all just people reacting to internal pain.

Honestly, Cliff can be such a great character from time to time. He’s a loving father figure to Jane and from his short interaction with Dorothy, it’s evident that he’s meant to be a great one to her too. When they return to the ship, Niles makes Dorothy promise never to make another wish again. Cliff thinks that’s sad, but he doesn’t understand Dorothy’s power. She can lay waste to the universe.

Cliff assures Niles that he will be there to take care of Dorothy once Niles is gone and Niles seems grateful. And then he jettisons Cliff out the airlock into the vastness of space.

What! What just happened? Can we ever trust Niles? That man is a terror and true evil. Someone had better rescue Cliff in the very next episode because I cannot stand the thought of him being trapped in his robot body in outer space for eternity. He’s had such a raw deal at the hands of Niles, and there seems to be no end to it. These cliff hangers on Doom Patrol Season 2 are really surpassing themselves!

Next: Disney Plus: 5 upcoming shows we’re most excited to watch

Why do you think Niles abandoned Cliff in Doom Patrol Season 2, Episode 6? How do you think Cliff will be rescued?