Twisted Metal season 1, episode 9 recap: “R04DK11”

The penultimate episode of this season of Twisted Metal starts with a quick update about Sweet Tooth. It appears that he’s getting ready for something big, and whatever the plan is, it involves a whole lot of bombs.

Stu suggests that because Stone currently thinks that they’re dead, they should take the opportunity to go somewhere else and start a new life. Sweet Tooth doesn’t think so. He would much rather take on Stone, and since he’s the psychotic clown that’s in charge, that’s what they’re going to do.

John has to track down Quiet

Meanwhile, John is having to recover from his lowest point that happened at the end of the last episode. Quiet is gone and Evelyn the car is destroyed. John has to begin to put the pieces of his world back together. He finds another car, but it won’t start. However, there is a CB radio in the car and that gives him an idea.

Quiet is on the road alone and she is almost killed by someone trying to take her car, but at the last minute, the truck convoy from an earlier episode saves her. She asks them how they knew to look for her, and Watts and Amber reveal that John was the one who contacted them and had them track down Quiet. Quiet confronts John, and while he apologizes for what happened back at the Holy Men’s compound, she doesn’t forgive him. Quiet says that she’s only working with him to get herself into New San Francisco, but that after that they’re done.

As the two of them work together on a new car, John tries to get back into the rhythm that they previously had, but Quiet isn’t interested. She breaks down for John exactly why his actions in the previous episode tore them apart and how it made her feel. While John knew that he had acted badly, it seems that it takes this to really drive home exactly what he had done and how his actions were destroying his relationship with Quiet.

The new car gets a name

John works through the night on the new car, and when Quiet returns in the morning, she realizes that he has made some adjustments to the car based on the idea that they are truly a partnership, not just John and a sidekick. John makes a more heartfelt apology, and a future for the two of them together seems possible once again. However, almost at once, there is an attack on the truck convoy by Stone’s men and John and Quiet have to prepare for a fight. They name their new car Roadkill and are ready to face Stone’s men.

Stone and his men have set up a blockade that forces Roadkill, as well as the truck through a narrow window on the road, that leads to a car graveyard with dozens of abandoned cars everywhere. At least that’s what it looks like until they get right in the middle of the cars. That’s when every car roars to life surrounding John and Quiet, as well as the truck. It looks like they’re trapped when the sound of an ice cream truck is heard in the distance.

Sweet Tooth comes barreling in with bombs going off as he starts destroying cars left and right. With everyone getting ready for the ultimate car-based face-off, the episode comes to an end on a cliffhanger.

Hey! Just like the video game!

With only one episode to go, this episode’s only job really, is to get everything set up for what comes next. While the show has had plenty of references to the Twisted Metal video game series and has dug pretty deep into the roster of characters that have been in the games over the years, the plot of the series has been pretty separate from the games this whole time. That isn’t surprising. Twisted Metal the game doesn’t really have much of a plot beyond the most threadbare one needed to justify the over-the-top car violence that the games are known for. But it looks like the show was headed in this direction the whole time.

We had a little bit of Twisted Metal style action earlier in the series when Quiet and Stone faced off against each other in their respective cars, but it looks like this episode is building to the point where the final episode of the season will be a full-fledged Twisted Metal inspired finale.