In The 100’s Season Finale, Will Clarke Finally Go Over the Moral Edge?

A storm’s a-comin’! The grim sci-fi drama The 100 closes out its second season with ruthless teenager Clarke (Eliza Taylor) battling to rescue her friends from Mount Weather, the compound where they are being held by Cage (Johnny Whitworth), the bone-marrow-harvesting leader of the Mountain Men.

“This is the episode we have been setting up all season,” previews executive producer Jason Rothenberg. “The theme of this year has been ‘Is there a point at which you can go too far for a just cause?’ At what point do you become the bad guy?”

Some might feel that Clarke, the de facto leader of the crashed Ark’s survivors, has already ventured into villainous territory, what with the mercy killing of onetime love interest Finn (Thomas McDonnell) and her role in the missile attack on a heavily populated Grounder camp–but she has certainly been back among the heroes lately. Especially now that she and a reunited band of allies are committed to freeing their loved ones without harming the innocent residents of Mount Weather. “Clarke and the others are going about it as the good guys,” Rothenberg says of the rescue mission. “No civilian casualties.”

But can they stick to that promise after Cage’s horrifying experiments threaten to derail everything? The situation will bring Clarke “to the moral line she doesn’t want to cross,” Rothenberg says. Fortunately, her friend Jasper (Devon Bostick) devises a plan that could turn the tide in their favor. With the team scattered throughout the facility, though, he may not be able to get word to Clarke before it’s too late.

However that all ends, life probably still won’t be getting any easier for the survivors. Former Ark chancellor Jaha (Isaiah Washington) and his crew continue their search for the mythical City of Light and, according to Rothenberg, that plot takes a twist as shocking as last season’s “white room” cliffhanger. “We will reveal what the City of Light is,” he says. “And it’s nothing at all like what anybody could imagine.” Sounds dark.

The 100, Season finale, Wednesday, 3/11, 9/8c, The CW