‘The 100’: ‘The Dying of the Light’ Marks the Beginning of the End (RECAP)

the 100 715 the dying of the light clarke griffin eliza taylor
Spoiler Alert
Jack Rowand/The CW

The 100

The Dying of the Light

Season 7 • Episode 15

rating: 3.5 stars

[WARNING: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for The 100 Season 7 Episode 15, “The Dying of the Light.”]

After last week’s explosive ending, Clarke (Eliza Taylor) and her friends are stuck on Earth—while Madi (Lola Flanery) sent herself to Bardo in hopes of stopping Cadogan (John Pyper-Ferguson) from hurting any more of her friends. Clarke is handling this about as well as predicted; which is to say, she’s not doing well at all. She’s desperate to find her daughter, and her group hatches a plan.

Meanwhile, under the rubble, Murphy (Richard Harmon), Raven (Lindsey Morgan) and Jackson (Sachin Sahel) work to save a gravely injured Emori (Luisa D’Oliveira). Here’s how it all goes down.

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The Search For The Stone

In the bunker, Murphy frees himself from the rubble and meets up with Raven and Jackson. They find Emori, but she has a piece of rebar through her side, a la Rick Grimes on The Walking Dead. “Just a scratch,” she says. That’s the spirit! Jackson gets her wound cauterized, but he needs more than the cot Raven found—he needs to get back to Sanctum. They get to work whacking out the floor in the recreation room, since they assume that’s where they’ll find the stone.

But Emori puts Raven in an impossible position—she begs her to go to Bardo instead of Sanctum to save everyone, rather than just saving her. Raven refuses. “I’m done watching the people I love die,” she says. They find the stone, but Emori stops breathing… Jackson says he can keep her blood circulating, but they have to get to the stone.

Free Your Mind

Meanwhile, on the main level, Clarke and Octavia (Marie Avgeropoulos) try taking the pills, but the magic doesn’t work for them because there’s no one waiting to pull them through to the other side. Indra thinks that once O’s “inside man” (Levitt) pulls them through, they should find Madi and kill Cadogan, but that plan’s met with resistance. Jordan interjects, again, that it’s not a war—and he knows this because the Red Sun toxin showed him the next step in human evolution. “In my heart, I know there’s a purpose to everything, and we don’t find out what it is by killing each other in the next war,” he says.

Frustrated and distraught, Clarke storms off. She and Gaia have a heart-to-heart, in which Clarke expresses that if she loses Madi, she’ll have nothing—“be nothing,” as she puts it. After a meditation session, she and O are pulled through to the other side.

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For All Mankind

In Bardo, Madi meets Levitt, who’s nice to her. He puts her into m-cap, and the procedure quickly brings up Clarke. Ever her mother’s daughter, Madi talks back to her captors; and she tells Cadogan his last war is a test. Surprisingly, that’s fine with Cadogan. “If I can spare us the pain of fighting,” he says, “I welcome that test.”

The m-capping continues, and Levitt shows her a picture of Cadogan’s daughter, Callie. The machine glitches out as she tries to focus on the drawing, and Levitt notes that the memory isn’t stored in the normal part of the brain. In order to figure out where it’s coming from, he’ll have to dig deeper into her brain, which could be dangerous. Of course, Cadogan’s willing to risk Madi’s life “for all mankind.”

Levitt manages to find Callie in Madi’s head, and Cadogan’s desperate for more. They manage to rummage around until Madi remembers Becca said Cadogan wasn’t ready for judgment day, and she refuses to help. That doesn’t fly with Cadogan, who orders Levitt out of the room and proceeds with the testing, even though it might kill Madi. Levitt goes straight to the bridge and brings Clarke and Octavia over. Except… the bridge has been moved, and Clarke and O land in the middle of a batallion of soldiers. Yikes!

A Surprising Team-Up

Levitt works to free them from their cell, where they’re stuck next to Sheidheda (who’s singing the grounder anthem, in a cool callback to Season 3). He gets to them and they opt to create a distraction using Sheidheda; they say they’ll set him loose, and he has to distract the guards. He does just that, taking down a whole squadron and then running into another, yelling, “is that the best you can do?”

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The Last War Has Arrived

Raven uses the stone to open a portal, and they all go through. Meanwhile, on Bardo, Sheidheda splits, and Clarke and Octavia get into Madi’s room… where they find her, unable to move or talk after having suffered a massive stroke. Clarke cradles her daughter and cries, distraught after Levitt tells her recovery is impossible. She picks up a gun and starts toward her daughter, but O stops her. “I’ll do it,” she says. “I’m not letting you live with this.”

Clarke tells her daughter how much she loves her, and Octavia readies herself to pull the trigger—but Levitt interrupts, saying Cadogan got the test code. They have to leave, but Clarke promises Madi she’ll come back for her. After she goes, a tear trails down Madi’s cheek.

The 100, Wednesdays, 8/7c, The CW