#obspec analysis

Project Peony

Castor needed Helena so that they could try and find out why the clones from Project Leda can heal as quickly as they do and then apply that genetic modification to the soldiers of Project Castor. One of the things I loved most about the idea of Project Peony was how diametric it is and how it highlights the differences of Leda and Castor beyond the shaky “men versus women” way that it has been presented thus far for the canon season 3.

The Castor clones are described as having physical injuries. Adam Casey with his facial scars, Mark’s scar where he removed the cyanide capsule from his arm, and Harrison Childs with his double amputation. Because the clones in Castor are militarily based, their lives are constantly being threatened by violent outside sources. Castor was created to be a group that did things en masse. Strong and completely disposable.

However for the clones on the Leda side, so much of who they are is internally based. Starting with the purpose of the project as a way to harvest the immunosuppressants their bodies make for the creation of medications to create orphan drugs. They are being ravaged by an autoimmune disease that they is killing them from the inside out. You wouldn’t know that a Leda clone was sick unless they literally coughed up evidence of their genetic defect. They need to be immune to a wide variety of diseases as well as have the ability to heal quickly so that the production of Vm24 won’t be interrupted, disrupting the production of orphan drugs.

Who Am I Really?

Now the group from Project Leda faces a newer and more frightening aspect to who their humanity and individuality as they are literally fueling the industry of orphan drugs. I can only assume that if the OB Spec Cabal wrote a spec season 4, the fallout from that knowledge would rear it’s ugly head in some very interesting and painful character growth across the board. But this isn’t something exclusive to Leda. In OB Spec, a common things for characters was removal of identity or humanity through the behavior and actions of others

For some characters, like Rebecca, Mark, and Rachel they had the chance to rebuild and reforge their identities and reclaim their humanity back from their oppressors. Despite Rachel’s best efforts, ultimately her status as a part of Leda has rendered her unable to break free of her genetic abilities; leaving her powerless and subservient to the will of others. No matter how hard Rachel tries to make herself in the whole, powerful woman she wishes to be, her close ties to DYAD have made that impossible and served to highlight her defects and lack of perfection.

Other characters didn’t get that opportunity. Helena’s cannon attempts at reclaiming her sense of self and humanity were soundly shut down in OB Spec. By the end of the season, she found herself betrayed and angrily distant from Sarah; coping with the idea that violence may always be an integral part of who she is; and falling back on her old sense of self for comfort and stability. Harrison Childs will always be viewed by his father as an inferior failure that will never be able to live up to the promise that he saw in Beth.

Motherhood

Motherhood isn’t a new idea for Orphan Black or OB Spec. But what I loved about the OB Spec take on things is how it provided more information and context about already established characters.

Seeing how being the genetic source for 400 failed attempts at a new cloning project has clearly affected Rachel in a profoundly negative way. Then to have only one clone from those endeavors come out crippled by polio and faulty genetics, further highlights Rachel’s animosity and twisted perspectives on motherhood and what it means for her.

But for many other characters, having the opportunity to see their mothers, (metaphorical or otherwise), gives us as readers such a huge opportunity to see where our characters have come from and how it has shaped and molded them. No matter how these characters feel about their mothers, the similarities are striking. Alison desperately fights off anything that would make her turn out like her mother, but at the end of the day she and Bernadette are very similar in how they speak and move about in the world. Same goes for Sarah and Mrs. S. As much as they are continually at odds with each other, their similarities extend to everything from the way they speak to the rebellious way in which they move about in the world. Finally, Leslie and Cosima; a mother-daughter relationship for the ages. Sure they walk alike and talk alike but the compassion and love they have for each let’s us see how Cosima grew into a compassionate, intelligent, and determined woman. Viewing such a wide spectrum of motherhood with so many characters could easily be a topic by itself with the vast amount of relationships and how they emphasize pre-existing themes. Especially when compared and contrasted against each other.

And One Last thing...

What a fantastic thing to notice! Yes, it’s true. Leslie gets inducted into Clone Club almost right away. Bernadette? Not a chance. We did this on purpose. Part of it is to show the differences between Cosima and Alison — Alison’s good at keeping secrets. Cosima, not so much. Alison wants the fact that she’s a clone to be nonexistent. Cosima’s embraced it, and so she’s quicker to share. 

But it’s also to show the differences between Leslie and Bernadette too. Leslie gets a membership to Clone Club because Leslie is a woman who rolls with it. Leslie has the Cosima wonder-eyes in her. So, when she notices that something’s up, we trust that she’s not gonna run away in fear or anger. Bernadette? Hmmm. Bernadette’s not quite an out-of-the-box thinker. She has that perfection-seeking streak to her (same as Alison). She’s harsh, gilded with nail polish and a perm. And when something seems off, Bernadette isn’t about to “roll with it.” Bernadette’s gonna pretend it never happened, then most likely she’s gonna throw it at you veiled in unintentionally snarky comments for the rest of your life. Which, being Alison, you’d probably rather not be on the receiving end of. Much cleaner to keep your clone secrets to yourself. 

Hello, Geek Monkey here, and I don't know about you, but I'm excited to talk about Adam Casey!!!! Not only is his name awesome (thanks guys!) but he could be the answer to our clone disease prayers, so I mean, how can you not love him???

So in OBspec6 Cosima finally finds what she's been looking for forever: a sequence she can potentially use for a cure! HOORAY!!! But what exactly is this sequence, and how can it help her?

This sequence is what Cosima thought was in Ethan's book: a version of the synthetic sequence in her DNA that is similar enough (i.e. encodes infertility), but is not identical, and therefore may not have the side effects of the clone disease. By using this sequence in gene therapy (which is basically replacing a mutated gene with a functional gene, which I describe more detailed here), Cosima could very well cure the clone disease.

Now how is it even scientifically possible for Adam Casey, a genetic male, to have a sequence that encodes infertility via the uterus and ovaries? Well, if we remember our Orphan Black backstory, we know that the clone project began as a military project, and eventually Leda split off and became a separate entity associated with DYAD. But in all likelihood, the Duncans, or at least someone who was part of their team, worked on the clone project from the start. The synthetic sequences were probably also an early aspect of the project, and so some form of the sequences, however preliminary, were most likely inserted into the genomes before the Leda/Castor split.

In the case of OBspec, Duncans and Co. devised the synthetic sequence for infertility first, because of course this was of great importance to keep the genetics of the whole project under control. So a preliminary version of this sequence was already placed in the genomes of both Castor and Leda before the Duncans left for DYAD. Now, once they split, there was much tweaking to the sequences to get their desired results, and so the Leda sequence changed into the one we are familiar with, with its unfortunate side effects. Over in the military, however, they would not have been interested in a sequence encoding for ovary and uterus underdevelopment, so they would have ignored that sequence, leaving it as it originally was. This sequence remained in the Castor genome, having no side effects on the clones because of their different anatomy, but silently waiting to be discovered as a possible key to the Leda problem.

I realize I’ve talked about Rebecca Levin before. And it’s no secret that a Deaf clone would be something relative to my interests. But what really got me excited was how Rebecca’s character arc played out; and how that arc both stripped Rebecca of her humanity and then allowed her to regain it in a way that reinforced the overall themes of the show and highlight that humanity through a d/Deaf perspective.

The complexities and intricacies of Orphan Black are one of the many aspects of the show that keeps the audience interested. The characters are not clear cut and as black and white as they initially appear and their behavior reinforces those ideas over the course of the story. This complexity allows the characters more humanity than they would have if they were reduced to being good or evil or a specific character type or trope. This allows the audience to not only explore how they fit into the larger picture of the mysteries of the show itself, but it allows the characters the humanity to exist within a story that is a meditation on what it means to be human and how that variety operates in a grand sense among characters that could be painfully similar at first glance.

Obspec is no exception to this rule. As the audience, we have only had a brief look into the amount of work that went into creating the scripts. But that work has allowed the creation of new characters and situations that fit seamlessly into the overall universe of Orphan Black. Rebecca Levin is a character that has expanded in the obspec universe, much like her canon counterparts, to have a level of humanity that not only fits snugly within the themes of the show, but also allows her to grow and move about in obspec in a way that is unique to her.

Episode 5 focused on Rebecca in a limited way in which her deafness and clone-hood trumped her humanity, sense of self, and agency. Her interactions with Delphine emphasized the idea that Delphine views Rebecca as broken. She is something that needs to be fixed and changed to fit Delphine’s idea of what it means to be human. To be a whole person. Additionally, using Rebecca for her genetic material does nothing to deviate from that mindset. As much as clone club likes to refer to Delphine as a puppy that has been changed by loving Cosima, obspec reminds us that Delphine, despite her good intentions, is deeply flawed and ambitious. Compared with Cosima in these scenes, on the surface, Rebecca is only there to serve Cosima’s plot. She’s the clone that is potentially “spare parts” that could fix Cosima. It’s not till the end of the script that Rebecca is allowed to reclaim and assert a small bit of her humanity in her conversation with Cosima.

Rebecca isn’t allowed to exist in her person-hood until episode 6 when she is allowed to finally become a whole, complex and fully realized human being. She’s sarcastic, creative, funny, ambitious, and compassionate. Like all of the other Leda clones; her Deafness, culinary skills, patience, compassion, and humor are not the most interesting things about her. And like all the characters on Orphan Black, Rebecca is the whole sum of all those parts of her self. Fitting with the themes of the show, Rebecca is allowed the space and opportunity to reclaim her humanity among some of her sisters* from Project Leda.

Finally, from a historical perspective, Rebecca reclaiming her sense of self on her terms is important in the context of Deaf history. Throughout history, and even today, d/Deaf people have been oppressed and marginalized by the larger hearing majority. The repression of ASL and Deaf culture, accusations that deaf people are lacking faith or are possessed by demons, sterilization and oppression based on the principles of eugenics, claims that ASL isn’t a language and that Deaf culture is invalid, or the ignorance of the larger hearing community are all ways that the d/Deaf have been historically oppressed by the hearing since Ancient Greece.

Allowing Rebecca the agency to be who she is further reinforces the larger themes of identity, self, autonomy, and self- determination. But adding that additional layer of being in a repressed minority group because of her Deafness, allows Rebecca to overcome a larger historical narrative of oppression but also present a new narrative on what d/Deafness actually is and how it operates in the larger world. Rebecca shows the reader that a Deaf person can have a rich and complex life with the only difference being how they interact and communicate with the world at large. Additionally, through Rebecca we can see how damaging and oppressive these attitudes and beliefs can be; and how being aware of them can lead to eliminating them and allowing the d/Deaf to live on their terms without punishing them for difference and non-conformity.

So, yes! OBspec abides by the general theory that Beth knew everything (or, at least, a whole whole whole lot more than we’ve been told she knew in canon). She knew about the military monitors and Castor because of her dad, and, as a result, she knew that the conspiracy went a lot deeper than she ever told anyone. 

As for Rebecca… Yes. Rebecca has a driver’s license, so Rebecca would have come up along with Alison, Cosima, and Tony (and, in my opinion, probably also Jennifer and whatever other clones that exist that we haven’t met yet who live in North America).

But, Beth didn’t contact Rebecca. Why? Well, I’m not sure exactly. I didn’t need to work that out for my story. My best guess is that after some quick detective work on Rebecca, Beth realized how close she was to DYAD. Get in touch with a clone that close to DYAD and you’ll blow your cover real quick, Beth. Better just to leave it be for now and circle back around later.

Hey Clone Club! 

happyjacq here! Welcome to Author's Notes for #OBspec Episode 5: An Alternation of Flights and Perchings, otherwise known as the one that made you laugh, cry, and almost die. 

Let's jump right in! 

That Teaser: You bet your ass that was a train station. Ah, OBspec Episode 5. The "Intercut Fiasco” episode. It’s a lot of scenes, a lot of transitions, a lot of things happening all at once. But the intercuts here allow for some pretty sweet parallels and really amp up the pace. And for an episode as exciting as this one, the pace needs to feel like a ticking clock.

Your New Favorite Clone is Not Even Real: Bringing in a Deaf clone was one of the very very very first things on our OBspec wish list, and based on where Season 2 of Orphan Black netted out, Rebecca couldn’t have fit any better with where we wanted to take the plot, science, and themes of our season. Crafting Rebecca was a ton of work. She required chats with a bunch of people, including the incomparably lovely Laine (our friend and audiology, speech and language, Deaf culture, and sign language expert), Casey (your friendly neighborhood science extraordinaire), and a bunch of other friends, relatives, professors, and random acquaintances. On top of that, we combed books and internet resources all about deafness and Deaf culture, about facial grammar and Deaf etiquette. We tracked down scripts with Deaf characters to figure out how something like this is translated to screenplay format. We watched Ted talks and YouTube videos and lots of other stuff. And, after all of that work, I couldn’t be happier with the way Rebecca has translated. It was an honor to create her. She’s one of the things I’m most proud of within OBspec.

Rebecca as Science: You met Rebecca in Episode 4, but it’s not until Episode 5 that the totally crazy science behind Rebecca really comes to the surface. Rebecca’s deaf, but that’s hardly the most biologically *signs* weird thing about her. When figuring out the specifics of the clone disease with Casey, Rebecca’s very convoluted medical history (and it’s place within the OBspec plot) emerged--you can read all the specifics here. Respiratory, auditory, digestive, reproductive, immunological, and then...nothing. It fixed itself. Magical Princess Rebecca Levin. We want Cosima to be a Magical Princess too, please!! But, at the end of the day, it's not meant to be. 

The Cold, Crisp Taste of Cochlear: Cochlear implants are a highly debated topic within the Deaf community. In our research, we came across a lot of science and even more opinions surrounding them, which gave us a lot of really meaty stuff to work with. Rebecca doesn’t want a cochlear. That’s her choice. She’s comfortable in her deafness, proud of it. It’s given her language and community and identity. Delphine’s seen that experience and struggle reduced to an interesting statistical outlier by Dr. Leekie. And Delphine’s a eugenicist, let’s not forget. She’s always been one to push for advancement at the price of her patients’ agency. There’s so much contentious history in the Rebecca and Delphine relationship that colors both women here, and it was really challenging and fascinating to let that come alive.

Rebecca as Character: After all of our research was complete, we had to sort of back our way into Rebecca’s personality. And what finally made her come alive was this: Rebecca makes herself at home wherever she is. She will sit on your kitchen counter, eat your food, watch your cable, sleep in your bed. And once we knew that, the rest quickly fell into place. She became so tiny and honest and rude. Then, she became loud. Which was really rich. Her ideas are loud, her voice is loud, her personality is loud. And then, under all of that, she became very deeply vulnerable. Because Rebecca’s no stranger to being attacked from all angles. It’s why she doesn’t get along with Delphine--she’s always expecting attack. So, she’ll call you out, drop a truth bomb, pick a fight. But, when Cosima places a loving band-aid over Rebecca's biggest fears, suddenly Rebecca is revealed to be this secret little optimist. And that’s the thing about Rebecca. She’ll only reveal those parts of her when she knows you need them so very very badly.

Cosima vs. Tag Number: That thing Cosima does that feels so exactly Cosima? It wasn’t even planned. Cosima replacing Rebecca’s tag number with her name wasn’t even on our radar until I was writing the scene. And then, suddenly, I so strongly felt the Cosima inside my brain saying, Jacq Jacq Jacq please let me do this please like you don’t understand how much I need to do this please just let me at that marker. And I said, ok Cosima. Go for it, girl. And that tiny action became this gift that so neatly sewed up that story and that relationship. It’s so rare for those really pure moments to occur, and I’m so thankful for this one.

Rachel Duncan and Death Eater Hogwarts: Oh, Rachel. Why are you such a bitch? Rachel likes control. Rachel likes power. Rachel likes perfection. And now, she’s finally getting a taste of what those things feel like again. Somewhere in our stack of Arc Chart Post-Its there’s a Rachel note that states: “Rachel Runs DYAD Like Death Eater Hogwarts”. And Death Eater Hogwarts, DYAD certainly has become. Except Rachel is like Snape and Voldemort all rolled into one blue eye and a blonde bob. Rachel’s micromanaging everything, trying keep her hands on as much as she can.

Jacob Wrestling with the Angel: Miller’s at it again. And, we finally find out his first name! Corporal Jacob Miller, that fucking turd. Names are a fairly prominent theme throughout OBspec, including when and how you find them out, who can use them, mistaken identities, the use of pet names and nicknames, when ranks or titles are used instead of names, etc. In a lot of ways, this scene with Miller is Helena’s emotional climax within the military, and it’s meant to parallel her history on Orphan Black. This time, it’s not “Not Beth,” but “Not Mark.” It’s not “there’s a light in you,” it’s “there is darkness in you.” And it’s not Kira asking Helena “What happened to you?” It’s Helena asking Miller. And the fact that Helena’s the one to finally tease out Miller’s first name gives her all the power in that relationship.

Sarah as Beth: OBspec’s first cloneswap! The return of Sarah as Beth was one plot point that we couldn’t wait to incorporate into OBspec. We’ve missed that fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants Sarah-as-Beth knot in our stomachs. And having Art be the one to suggest Beth’s return is really important to show just how much Art has grown to trust Sarah. In this episode, Beth is our Trojan Horse. Greek mythology abound.

The Inferno Infiltration: The first draft of Act IV was 17 pages. 17 pages!! So much needed to happen! In the slice and dice, the scenes got tighter, faster, jumpier. But, it’s the setting that adds to the heart-pumping action as well. All the hallways and stairways mentioned are based off real places at Milena’s school where we would sometimes meet up to write. I mean, a tunnel like that really sticks with a girl. And, if you pay super close attention to the layout of the ASPIS headquarters, you’ll notice that all those subdivisions line up quite nicely to a certain Dante’s Inferno. Pernkopf’s office is Room 303: the circle of gluttony in which Miller just can’t get enough. Sarah crashes through the tunnel of anger on 5. Helena’s kept on 7, Dante’s circle of violence. Stuck on 8 in the elevator with Harrison, it’s fraud all the way. And down on 9, Sarah’s caught in the circle of treachery with the Colonel.

Hello Clone Club! I am here to talk to you about everyone's favorite fictional fictional clone, Rebecca Levin!!! We at OBspec love Rebecca for about a million reasons, but one reason close to my geek monkey heart is the science behind Rebecca!!!!!!

So we meet Rebecca because Delphine has stolen her for Cosima (that's oddly romantic), thinking that Rebecca's sequence may be different from Cosima's - the key to Cosima's cure. But why would Delphine be thinking that in the first place?

Well Cosima thought the same thing about Sarah's sequence, as we saw in OBspec3, where she and Scott tested the sequence against her own for any differences. Cosima thought that Sarah's sequence might be different because Sarah is fertile, and because of this, Cosima thinks there must be something genetically different about Sarah. Delphine thinks of Rebecca in much the same way: she was different than the rest, so there must be something genetically different about her.

How was Rebecca different from the rest? Well, as Delphine briefly described in OBspec5, Rebecca got sick at an early age. Instead of the clone disease beginning with polyps in her uterus that spread to the lungs in the late twenties, Rebecca experienced chronic respiratory symptoms similar to bronchitis beginning around age four, which eventually led to her loss of hearing.

It wasn't until puberty that the polyps in her uterus appeared, which led to her receiving a hysterectomy; unfortunately her symptoms persisted, leading to things like heart failure, kidney failure, and issues with her digestive system (particularly the colon, which plays a part in your immune system). This persistence of symptoms is indicative of autoimmune diseases, as the underlying problem does not lie in the affected organ but in the immune system, which of course for OBspec, and for Delphine, means that the problem lies in the infertility sequence. 

All in all, Rebecca was dealt a rough hand, spending her first twenty years in and out of the hospital (which is yet another reason why Rebecca is against the idea of a cochlear implant. She's already been under the knife more times than she cares to remember).

Why would Delphine think using the sequence of someone who had such a severe version of the clone disease would help Cosima? Because, despite all the odds, Rebecca got better. For nearly ten years now, Rebecca has been healthy; her body seems to have fixed itself (how is this possible? Who knows?! Maybe one day I'll tell you), and she can seemingly go on with her life without fear of further complications. Delphine knows this as one of Rebecca's doctors, and believes that whatever caused Rebecca to be okay is in her DNA and can help cure Cosima.

Unfortunately, Delphine was wrong (much like Cosima was wrong about Sarah), and their sequences are the same. Why is it that these three women can have such radically different expressions of the same gene? Well one answer, the answer that we here at OBspec favor, is the epigenetic reason!

Sarah, Cosima, and Rebecca all have the same sequence with the exact same base pairs in the exact same order, but because of epigenetic differences, this sequence is expressed in vastly different ways. In the case of Sarah, her sequence was most likely silenced, causing her to remain fertile, and therefore free of risk of the clone disease; for Cosima, her sequence is expressed in the way it was intended by the Duncans and their team; and for Rebecca, her sequence had increased expression, causing the disease to have a much earlier onset and have much more serious symptoms. (For more on epigenetics, check this post here.)

Oh, Anon. I know. It hurts. I know. 

As for how dare I…well, I realize that this may be a rhetorical question, but it is a rather interesting one. So, how dare I? I know it’s kind of weird to say, but I didn’t find this particular plot point a hard one to decide upon. There are plenty of scenes in OBspec that gave me pause. But, if I’m being honest, this was not one of them. 

I know it hurts to think about it like this, because it really does hurt a lot, but Helena isn’t just a character existing in the world. She’s a character existing in a story. And characters who exist in stories often have to go through things they don’t necessarily deserve for the sake of the narrative. 

But, it’s more than that, too. If Helena loses her baby, this also gives her some really meaty emotional stuff to contend with. This is Helena’s body betraying her…the body she’s been taught is an abomination. The body she’s been taught to turn against (and she’s recently turned against it again, if you remember), and now it’s fighting back, taking things away from her like she tried to take things away from it. It’s saying, I control you. I make the decisions. You’ll never escape me. And you’ve treated me badly. I’ll treat you badly in return. 

And in a way, every clone confronts this betrayal in a different way throughout our season. Cosima’s body is a ticking time bomb, betraying her at every turn, just waiting for those stem cells to run out of time. Rachel’s body has this jarring new enhancement that is so painfully obvious and she’s trapped inside this body that just can’t seem to get anything the way she wants it. Sarah somehow ended up with Kira and yet it’s because Kira came from Sarah that she’ll always be in danger. Tony has pieces he never wanted anyway. Charlotte overhears Rachel say she’s a burden, a blasphemy. Rebecca’s body had things going wrong left right and center for her entire life before it finally decided to get its shit together, but not without changing the entirety of her self-identity along the way. And Alison…well, don’t you worry, we’ll get around to Alison eventually. 

So, I dared, Anon. I dared. Because Helena doesn’t need to be a mother to be interesting. She doesn’t need to be a mother to be important, or loving, or complex, or a really fantastic character in general. 

But, she does need to not be a mother in order to feel that primal kind of betrayal.