The 100: "Join or Die" Photos 15 IMAGES

Pike’s interesting, guys! He’s interesting!It took far too long this season, but “Join or Die” finally gave us a reason to be invested in Pike and to at least partially see his perspective. Up until now, despite strong work by Michael Beach, the character has felt like a one-note antagonist who’s uber-militant approach wasn’t just dangerous, it felt actively stupid – especially as he was escalating a war against every single Grounder he would have no chance of winning.But now, seeing his stubbornness pitted against Jaha’s intent to make him take one of those chips, it suddenly changed things as he is now a crucial player in a new resistance – one of the few left who are trying to stop ALIE. And while it was also easy to root for Indra to get her revenge, it would have been a mistake to kill Pike off at this point, just as things were changing so much for his place in the story.Of course what also was so fascinating were those flashbacks to Pike on the Ark, in the two weeks before the 100 were first sent to Earth. Seeing him do his best to toughen up and train these kids for what awaited them – and even try to accompany them to help them – was an effective way to give more texture to his “It’s us against everyone else” approach.The flashbacks were very well done too, as far as fitting in with the show’s history. From the use of a few now-dead characters to the way they made everyone look as they did when were first met them (Goggles Jasper! Beanie Miller! Clean… Everyone!), it all visually charted. Also smart was only focusing on one of Pike’s classes – making the absence of people like Finn not stand out as much, since we also weren’t seeing Monty in this class either.And I loved the full circle bit of playing “Radioactive,” from the show’s pilot episode (where its inclusion felt oh-so CW, in a “here’s a hit pop song!” sense) – now re-done as a slow, mournful cover. It was one of several nice callbacks this week, including Clarke and Bellamy’s “Together” reprise (this time while not committing genocide - though I really hope they're not setting up a romance between them) and Octavia finally getting to use the phrase Lincoln taught her for safe passage with Luna’s people.This was a particularly brutal episode, even by The 100 standards. Just the visual of all that blood on the streets of Polis was unsettling, but things escalated quickly as Pike began to be cut up by Indra (okay, he had that coming) and then Kane was quite literally crucified (he did not have that coming!). I did wonder if this might be the end for Kane, before Jaha and ALIE cruelly used Abby to get Kane to break and take the chip – which was all appropriately upsetting.Between the oh-so dramatic events in Polis and the intriguing flashbacks, the material with Clarke, Bellamy, Octavia and Jasper wasn’t as engaging as the rest this week – in fact, I almost wish we’d held off seeing them (in the present) in this episode as they searched for Luna and more time was spent on the other storylines. And Bellamy may be right that he tried to save Lincoln, but come on, dude, given your role in Pike’s regime, you’re already asking when she’ll forgive you? Give it some time!But the final moments, as Luna (Nadia Hilker) – who’s taken a vow to never kill again (good luck, given the show you're on...) – was finally revealed, along with the big “holy crap” moment showing Clarke and co on that oil rig at sea (seen before in the opening credits!) picked things up considerably.Plus, I love that Luna’s group are giving us Aqua Grounders!