“Quick And Painless” continues this season’s relative upswing in quality by returning to the show’s most reliable source of dramatic tension, and its greatest excuse to throw together action-packed scenes: the spread and subsequent attempts to contain the vampires. At its core, the show is an epidemic narrative, and as much as such a method of storytelling requires
a certain amount of character sympathy, the fact that the story is rooted in the tropes of the horror genre means The Strain can, every now and then, also get away with broad caricature. That’s especially true with tonight’s episode. There isn’t a whole lot of plot to burn through–most of the episode sees Eph trying to get the pathogen to Washington while Fet and Dutch help Feraldo’s task force clear out Red Hook–but “Quick and Painless” still contains some of the season’s best sequences.
I mean, any episode oftelevision that sees Abraham Setrakian seek out an arms dealer played by Jamie Hector (a.k.a. Marlo Stanfield from The Wire) in order to track down an ancient book is going to be great, but tonight’s episode is more than just fun for antique hunters. The biggest driver of the plot this week is Eph, who’s heading to Washington in order to try and get his and Nora’s pathogen to the Pentagon so the military can start using it to fight the strigoi. Getting to Washington isn’t easy when you’re still a wanted man, though, so Eph does what he needs to do: He shaves his head, and the internet breathes a collective sigh of relief. All joking aside though, Eph has never been a better character than he is in “Quick And Painless.” He’s decisive and driven, the potential success of the pathogen injecting his character with a sense of purpose. For too long Eph has been merely a shell of a man, a doctor prone to outbursts who’s struggling to raise his son in this vampire-filled world. It’s a lazy characterization, and giving Eph a renewed sense of purpose works to fix that. Plus, he beats up Barnes when he’s recognized, then throws him off the train while it’s still moving; a determined, ruthless Eph is much better than sadsack, whiny Eph.
The focus on the epidemic also heightens the human drama. Because the vampires have mostly been under wraps (meaning the epidemic has been contained municipally), the true stakes have always felt relatively small. But with the introduction of Feraldo and her SWAT team clearing out city blocks, there’s a new urgency to the story. The threat of the strigoi feels more immediate, especially when Fet and Dutch, who join the team after Fet’s released from custody, learn of the spider kids. There are always variables when it comes to an epidemic and that’s what the SWAT team, Fet, and Dutch are learning. They’re bouncing ideas off one another and learning from past mistakes and triumphs. Fet introduces the team to silver grenades. The SWAT team shows them how shooting a vampire in the head works pretty damn well, too.