There’s an absolute reason this week’s episode is titled “Halo,” and I’m not going to bury the lede. It’s the season finale of Halo Season 2, and I’m telling you, you’re not ready.

Spoilers if you haven’t seen this episode, spoilers if you haven’t seen the series, spoilers if you haven’t played the game. I haven’t played the game, but I’ve done quite a bit of research on a few things.

A lot of really interesting stuff happens in this episode, and they do wrap everything up nicely with a bow. One of my predictions from last week absolutely came true: we’ve finally gotten the complete Master Chief. He’s got the suit, he’s got his helmet on, and he has Cortana.

Why It’s Called Halo

The episode’s called “Halo” because that’s where we are. They literally took us right to the doorstep of the very first game.

Now remember, I’m a total neophyte when it comes to this stuff. I don’t know anything about the Halo games other than what my son played, so I’ve had to do a lot more research to see what this was all about. What I found out is that the game itself starts with you as Master Chief on the Halo, and your mission is to sort it out as best you can with stuff happening above you in space. They did all of that. We’re talking down to him flying in through space, which I now find out is a thing that happens in the game. You’re literally going through it in the first person, the whole nine yards.

The Third Wave

We start out with Master Chief, and he’s got a mission. Then you see the Spartan-IIIs, the third wave, and Kai is with them. They’re getting ready, and their ship blows up. “This is what we train for.”

When the ship blows up they’re scattered, and we’re following Perez in her suit until she finally makes it. They head for the breach point, because remember, two whole other waves have gone before this one. It almost does feel like the simulation, in that they just kept going on the idea that eventually someone’s going to get there.

So they all get there, they get under the ship, and right away they’re like, we had no resistance. They reach this one junction point and they see more of the bodies piled up, so the first wave did make it. And then, boom, Covenant guys are coming in and shooting. Kai is obviously outclassing all of the Spartan-IIIs, but they do their best, they manage to make it to the bridge, and they’re holding that bridge as strong as they can against unbelievable odds.

Chief Hangs Up on Parangosky

Master Chief is on a ship headed toward the Halo, and he can clearly see there are other ships out there. Parangosky decides to give him a call.

“Master Chief, this is Admiral Parangosky.”

“Master Chief, copy. What do you want?”

She’s doing her smarmy political best. I want to tell you, on behalf of everyone, we’re so happy you’ve returned, Chief, blah blah blah. She’s really just making a big show of it, and he’s not hearing her at all. At one point he turns her off, and everyone’s looking around, and she’s all nervous because she doesn’t want anyone thinking he’s not paying attention to her. It’s funny.

But Chief sees it and he’s hearing everything, and he makes the decision. He stops the ship, and instead of heading to the Halo he takes off for the Covenant corvette.

Kai and everyone are hunkered down, and out of nowhere you see the forces that were attacking them turn and start dealing with something else. Everyone’s looking. And who comes in? Chief. And he is raw. Oh my gosh, he is so good. It’s the game all day. He’s a one man army waging war, shooting people up, and then he grabs the energy sword and he’s cutting people and flipping around. He’s amazing.

He walks in and Kai’s like, what are you doing here? He’s here to save them, basically. That’s what it boils down to.

She makes the decision that they’re going to get a bunch of the others off, and she’s staying. She has the spike, they’re on the bridge, and she knows what that could mean. So Chief helps make sure everybody gets off, and then he jumps off the ship and heads through space, the whole bit, toward Makee’s ship.

We see the final moments of Kai. Now mind you, at the very end of this she’s not dead, but she’s frozen, which in space situations could very well mean she’s in a form of cryostasis.

Makee, Cortana and the Escape Pod

On Makee’s ship there’s a final confrontation, if you will, between Makee and Cortana. Cortana tells her that if she keeps this up the ship’s going to break apart, and she needs to get into the escape pod. Makee looks at her and says, you know what I’m going to do. And Cortana goes, well, there’s a pretty good chance you’re going to erase me permanently. Yeah. No, don’t do that. And Makee crushes the little receiver thing.

Then they cut to outside the ship, and you see she ended up taking Cortana’s advice. She jumped in the little escape pod along with the Arbiter, and they’re heading down to the Halo.

Bro, It’s the Flood

This is one of the few times I’m going to go back to the C-plot, and it’s okay.

Halsey’s made it up to the bridge where Parangosky is, and she starts observing some things. Meanwhile Halsey’s daughter goes back into her lab, and there’s another young hopeful scientist there. She looks at her and asks, you didn’t open the little thing, did you? No, no. And she leaves.

We follow the scientist for a little bit, and she’s getting sick. Something’s happening. At one point she starts to freak out and attack somebody, so they stick her in the brig. And I’m like, whatever. Kessler and them, that storyline is so unimportant to me I can’t even tell you.

But they keep looking at this thing, and I keep thinking to myself, I know this. What is this?

Bro, it’s the Flood. This is the beginning of that entire scenario. They’re doing a great job setting stuff up, and I knew they were eventually going to have to.

We get voices in the whole thing too, and I believe the voices are either the Precursors or the Forerunners talking to Kwan Ha. Everyone’s being attacked, everyone’s running away. Kwan Ha gets cornered, and eventually she sees the face of that shaman lady, who tells her, I can’t hold them back much longer, you’d better hurry. That’s when Kwan ducks out.

This parasite, this spore thing that’s infecting everybody, shows up as these little bugs, and it tries to get Halsey. Halsey manages to barely escape, or so we think. When she meets back up with her daughter, she’s been infected. A drop of blood, something on her, whatever it was. So at the very, very end of the episode her daughter puts her in cryostasis. It’s being slowed until she can figure it out, and that ends that particular storyline for now.

Game Recognizes Game

Back on the Halo, who wakes up? Chief. He’s in the middle of this valley area, and the Arbiter and Makee are already there someplace. Chief grabs the nearest weapon he can, and him and the Arbiter go at it.

The Arbiter is whooping up on him so hardcore. Finally, at the very end, Chief manages to get the better of him. The Arbiter’s telling him to kill me, destroy me, and Makee is about to translate when Chief says, I understood what he said. Because warrior game knows game. Game recognizes game, all day. I know exactly what he said.

So Makee goes and touches the control panel, the door opens up, and they go in. Throughout this whole thing Chief’s been having a conversation with someone, and it’s a voice we haven’t heard yet. Once they get to the end, you find out it’s the AI that controls the compound. It’s already spoken to Makee, and now it’s talking to Chief. It’s literally a race.

And that’s where we leave off.

That’s why it’s called “Halo.” We’ve reached the doorway to the actual game itself, or at least what the game should be. Obviously they’re probably going to deviate, just like they’ve done with everything. We got the Fall of Reach, because the Fall of Reach was always a prequel anyway. Now we’ve got Halo. I’m sure we’re going to keep moving on forward.

The Verdict

Halo Season 2’s finale, “Halo,” is a 9 out of 10 on the Know-It-All Index. Did they stick the landing? Yes, they did. And because I’m super impressed by the way they connected and butted right up to the first game, it gets a solid nine.

That’s my episode rating. For the entire season, Halo Season 2 gets an 8.5 out of 10.

This season is by far head and shoulders above Season 1. Season 1 was a little chaotic, and it took me a bit to wrap my brain around some stuff. This season came in knowing exactly what it was, exactly what it wanted to do and exactly where it was going, and that goes a big long way with me. I enjoyed the heck out of this.

I can’t wait for whatever comes next, and I know you’re going to be excited, because I am too. As soon as information comes out about it, I promise I’ll let you know.

Let me know your thoughts on the season, and on the show in general. I’d absolutely love to find out what you think about the series. The conversation lives in the comments on the video above.