DISCLAIMER: This recap of Twisted Metal Season 1 Episode 8, “EV3L1N,” contains spoilers. Read at your own risk.
A young John wakes up in the driver’s seat of a wrecked vehicle, and blood runs down his head. He manages to retrieve a burning photo from the glove compartment before getting out of the car. As he gets out, a strange woman rushes up and asks if he is ok. She asks where his parents are, his age and his name but John doesn’t know. The woman says she will get John home safely, but instead, she hits him on the head with her staff and knocks him down. She jumps into his car and, as she drives off, yells that a Watkyns storm is coming. Multi-colored lightning strikes around John, forcing him to an underpass. He then looks at the photo of the young boy and asks, “Who is this a-hole?’
Presently, Quiet (Stephanie Beatriz) takes a turn driving Evelyn as John (Anthony Mackie) nurses a hangover in the passenger’s seat. They casually joke about living together in New San Francisco, then Quiet pulls the visor down, and John’s photo falls out. He tells her to be careful, and the moment she says she can handle it, the picture flies out the window. John angrily searches for the photo on the side of the road as Quiet walks up to help him. She insists on searching for the photo even though John tells her to stay back with Evelyn and the package.
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Quiet finds the picture, and as she once again teases John, three holy men attempt to drive off in Evelyn. John takes one down with a headshot, and Quiet downs another one with her hatchet. A hungover John half-heartedly runs after the thief while holding back vomit. John screams at Quiet, and they walk awkwardly in silence down the road for a while. After Quiet apologizes, John explains that he lost Evelyn twice before, but she always comes back to him. Church bells ring in the distance as Quiet agrees to help John get his car back. They decide to get the masks from the dead holy men to blend in.
Flashback to young John, who is now trying to survive alone in the woods. As he reaches for a peach, he falls and rolls down a cliff. At the bottom, he finds Evelyn covered in overgrowth and removes a decomposed body from the driver’s seat. He turns the key in the ignition, but the engine only sputters. However, he finds food, toilet paper and nudie magazines in the backseat. The boy starts a fire with a lighter and cash he found in the car. He pats Evelyn as he sits by the fire and finally relaxes.
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Wearing the masks from the dead holy men, Quiet and John stash the package outside of the camp before they wander in. The holy man camp is a chaotic zoo with rowdy bikers fighting and doing drugs. Quiet notices a group of dominatrix beating on some of the men and treating them like dogs. John and Quiet are offered a jack and coke and, after chugging, are told the crunchiness is the “coke.”
A man dressed in religious garb walks out and is praised by all of the holy men. The preacher (Jason Mantzoukas) welcomes them all to their annual Colorado pilgrimage. He then explains that he used to be a man of God, but when the world collapsed, God was nowhere to be found. We are the gods, he says, and the roads will forever be our domain. All of his followers then bring him gifts, which mostly consist of drugs. The preacher is especially impressed when one of the holy men drives up to Evelyn. He says he is going to have sex with the car, but before he can get his pants down, John challenges him to a fight.
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The preacher dramatically throws off his robes and snorts a line before the fight. He then leads with a Superman punch that immediately puts John on the ground. As John gets up, he throws some dirt in the preacher’s eyes and gets him to the ground after a few punches. Preach recovers quickly and fights even more erratically. He then tells John he was possessed by a little demon baby that made him kill a church full of people.
While the preacher continues to taunt John, Quiet sneaks off and finds a man working on some cars. She poses as one of the dominatrix goddesses and asks for the keys to a car. When he says that goddesses only ride shotgun, Quiet kicks him right in the family jewels and attacks him. We see flashes between John and Quiet fighting until Quiet gets the better of her guy (and the key). John is knocked out by the preacher and put in “time-out.”
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Young John is ambushed in the woods by a group of cannibals who want to eat him. He jumps into Evelyn, turns the key, and she miraculously starts. John is able to drive away from the cannibals to safety thanks to Evelyn; she has once again saved his life.
Quiet breaks John out of his time-out cage and suggests they leave in the car she just acquired. The holy men notice the missing vehicle and begin locking down the camp. Quiet begs John to leave, but he cannot abandon Evelyn, so they go their separate ways.
Evelyn runs out of gas after John gets away from the cannibals. He thanks her for saving his life and promises to fix her up. John says it is just him, her, and the road as he smiles and falls asleep in her backseat.
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At the holy men’s camp, John throws on a mask and runs up to Evelyn but is immediately held at gunpoint by the preacher. They get into a scuffle, and the preacher shoots Evelyn’s gas tank, and gas runs everywhere. The fuel eventually makes its way to a knocked-over torch, and just before the preacher stabs John, everything goes up in a massive explosion. Quiet sees the explosion from afar and is devastated. She takes off in her new ride with the package next to her.
The holy men load an unconscious preacher into the back of a vehicle and speed away from the wreckage. John rolls out from underneath Evelyn’s hood; it’s almost as if the hood protected him from the explosion. John looks up to see nothing left of Evelyn but a burning frame. “My Immortal” by Evanescence plays as John picks up what few pieces remain of Evelyn. We see flashes of John as a kid gathering the same parts to get her running. Adult John sits in the driver’s seat of Evelyn’s remains, and then we see young John choosing the EV3L1N license plate. John sits and holds Evelyn’s steering wheel in front of a makeshift memorial he made out of her parts and license plate. I’m not crying; you’re crying.
Twisted Metal Season 1 is now streaming on Peacock.
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