With just two months until BBC America sends in the clones all over again (pun quite clearly intended and happily revelled in), the New World offshoot of the UK’s national broadcaster has unveiled, one-by-one via Instagram, a series of dramatically-intense, defiant new teaser trailers profiling each of the female clones, and giving us brief but searing insights into their states of mind after what can only be described as a full-on season 2 finale (which included that joyous, technically-brilliant dance scene featuring the song “Water Prayer Rasta Mix (Matt the Alien Remix)” by Adham Shaikh.
As you can imagine, these women, who all possess markedly different personalities, strengths and weaknesses, worldviews, and even appearances despite their underlying identical resemblance to each other, are in no mood to be played with anymore.
Birthed in an experiment by cruelly curious minds at Project LEDA, obsessed with seeing what would happen if you could successfully bring clones to maturation, Sarah Manning, Alison Hendrix, Cosima Niehaus and Helena are done with being subjects of overgrown petri dish fascinations.
But of course having a defiant mindset and being able to do something about it are two altogether different things, and with Helena now back in custody with the military side of LEDA or Project CASTOR as it’s known – the institute, Dyad, which birthed the female clones handed over control of the male clones to the military – and a whole new coterie of male clones to deal with, none of whom look like they have stopped drinking the genetic experimentation Kool-Aid just yet, things looks like they’re going to get a whole lot more complicated and worse for everyone before, hopefully, they get better.
Thankfully, the skilfully-executed reveal of the male clones including Marc the cultist and one of the soldiers guarding Helena did a magnificent job of expanding the world of Orphan Black, allowing Sarah (newly reunited with daughter Kira), Cosima (who proved herself to be quite the book-reading aunt) and Alison to do their “Don’t f**k with me” thing on a much bigger palette.
Season 3 is clearly going to set off at a furious pace, but what most pleases me about these trailers is the way they captured the distinct sensibilities of each of the female clones, distilling their defiance in their own unique ways.
It’s an especially important way to approach the season 3 promos since one thing Orphan Black has been at pains to do since season 1 has been to make it clear that these women are no longer simply just clones but living, breathing individuals with as much right to live life on their terms as anyone else.
It’s a vitally-important theme, and immensely current, particularly in the wake of the rapid genetic science advances of our age, which are in a lot of cases outstripping the ability of ethics and the law to keep pace, and I have no doubt that this highly-intelligent, tautly-told series, held together by the extraordinary talents of Canadian Tatiana Maslany, will continue to explore them in ways that thrill, surprise and above all, make you think, really, REALLY think.
Orphan Black, one of the BEST series on TV at the moment comes back to our screens on 18 April 2015.
And here’s the full “Clones Will Be Clones” trailer released a month or so ago …