Soul train is the 5th episode of the first season of revolution and continues the plot of following Miles and Charlie as they move to rescue Charlie’s brother Danny, this time he’s on a train. Nora wants/tries to blow it up as part of the resistance movement and captain Neville is there to. Apart from the basic plot I believe this is one of the better episodes of the season so far and the reason I think it is, is because of character development.
This episode is mainly focused on the character Captain Tom Neville of the militia. We are shown flashbacks of his life before the power outage. He used to be in the insurance business and from what I could tell, he seemed like a quite a good man. He seemed like he had a good set of morals and boundaries like in the scene where he wanted to help those who suffered smoke damage but couldn’t. What I thought is that in his past life he seemed to be a man with no power, while in this one he is one with a lot. It changed him, but I’m not sure if really for the worst.
When you look at his character throughout the season I remember in one of my previous reviews for episode 2 chained heat I noted that Neville seemed guided by some sort of set of morals and codes which decide his actions. What I do think about him now is that even though he does have these morals and codes often times he is absent choice in the matter. Like when he was working in insurance, he couldn’t help the smoke damage victims and in a later scene looked to be taking his anger out on a punching bag. In current times he is quite powerful, but will easily fall into line under militia orders but what’s his punching bag now? Danny? I think he will be an interesting character to watch and I speculate at the moment but I think he’ll be one to change later on, maybe even defect from the militia or he’ll just fall into line every time. At the moment I think he is a reason to watch the series, it would be good if more characters were like that.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQSS1x2S-lA[/youtube]
Apart from the Neville developments characters pretty much follow the plot as mentioned. We learn a bit about Nora and how she is part of the militia and there is another interesting scene between Charlie and Neville (once again a Neville moment).
If anything this episode is a captain Neville episode, it is entertaining and interesting to watch. It does enough with the plot to keep the story moving while telling the origin of his character, it’s an episode of Revolution done well and Giancarlo Esposito did well with his character in terms of his acting. Overall a great action based and character driven episode of the show and a step above from others of the past.
