The Last Ship Season 5 Episode 1 Review Casus Belli
The final season of The Last Ship begins with a chilling peace. It is three years after the crew of the Nathan James was able to stabilize the world’s crops. The Red Flu is over. Captain Tom Chandler is now a teacher at Annapolis. Everyone else is taking time from their regular lives to gather for the launching of a new Naval Fleet. For a brief moment, the final season feels like the crew of the Nathan James won. But before that the show gives several clear indications of where this final adventure is headed.
First, Captain Chandler is lecturing his class about the Pelopennesian War. A war in which two sides fought each other during a plague. The allusion to Athens and Sparta going at it is far from subtle. While the Nathan James and their crew will undoubtedly be one half of this upcoming war, who exactly is their enemy?
The show immediately shifts from a classroom to a bar scene in Panama. Danny Green and Sasha Cooper are discussing getting tickets to a Presidential dinner. Again, the show cannot help laying out the plot with hit you over the head indications. Their informant Marco suggests that “whoever controls the Panama Canal is King” and that right now the President of Panama controls the canal. Also, there is a subtle mention of the President not being afraid of a larger enemy from Colombia. Before you can process what that means both Danny and Sasha suggest that all you have to do to control the Panama Canal is kill the President.
Before the first episode’s action kicks into gear the show gives you the final hint of how things are going to play out. As Captain Chandler talks on the phone with Sasha he is holding in his hand a paper with the title “the next virus will be cyber”. The next few scenes are nostalgia filled reunions with old faces in new places. The crew of the Nathan James now have families, love interests, new titles and everything else that comes with peace. Most are in different positions with the Navy and Kara Foster is the acting Captain of the Nathan James.
The rest of the episode is broken into two action filled parts. One is in Panama where it feels like a slick spy movie as the Vulture team infiltrates the Presidential dinner to try and secure access to the Panama Canal. The other part is where the Naval Fleet loses all communication after a Cyber-attack and finds themselves being bombarded by an unknown enemy. This show has delivered some of the better network television action sequences for the last few years and the first episode does not disappoint. After some bazookas, rail guns, assassinations, and the heartfelt loss of an old face there is no doubt that the Last Ship is back.
By the end of the episode, team Vulture is in a position to help fight the new enemy in their backdoor as they continue on to Colombia. The brand new Naval Fleet takes a massive loss during their own battle and by the end of it the Nathan James is the last ship. Two battle fronts plus a brand new enemy. The final scene makes it clear that it will be the North versus the South. And that the only chance anybody in the new United States has relies on the crew of the Nathan James.
