Recap / The Hardy Boys 2020 Season 3 E 5 Revelation

Season 3, Episode 5:

Revelation

After a shocking blow, the gang must divide and conquer to determine the identity of Deep Voice and get the Core back.

---

This episode contains examples of:

• Apologetic Attacker: Fenton is forced to tase the Brainwashed and Crazy Laura when she tries to kill him, repeatedly murmuring that he's sorry.
• Badass in Distress: Trudy Hardy, Jesse Hooper, and Brian Conrad are Lured into a Trap by Sparewell, hit with Knockout Gas, and abducted.
• Bag of Kidnapping: One from the heroes. Once Callie learns from Donald that Drew's been lying about her identity and she's actually Hurd Sparewell's daughter and possibly one of the bad guys, she and the Hardys subject Drew to this, throwing a bag over her head as she returns to her dorm room and bringing her all the way from there to JB's safe room in Dixon City offscreen to question her.
• Bait-and-Switch Comment: Frank and Joe listen to JB's tapes of his recorded phone calls after he's murdered, and one such tape is of their dad, Fenton (a very well-known private eye), calling to make sure that he isn't going to be a negative influence on them. When he introduces himself, JB responds with, "Well well well, if it isn't the world's greatest detectives' dad", once again highlighting how highly he regards the boys' skills.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: What the fake coroner, Dr. Grafton, did to Laura after she was kidnapped and her death faked because she knew too much, putting a microchip inside her brain that turned her into a "soldier" who can't properly remember Fenton anymore and tries to eliminate him. Once Fenton overpowers her, he forces Grafton to reverse the process by disabling the microchip.
• Bus Crash: When Agent Driscoll informs Chet, Belinda, and Brian that Olivia is not actually Anya Kowalski's daughter (as she was childless), he also tells them that Anya passed away the previous winter (which would be in the Time Skip between Seasons 1 and 2).
• Character Death:
  • JB Cox is the biggest death of this season so far, which was heavily foreshadowed in the previous episode, dying within moments from the two shots he took In the Back while saving the boys from Quill's murderer, though not without giving Joe a Dying Clue first. This leaves Frank, who previously wasn't a big fan of JB, very upset and shaken, while Joe is completely devastated.
  • Played with for Anya Kowalski; she actually died several months ago, during the Time Skip between the first two seasons, but the audience and main characters only learn about it now.
• Chekhov's News: The Sparewell Technology TV commercial first shown in "A Strange Inheritance" becomes important when the boys recognize the voice of the man speaking in it—the company's owner, Hurd Sparewell—as the same one from JB's recorded call hiring him to find the codexes.
• Chekhov's Gun: JB told Joe in "A Strange Inheritance" that he doesn't know who his clients are (which tracks with all previous jobs shown) because he's hired over the phone or via answering machine, so there are no names or faces. The boys discover with his Dying Clue that he tape-recorded all of these messages, and they're able to listen to the tapes to figure out who hired him to steal the scrolls.
• Comedic Sociopathy: Biff wonders what to do next as she and Phil spy on Hurd Sparewell from a distance. Phil suggests kidnapping and questioning him to find out his plans for the Core, and "maybe torture him a little bit."
• Continuity Nod:
  • While reminiscing about JB, Joe recalls how he was pretending to be a survivor of the Astghik crew. He also fondly notes with a smile how this was "so dumb", referencing how Joe figured out near-immediately that he was lying.
  • While going through JB's tapes of phone calls that he's received in the past from clients and others, the boys listen to the one where Stefan originally hired him near the start of Season 1 to steal the piece of the Eye from the Tall Man on the plane. However, this recording also contains a Series Continuity Error (see below).
  • Similarly, the radio and coded note that JB left behind for Joe at the end of the first season is referenced when another tape reveals that Fenton found them, deciphered the note, and called JB about it himself to make sure he wasn't going to be a bad influence on his boys.
  • In the call where Hurd first hires JB, he references him having stolen the Eye previously and asks if he still has it. After (truthfully) saying he does not, JB replies that he's no longer interested in stealing ancient relics because they're "kind of a pain", referring to his conclusion from the end of Season 1 onwards that he didn't want anything more to do with the Eye (or objects like it) because they're too dangerous.
  • And in their second call, which takes place after he stole the Hardy Boys' scroll piece they got from Fenton, JB talks about having been sent to "some house on a hill that doesn't exist anymore," which was previously established in "A Strange Inheritance." However, he does lie to Hurd that he "stumbled onto" the one scroll he has while he was there, probably to avoid revealing that the Hardys had it and bringing them to his client's attention (though they eventually, through Quill, still sought out the boys later anyway).
  • Apparently the senile William Vogel is living out the rest of his days at Pine Grove Institute, the same place where Aaron's and now Adrian Munder's catatonic bodies are being taken care of. Somewhat oddly, this connection is not brought up at all, maybe for the sake of time.
  • As Callie interrogates Donald about what happened to him and Drew at Rosegrave, he references the previous things she questioned him about where he wasn't involved: getting her blacklisted from prep school ("Conflicting Reports") and planning a bombing ("Heading for Destruction").
• Contrived Coincidence: Out of the dozens of tapes that JB has in his cabinet, the very first one the boys pop in is one of his few jobs they know about: Stefan hiring him to steal the piece of the Eye on the plane near the beginning of the series. And the one they're looking for, with Hurd recruiting JB to get the codexes, is still only the sixth tape we hear—another of which happens to be one of their own father calling—although the boys may have listened to more of them offscreen.
• Died in Your Arms Tonight: JB dies, after Taking the Bullet for the Hardy Boys, while Joe is still gripping his jacket and trying to hold him upright.
• Disowned Parent: Drew hates her emotionally and verbally abusive father, Hurd Sparewell, telling the Hardy gang she doesn't consider him or her older sister Olivia family (hence using the alias "Drew Darrow"), and wants to bring down his company, Sparewell Technology.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • In JB's safe room, Frank decides to check the security tapes to see if he caught anything on them, but the tape deck is empty. We know JB did see something—Cadmus Quill's murder, and likely the face of the woman who killed him—but the tape got jammed when he tried to take it out and he had to flee without it to avoid being caught as well by the killer, who, unsurprisingly, stole the tape herself.
  • Continuing an example from "A Promise of Trouble": When talking to Frank, Joe, Biff, and Phil, William expresses his anger that after George Estabrook "trusted me with his life", Gloria then tossed him aside like trash...not knowing that George actually told Gloria in a letter to kill William once he'd done his duty of helping her hide the codexes, and her firing him instead was really an act of mercy.
  • Once the Hardy Gang finds out that William used to work for the Sparewells and was close to the daughter of the family (for whom he had the Crystal necklace made), they think he means Olivia. This is Right for the Wrong Reasons, as Olivia does turn out to be a Sparewell, but viewers have already seen that Drew is the one with this necklace and can piece together sooner that she's the Sparewell they're looking for.
  • A retroactive example: In "Heading for Destruction", Olivia (pretending to be Anya's daughter) warned Fenton that, with the Evil Power Vacuum in the Circle, a dangerous new group of people is vying against them for control. Since said party is now discovered to be Sparewell Tech, and her real name is Olivia Sparewell, the group she was referring to was her own.
• Dying Clue: JB survives just long enough to give Joe the combination to the lock on the storage cabinet in his safe room (12-23-14), which contains voice tapes of all calls he received from clients wanting to hire him, including the bad guys ultimately responsible for his death.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • Joe is crushed by JB dying to save him and Frank from the woman in the hood, and his brother has to drag him limply away from the scene. When they get back to his apartment, Joe's still in tears, can't even speak, and just keeps trying to rub off JB's dried blood on his hands.
  • Joe gets another one after Hurd calls the whole Hardy Gang to gloat about taking their guardians hostage: he's distraught that they don't know where Fenton is, Aunt Trudy's gone too, everything's going From Bad to Worse, and it all feels like, despite JB's Heroic Sacrifice and Dying Clue, he died for nothing in the end. Frank assures Joe this isn't true, gives him JB's watch, and vows that they'll win and save their loved ones.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: While holding Fenton prisoner, Dr. Grafton promises to use a Taser on him if he struggles during the "operation" he's about to perform. Fenton breaks free of his restraints, overpowers the man, zaps him with it instead, and straps him to the table.
• I Have Your Parents: Sparewell Technology tells the gang that they've taken the boys' aunt (and Biff's stepmom) Trudy Hardy, Biff's mom Jesse Hooper, and Belinda's dad Brian Conrad as leverage to keep them from interfering in their plans.
• I Shall Taunt You: Hurd's I Have Your Parents phone call doubles as this, telling the boys that they're too late because he has all he needs to enact his plot and they can't stop him, and also mocks them that, if they don't stay out of his way, more people are going to die "just like JB Cox."
• Impersonating an Officer: After being very heavily implied in the previous episode, it's now confirmed that Olivia is not really a DSA agent. In fact, not only is she working for Sparewell Tech, she is a Sparewell herself: Hurd's oldest daughter.
• Instant Sedation: It takes all of about 15 seconds after Fenton starts eating the drugged sandwich for him to pass out from it.
• It's All My Fault: Joe, in utter turmoil over JB's death, says this to Frank, feeling that he (Joe) got him killed by convincing him to stay in the game and help them a little longer when he wanted out, only for him to die saving them. Frank assures Joe that it wasn't his fault, and JB's Dying Clue gave them the new lead they needed, so he wanted them to stick with it and believed in them to find the answers.
• Knockout Gas: Sparewell Tech (which Olivia is part of) uses this to kidnap Trudy, Jesse, and Brian, just like Olivia did to Fenton previously.
• Lovable Rogue: Joe sums JB up this way when reminiscing about him to Frank, noting that he was very obviously lying about his identity when they first met, but Joe still knew he could trust him in the ways that counted most. Part of the reason it took him so long to actually get sick of JB's double-crosses for real was because they always did it to each other in a playful, "get ya back later" sort of way. (Though this is likely nostalgia talking considering that these incidents were portrayed far more seriously when they originally happened.)
• Mistaken for Romance: Donald Dukay's huge ego makes him totally misinterpret Callie's repeated questioning of him—which is only to get vital info about their cases, and is fairly antagonistic because he's such a Jerkass—as Belligerent Sexual Tension from her being in love with him, clearly not caring that she already has a boyfriend or when she tells him point-blank, in multiple different ways, that it's not true.
• Mistaken Identity: The now old and senile William Vogel, who's revealed to have worked for Hurd Sparewell after Gloria fired him, mistakes Biff for Hurd's daughter, whom he adored and had the Crystal necklace made for: Drew "Darrow", actually Drew Sparewell. Seeing how Biff looks about as different from Drew as can be and William seems to latch onto her just because she's the only girl present, he must be really senile.
• Noodle Incident: The boys get a few rather amusing ones for some of JB's other jobs while they're listening to his tapes, including turning down a request to steal 13 paintings from one museum, insisting on being a blackjack dealer for a casino theft, and demanding season tickets as part of a job to steal a trophy from the Hall of Fame.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome: The boys learn that, sometime during the Time Skip between the first two seasons, Fenton found JB's radio and note to Joe, successfully decoded it (which took Joe and Chet a while to do) to get JB's phone number, and called him. They're suitably impressed.
• Offscreen Teleportation: The Hardys and Callie abduct Drew for questioning by ambushing her when she enters her dorm room at Rosegrave, put a bad over her head, and when they take it off, she's now in JB's safe room in his apartment in Dixon City. Apparently she just sat there passively while being transported from one location to the other and didn't try to escape or say anything to them?
• Oh, Crap!: The gang's reactions, especially Belinda's, upon hearing Hurd's I Have Your Parents threat.
• Papa Wolf: While listening to JB's call recordings, Frank and Joe hear one from Fenton, who, during the Time Skip between Seasons 1 and 2, found and decoded offscreen the note JB left for Joe along with the CB radio. Fenton isn't outright threatening or even hostile, but does firmly make it clear that he doesn't want him or anyone else acting as a bad outside influence on his sons or leading them down the wrong path. JB just assures their dad that the boys don't really listen to him anyway, and Fenton responds more warmly that he can relate.
• Parents in Distress: The boys' aunt, Biff's mom, and Belinda's dad are knocked unconscious with gas and kidnapped by Sparewell as hostages.
• Please Wake Up: As JB closes his eyes and dies, Joe desperately shakes him by the shoulders and shouts, "No, no, come on!", to no avail.
• The Reveal:
  • After Gloria fired William Vogel, he went to work for tech billionaire Hurd Sparewell, owner and founder of Sparewell Technology, and formed a close bond with his daughter, for whom he made his piece of the Crystal into the necklace.
  • Not only is Olivia Kowalski indeed not really a DSA agent (as hinted prior), she's not even Anya's daughter at all, as the latter never had children. Her real name is Olivia Sparewell, Hurd's oldest daughter.
  • After Donald previously indicated "Drew Darrow" is an alias, it turns out her real name is Drew Sparewell and she's also Hurd's daughter, Olivia's younger sister, and the Sparewell child whom William was close to.
• Right for the Wrong Reasons: The Hardy gang finds out from Vogel that he used to work for the Sparewells, and—thinking Olivia was the one he had the necklace made for after finding out she's not really Anya's daughter—conclude that her real name is Olivia Sparewell. That is in fact true, but she's not the Sparewell daughter for whom Vogel got the necklace; it was actually her younger sister, Drew Sparewell.
• Series Continuity Error: In JB's recorded call with Stefan, the latter states that "Ms. Estabrook" will cover JB's required expenses to hire him to steal the Eye. JB previously told Joe in "A Strange Inheritance" that there are "no faces, no names" when it comes to his clients, and indeed, it was a plot point in the first half of the first season that JB didn't know who his buyer was, and he and the boys were separately trying to figure that out.
• Strapped to an Operating Table: Fenton wakes up like this, with the phony coroner who apparently faked Laura's death about to perform some kind of mind-control procedure on him. Fenton breaks out of the straps binding his arms and turns the tables.
• Tampering with Food and Drink: Fenton reluctantly eats the sandwich that his captor leaves for him, only to black out and collapse in less than 20 seconds from the drugs it's laced with.
• Tragic Keepsake: JB's wristwatch for Joe. Though in this case, he didn't directly give it to him; instead, Frank finds it in his safe room after his death and gives it to Joe himself, feeling sure (no doubt correctly) that JB would want him to have it.
• The Un-Reveal:
  • "JB Cox" was already previously revealed to just be an alias, and last season also established that he was a Rosegrave Academy student in the past, hinting at some kind of interesting backstory, especially with the question of how he went from attending Rosegrave to becoming a professional thief. Ultimately, the audience and the other characters never find out any more personal details about him, either before or after JB dies, and never even learn his real/original name.
  • With The Reveal that Olivia isn't actually Anya Kowalski's daughter, it's not made clear how she knew so much about her, what the Circle did to her family, and what Anya said to the Hardys in Season 1. The most likely option is that Olivia pretended to befriend Anya and show her sympathy to find out what she needed to know, or even that she forced the answers out of her, but it's not ever discussed.
  • There's also no indication of how Sparewell Tech knew where the codexes were that they hired JB to find two of while Olivia found the other two (until Fenton took them). Gloria revealed this in her video will, and it's clear Sparewell did see it somehow because they mistakenly sent JB to the real-life house on the cliff shown in the painting instead of going for the painting itself, but Olivia and JB were both on the hunt for the codexes in Season 2, before Gloria died and her will was sent to the Hardys. It's never stated that there was a copy of the video anywhere else that someone from Sparewell could have watched to figure all this out, or how else they could have known about it.
• Wham Line:
  • William is already known to the audience to be connected to Drew somehow because she has the necklace he had made with the Crystal piece, and William's talk with Biff indicates that this girl he made it for is the daughter of the man who employed him after Gloria. The gang is able to get him to name said employer, revealing a whole new major player in the case (and, to the audience, that Drew's been lying big-time about her identity):
    William: I worked for the Sparewells.
  • Drew telling Frank, Joe, and Callie about how Olivia is connected to Hurd, and to her:
    Drew: Orrin wasn't my only sibling. He has a twin sister.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Fenton and Sam previously came to Grafton's abandoned lab together looking for him and split up, at which point Fenton got captured. Even once he escapes here, it's not revealed what happened to Sam, who's never even mentioned.

---