Season 3, Episode 6:
Immolation
Tropes:
- Boom, Headshot!: Amos to Strickland.
- Chekhov's Skill: Bobbie being physically strong enough to arm wrestle her own Power Armor saves her life when, after a fall damages the armor and leaves it as a dead weight shell around her body, she manages to lift her arm just enough to shoot and kill the Hybrid!Katoa that was trying to kill her.
- Deceased Fall-Guy Gambit: As the Roci crew closes in, Strickland shoots his assistant and tries to blame her for everything. It doesn't work.
- Defiant to the End: Nguyen is unrepentant in his final moments, choosing instead to taunt Amos about how Mars is doomed.
- Dirty Coward: Dr. Strickland murders his assistant and tries to blame her for everything, and then begs when that fails.
- Fantastic Racism: Nguyen towards Martians, and Belters to a lesser extent. He outright states that the minute they left Earth to colonize Mars, they ceased being human, calling them "insects".
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Nguyen ordered numerous pods containing the hybrids to be launched to Mars. The Roci, UNN, and MCRN all shoot down some of these pods, and one of them hits the Agatha King, dooming the ship and everyone on it, Nguyen included.
- Hope Spot: Dr. Strickland has one when Amos persuades Prax not to kill him...only for Amos to kill Strickland himself.
- Jerkass Villain Has a Point: For all of Errinwright's selfishness, treachery, and Never My Fault attitude, he is absolutely right when he calls out Secretary-General Sorrento-Gillis as being a spineless, weak-willed, poor leader who's more obsessed with his legacy than anything else, and Sorrento-Gillis proves him right immediately afterwards by thanking Anna not for making sure a treasonous Corrupt Politician was arrested, but for saving his legacy.
- Karmic Death: Both of the show's worst villains get killed off in this episode, so naturally, their deaths are very karmic:
- Dr. Strickland kidnapped Mei and other children and experimented on them, turning Mei's friend Katoa into a hybrid. Amos (whose Berserk Button is harming children) executes him with a shot to the head as he fruitlessly begs for mercy.
- Admiral Nguyen was in on The Conspiracy with Mao and Errinwright, murdered Admiral Souther, and launched pods of the hybrids towards Mars to commit genocide on its 7 billion people just out of sheer racism. One of those pods was shot down and hit his ship, taking him out of action, before he's killed when Cotyar blows the whole ship up.
- Killed Off for Real:
- Dr. Strickland, who's executed by Amos.
- Katoa as Mei knew him was already almost entirely gone, having been turned into a hybrid, but here, Hybrid!Katoa is put down by Bobbie shooting the back of his head out.
- Cotyar, who blows up the Agatha King, with him still on it, to destroy the protomolecule there.
- Fleet Admiral Nguyen, who's also on this ship and dies in the explosion.
- Laser-Guided Karma: In addition to the karmic deaths listed above:
- After two and a half seasons of being a Manipulative Bastard and Corrupt Politician, and after being a passive-aggressive Jerkass to Anna for all of Season 3 so far, Sadavir Errinwright's treachery is finally exposed—thanks to Anna's efforts, to boot—and he's arrested for treason.
- Jules-Pierre Mao is responsible for the deaths of thousands upon thousands of people, including his own daughter Julie, thanks to Protogen's work with the protomolecule. Holden apprehends him and brings him to Avasarala to finally answer for his crimes. For bonus points, she’s wearing Julie’s suit, allowing Julie to posthumously condemn her father.
- Oh, Crap!: The moment Dr. Strickland sees Amos' Death Glare, he knows he's screwed.
- Papa Wolf/Knight Templar Parent: Prax, who sees right through Strickland's lies that he was taking care of Mei the whole time and clearly very much wants to kill him for it. Amos persuades Prax not to, though, and does it himself.
- Precision F-Strike: Amos gives one of these when he sees a giant protomolecule object ascending through the atmosphere of Venus, on TV. In a room full of kids.
- Sparing Them the Dirty Work: Amos talks Prax down from killing Dr. Strickland, telling him "You're not that guy"... then after Prax leaves the room, Amos tells Strickland "I am that guy" and blows his brains out.
- Taking You with Me: Cotyar becomes infected with the protomolecule after one of the pods carrying it crashes into the Agatha King. He destabilizes the core of the ship to blow the entire thing up and destroy the protomolecule there so it doesn't turn into another Eros situation.
- Wham Episode: Thanks to Avasarala's and Anna's efforts, Errinwright is finally arrested for treason, and Holden apprehends Mao as well. Amos kills Dr. Strickland, the children are rescued, and Mei and Prax are reunited, but Katoa completes his transformation into a hybrid and nearly kills Bobbie, who narrowly survives and manages to kill him instead. Nguyen launches the pods of protomolecule hybrids from Io towards Mars with the intent of committing genocide on the Martians, only for one of the pods to be shot down and hit his ship, causing the entire Agatha King to be infected with the protomolecule. Cotyar blows up the Agatha King to destroy the protomolecule, taking himself, Nguyen, and everyone else still alive on the ship with it. Fred Johnson, after being contacted by Naomi, uses the missiles he stole from the UNN last season to shoot down all the remaining hybrid pods. Naomi and Holden fully reconcile and reunite as a couple, but Naomi decides to leave the Rocinante, at least temporarily. Finally, the protomolecule growth on Venus launches a mysterious structure into space whose nature is unknown.
