Everything happening on The Strain is a lie.
Take Nazi vampire Thomas Eichorst, for instance. When last he met his old nemesis, Abraham Setrakian, the old pawn shop owner commented that Eichorst hasn’t aged at all since their most recent encounter, ages ago. But we now know that as a lie. Eichorst’s sinister grin, his human hue, is all a sham. He wears dentures over his raw gums. He applies makeup to his otherwise pasty skin. A wig sits atop his hairless head. He is a lie. The only things that are authentic about Eichorst are his vampirism and his willingness to wrong others.
Take Abraham as another example. He knows why he visited John F. Kennedy Airport after word broke out about Regis Airways Flight 753. But telling that truth is what landed him in prison — so why not bend the truth to get out? He tells a series of lies to the judge in order to leave his prison. “I’m old, and I’m not well,” he says. He promises to melt down the cane sword in his possession, even though it’s an heirloom with sentimental value. That last part is not a lie, at least, but there is no way that Abraham is willing to part with his sword — not when there are vampires all over New York.
And make no mistake: there are vampires all over New York. Just ask the rats. Exterminator Vasily Fet watches as the vermin congregate and move in a unified direction, swarming in packs unlike anything he’s ever seen before. As he notes, rats are led by their senses of smell and taste. If there’s blood in the water, they’ll find it — at least the rats don’t lie.
Jim Kent is a rat of a different color. The lies are worn all over his face, even if his lies come from a decent place. His wife is sick with cancer. In order to get her the treatment she needs, Jim lies to his CDC colleagues, allowing the mysterious box that came in on Regis 753 to escape the airport. He’s responsible for the vampire problem. The lies he tells to save his wife are condemning the world around him. Feed him to the rats.
But things could be worse for Jim. He could wake up in the morning hairless and without genitals. That’s the situation for Gabriel Bolivar, the shock rock legend who survived the Regis incident, but at what cost? After sucking blood from a lover in last week’s episode, Gabriel’s conditions have worsened. He has no penis — as essential an instrument as his vocals, one assumes.
Punctuating the point even further, penisless Bolivar isn’t even the worst deal in town. That distinction belongs to Captain Redfern, the pilot of Regis 753, and one of the four survivors. He volunteered to let Ephraim Goodweather conduct his research, and what did that get him? A repeated bashing to the brain with a fire extinguisher. In fairness to Eph, the killing was justified; Redfern was seconds away from slurping Kent and Nora Martinez like slurpies.
And if nothing else, killing Redfern exposed the greatest lie of all. The disease carried aboard Regis was not conventional. It’s not the flu. It’s not carbon monoxide poisoning. It’s something far worse. It’s something far bloodier. And it’s something that must be stopped at all costs.
In killing Redfern, Ephraim kills the lies — but there’s still much work to be done before the full truth is known.
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