Tonight’s new episode of Revolution, “Ghosts”, divides its time between two primary threads, each about former partnerships torn asunder but looking for common ground to reunite, and finding it in the form of evil armed henchmen. Nothing mends fences like common foes.

Of the episode’s two halves, more interesting and personal is the tension between Charlie and Rachel, as mother and daughter grieve the loss of son/brother Danny in last week’s mismatched showdown between a pair of working helicopters and one thermal-guided surface-to-air missile launcher. As the Rebel Alliance relocates its Annapolis base from its now-missile-ridden digs to a nearby former hospital, Rachel wallows in guilt and blame (when she’s not busy drawing electrical diagrams of the mysterious blue-light device she retrieved from her dead son’s innards last week), while Charlie rebuffs her and instead looks for opportunities for action, doing whatever she can for the resistance so that Danny’s death won’t be as much in vain as his hard-fought rescue from Independence Hall ultimately was. She storms off without Mom’s permission to assist in an overnight militia raid and returns the next day with an ugly shoulder wound, rebuking any attempts at assistance and talking back in hardcore Wolverine tough-guy whispers. Their argument ends with Rachel slapping Charlie. That doesn’t help, and seems unnecessary now that Tracy Spiridakos’ performance is showing signs of improvement.

Meanwhile, back in Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Randall Flynn, former Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Defense, delights in his decision to join Team Monroe, bragging about how, after much deliberation, he chose to ally with the Monroe Republic rather than with “Georgia, or Governor Affleck in California.” (Here’s hoping there’ll be a worthy payoff for that throwaway line someday.) After Flynn cheerily but lamely encourages a sulking Monroe to “lighten up” (ho ho it is funny because “lighten” has light in it and he has working lights and…Monroe just glares), he then tries to impress by showing off how he can activate power pendants remotely and use them as tracking devices. He does so with two such pendants from far away, rallies up a posse, requisitions a flatbed truck and a couple of Humvees (because when you’ve just made cars work for the first time in fifteen years, the smart traveling option is to find the largest gas guzzlers in existence), and speedily drives the 127-mile trip from Philly to Annapolis, MD, to fetch not only the two pendants, but the “giant brain” of a woman who’s likely holding them.

Aaron would prefer not to interrupt the Matheson family awkwardness, and therefore says nothing for a while after the two power pendants he’s been toting around with him suddenly turn on without warning. Eventually Rachel notices and freaks out. Aaron admits they tend to do this at random from time to time, as if they’re just broken kitchen appliances with a short in the wiring. Rachel, their co-inventor, insists no, they don’t do that at random.

Then come the air raid sirens. Humvees are here! Upon arrival, Flynn turns on mankind’s first working megaphone in fifteen years and issues demands more concerned with Rachel than with the pendants. While the saner Rebel Alliance soldiers evacuate, Rachel stays behind to pull apart the pendants, surprising Aaron with their secret nature: they’re flash drives! Apparently former Google executive Aaron never figured out how to unplug them from their bases. Rachel fills a sink with rubbing alcohol and other bathroom fluids, then dunks both flash drives to kill the signal — and, regrettably, their usefulness as tiny power generators.

Having failed to get out while the getting was good, Charlie, Rachel, and Aaron find themselves in a cat-and-mouse game through the hospital corridors, pursued by Flynn’s armed henchmen. Charlie takes one out with her crossbow, stabs another with a quarrel after her crossbow jams (not her first time experiencing crossbow issues), grabs herself an enemy rifle instead, and tosses her former weapon to Aaron to hold for her, as if he’s her caddy, because of course he wasn’t already too busy holding a working weapon for his own self-defense. Charlie knows him too well for that.

Alas, Rachel gets separated from Charlie and her gofer, and winds up nabbed by the henchmen. Flynn makes a grand speech about his theory that electrical power should be held and wielded only by those in positions of power. Charlie ruins his concentration with gunfire, rescues Rachel, and the trio make their getaway. I’m not clear on how that works, considering they have only their feet for transportation, and Flynn has vehicles with wheels and accelerators and speedometers and such. Nevertheless, getaway accomplished. Later, mother and daughter have apologies and hugs and tears, while Flynn stews silently and probably curses those meddling kids.

Meanwhile on the other plot track: Miles has resolved that the Rebel Alliance needs to start aiming for larger victories against their oppressors, not nickel-and-dime smash-and-grab acts that amount to nothing. The obvious solution: do everything Miles’ way, beginning with letting him bring in his best guys, old allies and coworkers and such. The recruitment drive begins in Culpeper, VA, which Miles says is twenty miles away but online resources insist is 109 miles from Annapolis. Maybe in a world without electricity, “mile” means something different now.

Thus do Miles and Nora pay a visit to one Jim Hudson (Malik Yoba from Alphas and New York Undercover), who naturally refuses because he’s out of the killing game. Hudson is now a town librarian living under the assumed name Henry Bemis, a reference to Burgess Meredith’s doomed librarian from the classic Twilight Zone episode “Time Enough at Last”. More than just his precious books, Hudson also has a wife named Sophia who knows nothing about his former life of soldiering or about The Twilight Zone. Miles insists Hudson has to help because, “You cannot wash that much blood off your hands.” Hudson resents the implication that change and redemption are but a dream, though lying to his wife probably wasn’t the best means to achieve them.

Thanks to info received from a Rebel Alliance informant (who’s then murdered despite his handy tip), a Monroe kill-squad comes to town takes the decision out of Hudson’s hands, particularly when the unnamed kill-squad commander (guest star Nestor Serrano) threatens his wife and says misogynist things to her. Pity the poor kill-squad, twenty men strong but armed only with large deadly guns, who fall quickly before the jump-cut editing-fu that is the hand-to-hand combat style of Nora, Miles and his two swords, and Hudson reluctantly out of retirement. The bloodletting is capped when Hudson chops the commander into a few pieces while his wife watches in horror and not in appreciation for the rescue. Miles’ earlier prophecy — in which he channeled the spirit of Joss Whedon and insisted that guys like them don’t get to be in happy couples — comes to pass as Sophia rejects the man she thought she knew. Even though Hudson’s new life built on lies wouldn’t have been ruined if Miles hadn’t come to town, he agrees to join the cause anyway. I bet the big fight scene broke his reading glasses, too.

I know what you’re thinking: Where’s Neville? Why isn’t Neville around? It would be so much better if Neville were here. Neville is consigned to one measly scene this week. Remember, last week he told Monroe that his son Jason was dead. Since he didn’t clarify that Jason is not physically dead, but dead only in the disowned I-HAVE-NO-SON sense, Monroe considers Neville on family leave. Neville is disappointed because he really, really wants to join the hunt for Rachel, especially since he doesn’t trust Flynn for a second. Monroe technically echoes his sentiment: “You know me. I don’t trust anyone.” The lingering look between the two raises the question: is this comment double-edged? Does he know Neville lied about Jason? It’s a foreshadowing of fireworks to come.

This week’s flashbacks star Colm Feore, our man Randall Flynn, most of whose origin stands revealed. He and his wife Lisa had their lives shattered when their son, Sgt. Edward Flynn, was killed in action in Kabul. With the Matheson’s handy-dandy power-killing tech now in the hands of the American government, Flynn decides for himself that perhaps fewer innocents would die in wars if there were no power to run the war engines. With this theory as his new credo, and with tragedy fresh in mind, Flynn sits at a table of military bigwigs and orders “the Tower” to execute the plan that would trigger the worldwide blackout and, as we’ve discovered over these twelve episodes to date, somehow not bring an end to all wars. Bravo, Flynn. Bravo.

Final scene: Aaron wheedling Rachel about what she knows, about what’s caused these fifteen horrible years, about the premise of the show in general. Rachel tries to answer with the silent treatment, but Aaron won’t have it. He’s not waiting six seasons for an answer. He wants to know now now now.

Rachel sighs, relents, and begins: “There’s this place. It’s called the Tower.”

To be continued!

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If you missed a previous episode of Revolution, you can check NBC’s official site for any episodes remaining online, consult your local Video On Demand provider, spend money on them over at iTunes, try Hulu if you’re so inclined, or check out past episode commentary/recaps here at MCC. Your handy episode checklist is provided below, along with recap links. Thanks for reading!

9/17/2012: “Pilot”
9/24/2012: “Chained Heat”
10/1/2012: “No Quarter”
10/8/2012: “The Plague Dogs”
10/15/2012: “Soul Train”
10/29/2012: “Sex and Drugs”
11/5/2012: “The Children’s Crusade”
11/12/2012: “Ties That Bind”
11/19/2012: “Kashmir”
11/26/2012: “Nobody’s Fault But Mine”
3/25/2013: “The Stand“