Bodies episode 7 recap: Elias Mannix creates the family he always wanted

Bodies episode 7 spoilers ahead

The penultimate episode of Bodies is focused on fleshing out how Elias Mannix (Stephen Graham) put his grand plan into action, beginning with his years spent portraying Sir Julian Harker in 1890. For simplicity’s sake, I’ll just call him Mannix here, since that’s who he is despite pretending to be someone else.

After landing in 1890 post-time travel, Mannix manipulates his way into Lady Agatha Harker’s (Anna Calder-Marshall) house. She doesn’t fully believe he’s her son and he even admits as much to her, but he’s still able to convince her to pretend that he is. Then he sets his sights on Polly Hillinghead (Synnove Karlsen) daughter of Detective Alfred Hillinghead (Kyle Soller).

They meet one day after church when Hillinghead had gone off with journalist Henry Ashe (George Parker). Mannix stops a thief from stealing Polly’s locket and the two strike up a friendship, with Mannix eventually employing Polly at his home to play music for his “mother.”

Poor Hillinghead. Mannix intercepts his transport to a different prison just to tell him he’s going to marry his daughter and then orders his lackey, Ladbroke (Andrew Whipp), to kill Hillinghead and make it look like a suicide. You know, the whole thing was pretty cruel because Mannix didn’t gain anything by having that conversation with Hillinghead. He could have let him die thinking he’d protected his family.

Nonetheless, things carry out as you might expect. Mannix successfully courts Polly and the two marry and give birth to Hayden Harker. Once Hayden is born, Mannix finally reveals the truth to Polly, introducing him to his doomsday cult and revealing his real name. He tells Polly that their son will have children, who will have children, etc. and eventually, one will give birth to Daniel Barber, the man that will become Elias Mannix’s father. It’s getting very Dark in here isn’t it? As you can see, it’s the perfect loop. Elias eventually sires his own dad.

In 1941, we see Polly all grown up (Greta Scacchi) and the day of her and Mannix’s death at the hands of Detective Charlie Whiteman (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd), who is then hanged for their murders.

Skipping ahead to 2053, Detective Iris Maplewood (Shira Haas) denies any knowledge of what happened to The Commander Elias Mannix. She also claims not to know what happened to Detective Shahara Hasan (Amaka Okafor), who is being pinned as the leader of Chapel Perilous.

In reality, everything that happened near The Throat has changed Maplewood’s opinion of Mannix. She sent Hasan to stay with her brother, Alby (Edwin Thomas), who has been taking care of her. They’re now working together. Hasan also reveals how her son died. The blast did not kill him directly, but indirectly, as he died from the radiation. Similarly, Maplewood says one of her earliest memories is watching her mother die, though she doesn’t go into detail.

At Maplewood’s apartment, she finds Gabriel Defoe’s (Tom Mothersdale) old notes and realizes there might be a clue to something that hasn’t happened yet. Defoe previously talked about how the Deutsch particle could send something backward and forward in time. He has a day marked four days later where his body could reappear, still alive.

Maplewood takes this theory to Hasan and they come up with a plan to retrieve Defoe and save him, with Alby’s assistance. But once Defoe recovers, he’s not as enthusiastic as they might have anticipated. He thinks it’s over. There’s no way to break the loop and Mannix is gone. But then Hasan says there was something Andrew Morley said to her in the Harker house basement she never understood. He said he felt bad making Mannix do something he would later come to regret.

So perhaps there is a point in time where Mannix does feel regret over his actions, meaning they could potentially send someone back in time to that point and make him change his mind. Maplewood volunteers and jumps through The Throat, emerging in 1890. The only problem is, her SPYNE obviously doesn’t work back then and she’s unable to walk.