What SIde Is Mark Working For On 'Orphan Black?'

As it turns out, Mark the clone isn't dead on Orphan Black . You sure fooled me, Orphan Black. I thought he was a goner considering the end of "Formalized, Complex, and Costly" suggested that we were down another male clone. I was all wrong. Instead of going for a kill shot, Momma Johanssen instead shot him everywhere else, so now he's bleeding and he's mad — completely understandable. Sarah patches him back up, and for a while it seems like they might join clone forces to save the day. At least it's going that way, until Rudy shows up and everything escalates very quickly. Now it's hard to figure out what side Mark is on, if he's even on any side. Could he be a completely rogue clone? The action of "Newer Elements of Our Defense" picks up with Sarah finding Mark in the cornfield, and he's profusely bleeding. The two of them manage to escape to a nearby abandoned house where Sarah stitches his wounds as best she can, and then he spends most of the episode slipping in and out of consciousness. Looking back on that, now I can't help but think it was a trap all along. Maybe. I don't know. Possibly? What is Mark even doing? Listen, there are lot of things that happened in this episode for the male clones, and it's gonna take some time to process them out. Mark may or may not have seized a golden opportunity to get close to Sarah for a short bit, only to betray her later. Last episode, if you remember, Gracie got a box of stuff that Mark desperately wanted. Turns out, the box actually used to belong to Henrik, and Sarah heads to Mark's motel room to find it. What's inside the box? Notebooks that used to belong to Henrik, who turns out to be Ethan Duncan's old lab partner. What?? Henrik somehow figured out a way to clone the clone DNA, and put the embryo (science!) into his wife — Bonnie!! — and she gave birth to a boy.

As or right now, this is the closest the clones have come to finding the original clone DNA. Now, it's time to find this clone of a clone. With this new information, Sarah and Mark drive to a long abandoned house where Henrik and Bonnie used to live. Henrik and Bonnie's baby is, sadly, dead, but Cosima thinks she can still pull some DNA off of it. Will it work? Let's find out! Time to dig up a baby clone grave! And that's when everything starts going wrong. Mark passes out — or should I say "passes out" since it might have been on purpose — and then Rudy shows up. Sarah's already dug up the grave, and learning what's inside, Rudy wants the tiny casket. Instead, Sarah hits him with a shovel, and flees to a nearby barn. Rudy's ready to kill her. Mark shows up (after waking from his unconscious state), and demands that Rudy stand down. In another twist I didn't see coming, Mark is Rudy's superior officer — and also calls him "little brother." Rudy has to abide by Mark's wishes, and he stops toying with the idea of shooting Sarah.

They might not shoot her, but they are most certainly taking her back to the Project Castor military base. Which is a total 180° for Mark, who just mere episodes ago was burning off his Castor tattoo, and thinking about running away with Gracie. So, what's up with him? Does his allegiance still lie with Project Castor, or does he really want to run away with Gracie? Does he even know what he wants? The fact that he tried to burn his tattoo off suggests he was thinking about escaping all together. He also tells Sarah that he loves Gracie, and I want to know if he really loves her, of if he's just saying that to cover his tracks. He's the male clone we've known the longest, but it still feels like we know nothing about him.

Also, the fact that he calls Rudy a "little brother." Could these male clones actually differ in age?

So Mark, come on, share a few more clone secrets with us, please? You can't just take a blow torch to your arm for fun, and never explain why. Image: Steve Wilkie/BBC AMERICA