Halo Season 2 Episode 2 Recap: Sword

Halo Season 2 Episode 2 "Sword" had the unenviable job of following up on the epic battle and intrigue of the Season 2 premiere episode, "Sanctuary". Episode 2 undoubtedly took a slower-paced look into the principal characters and storylines of Halo Season 2 – but as you will see in our recap below, there was quite a lot of 'moving the pieces' and 'place setting' that was accomplished. 

(FULL SPOILERS FOLLOW!) 

Halo Season 2 Episode 2 Recap

Deadly Interview – Episode 2 opens with a mysterious scene of Dr. Halsey (Natascha McElhone) interviewing a young red-headed girl. The girl enters a lavish room where Halsey is admiring a tree planted indoors, to bring her afternoon tea and treats. The girl describes the fruit that grows on the tree, before bringing Halsey another item: a Backgammon board game. Halsey begins to play Backgammon while also lightly interrogating the girl about what happens when she leaves that room – but the girl feels the pressure not to reveal it. She does open up to Halsey about what she remembers outside of the room – including a man, who seems to be the focus of Halsey's interest. Halsey wants to know about the man, who the girl credits for bringing her the "gifts." In mid-conversation, the girl's nose starts bleeding, and she starts to feel dread, all while Halsey is pushing her for an answer about the man. The girl suddenly falls dead on the table, leaving Halsey looking supremely frustrated. 

Injured Reserve – Back at UNSC command on The Reach, Spartans Kai (Kate Kennedy) and Riz (Natasha Culzac) have a private conversation about Riz's fitness for combat duty. Riz's injuries from Season 1 have severely impacted her body. Kai tries to be empathetic by suggesting Riz take a break; Riz's Spartan pride won't let her even hear of it. Kai next speaks with Master Chief (Pablo Schreiber) about their new handler James Ackerson (Joseph Morgan) making her miss the days of Halsey. Master Chief wonders if he isn't mentally broken since being separated from Cortana, and confides in Kai that he saw the Covenant's human 'chosen one' Makee during the Battle of Sanctuary (Season 2 Episode 1), despite Kai shooting down Makee in the Season 1 finale. The question of mental fitness gets put aside when the two Spartans notice that the board listing Spartan deployments is being changed. The "Cobalt" team Ackerson replaced Master Chief's Silver Team with is being listed as "standby," even though Chief begged Ackerson not to send them out without proper intel on the new Covenant threat. When the poor tech changing the board can't provide answers, Master Chief storms off to find Ackerson. 

[Title Sequence Plays] 

The Marked Ones – Back in the region known as "The Rubble" we pick up with the Episode 1 cliffhanger that series co-lead Kwan Ha (Yerin Ha) is back, having been gone since the middle of Season 1. Kwan is in The Rubble community and has bonded with Kessler, the son of former Spartan Soren-066 (Bokeem Woodbine). We witness what a day in The Rubble is like for Kwan when trackers come looking for wayward indentured servants that are marked with location beacons, like livestock. Kwan has been tagged with such a beacon and desperately tries to cut it off her body. The trackers find her and a big chase ensues; when she's finally cornered, Kwan finally gets her beacon loose, and confronts both trackers, killing them. 

New Spartan Perspective – Riz is doing fitness/rehab in the gym with blind former Spartan, Louis-036 (Marvin Jones III). Louis helps Riz work out her pain and injury without prying eyes and tries to get her to consider a life beyond being a Spartan. Riz is snippy about the subject, but Louis is unbothered, reminding her he knows how the "a**hole" Spartans think. Riz finally gets vulnerable enough to ask how Louis went on after losing his sight and having to retire from active duty. Louis tells her that she's not yet ready to understand. 

MIA – Master Chief confronts Ackerson in his office about Cobalt Team. Chief threatens to go over Ackerson's head in the chain of command to get Silver Team back in the field; Ackerson counters by informing John that the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) is now in command of the Spartan program – and he (Ackerson) is heading up the ONI. Ackerson also reveals to Master Chief that the Corporal he saved during the Battle of Sanctuary, Talia Perez (Cristina Rodlo), won't corroborate his report about Elites infiltrating the planet before the Covenant destroyed it. Ackerson ensues that Master Chief's mind may not be reliable after the trauma of the Battle of Raas Kkhotskha (Season 1 finale) and losing Cortana. 

Can't Trust A Pirate – In The Rubble, Soren-066's wife Laera (Fiona O'Shaughnessy) confronts her husband's crew of pirates about repairing his ship. Soren's crew tries to placate Laera, but she senses that there's treachery afoot and demands they get the ship fixed and go looking for their captain. Soren's son Kessler finds Kwan injured after removing her tracking beacon and killing the trackers. When Kwan says she has to go on the run, Kessler insists his dad will protect her; in her pain and frustration, Kwan responds that Soren is never coming back and that Kessler and his mom are in danger of mutiny. Kessler runs away wearing his dad's Spartan helmet. 

Train Like A Spartan – Riz is put to the test in a training exercise that has her trying to recover a tracking beacon from a mountain cliffside. Riz not only has to get the beacon, she has to avoid being sniped by Master Chief – and the first round does not go her way, and Riz falls from a high height to the ground. Vannak (Bentley Kalu) mocks her for losing; Kai (Kate Kennedy) is empathetic, wanting to let Riz rest and recover more – but Master Chief insists they run it again. Riz won't back down and gets ready to run it again – Kai has an obvious beef with Chief about how he's pushing her. Riz pushes even harder in Round 2, but even with Master Chief rooting for her, her injuries and physical limits are revealed, and she falls even harder, from higher up on the cliff. When Master Chief still will not relent Kai steps to him for an explanation; Chief tells his team that he knows the Covenant Elites he saw on Sanctuary were training for some big battle to come – and they must be ready, every single one of them. The Spartans run the exercise again. 

Die, Rinse, Repeat – Halsey and a new version of the red-haired girl are still in the lavish room playing Backgammon. The girl seems to think her score is higher, but Halsey points out that over the course of the games they've played, she has been banking a higher overall score (a strategy particular to Backgammon) – as Halsey puts it, small losses can still result in a big win. When Halsey tries to once again get information about "the man" the girl saw, she once again falls down dead on the table. Halsey looks up at the captors she knows are watching and asks, "What is the point in this?" 

Hello Darkness, My New Friend – Louis and Riz have a heart-to-heart conversation after her stressful training session. Louis shares an anecdote about his last day of sight, and why he never told his fellow Spartans when his vision first started to fade, until he was fully blind. Louis conveys how his own Spartan pride kept him hanging on to the last moment of sight – and how on that last day before a forever darkness he took in how proud, powerful, and beautiful he and his fellow Spartans looked. The scene pulls back to reveal that Louis has brought Riz to meet a friend of his, who will help her. 

Employee Welfare – Ackerson brings Kai in for a meeting about Master Chief. After expressing worry in John's mind state, Ackerson asks Kai directly if Chief could be compromised. Kai refuses to go there but does express a worry that John has too much bad history to completely look forward. But she insists that Master Chief is still a capable leader. Ackerson craftily maneuvers Kai into being his informant in the Spartan ranks, which Kai is clearly conflicted about. 

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner – An angry Master Chief barges into the home of Talia Perez – only to be subdued by the presence of her kindly mother. Chief is invited in for dinner.

Zen Healing – The friend Louis brought Riz to see uses his hands to heal Riz's body, while using meditative voice to also open her mind and perspective. 

Dinner Date – Master Chief has a nice rooftop dinner with Talia, her mom, and her cousins – who first tease Talia as if she's dating Chief. When the cousins ask Chief about his skills playing a popular Spartan-based fighting game, the response lets them know he's not a man for games. The cousins realize John is an actual Spartan, and immediately go full fanboy. Talia can't take it and leaves the table; in a private conversation, she confides in John that it was a comms relay going down that drew her unit out into the Covenant ambush on Sanctuary. Her trauma and doubt have kept her silent and scared, and John delivers the hard news that "coping" only means letting the faces of dead friends and monsters drift further away into your memory. 

End This Charade – It's revealed that Ackerson is the one controlling the horrific scenario that Halsey is trapped in, meaning that Halsey has been confined in some ONI base or facility somewhere on Reach the entire time. Halsey jokes that the dead clones describing a "nice man" outside the room directly contradicts Ackerson being that man; Ackerson counters that they both knew he'd one day be 'the man outside the room' in some form. Halsey reveals an anecdote about the pomegranate tree that's in the room – how her father cultivated one to grow on the planet they lived on and made them tirelessly maintain it. A young Halsey used the cover of a lightning storm to burn the tree down, never getting caught for the crime. The fact that the tree has been recreated in the room makes Halsey insinuate that there's only one way that Ackerson could have recreated its likeness – Cortana. Ackerson won't answer any questions about Master Chief or Cortana – but leaves Halsey the "gift" of a new "Julia" clone attendant. The pomegranate tree suddenly catches fire, startling Halsey and Julia; Ackerson leaves the room, revealing it to be some kind of holographic VR room. The open doorway Ackerson walks out of immediately raises serious questions as to whether or not Halsey is even the real, original person, or some kind of simulation or clone recreation.

Men On A Mission – A parallel set of scenes unfolds. In one, we see Master Chief using USNC computers to track the flight path of Cobalt Team's ship; the other shows Ackerson leaving Halsey and walking down the hall to another secret room, where he's keeping the Halo Keystone that Master Chief found on Madrigal – and Cortana (Christina Bennington). Cortana confirms that she provided "Col." Ackerson with the intel he needed about Halsey. Ackerson references a predictive set of projections he asked Cortana to calculate; the AI confirms a "97% probability" rate. Ackerson looks deeply disturbed (while still stoic) about that result, and calmly (too calmly) asks Cortana for "a viable strategy to prevent that outcome," but Cortana assures him her calculations are based on every scenario of action and choice she can factor in, given her status of being cut off from the network. Ackerson leaves in state of sad resolution, promising to visit Cortana again; Cortana innocently calls out the lie, knowing that based on "simulations" Ackerson won't be given the chance to speak with her again. Ackerson smiles and says his 'See you later' was just a gesture people do. In the computer room, Master Chief makes a startling discovery: Cobalt team never left The Reach planet. 

The Fight Comes Home – The Master Chief has the Silver Team suit up and deploy in the field. When Kai questions what they're doing, and why they're going it alone, John explains what he's deduced: the Covenant Elites took down the comms relay on Sanctuary before destroying the planet: now the Visegrád Relay on Reach has gone down, and Cobalt Team never returned from investigating it. Master Chief informs his team that the Covenant is already invading Reach. 

Return of the Blessed One – Makee (Charlie Murphy) and her Covenant Elites storm a USNC facility on Reach and kill the Marine squad stationed there. A secret vault is hiding what Makee is seeking: the larger Halo Keystone that was found on Eridanus II. 

How to Watch Halo Season 2

Halo Season 2 is streaming on Paramount+. You can watch the show if you are a subscriber – or try a one-week free trial of Paramount+ HERE.