In Vaulted Halls Entombed
Episode 8 of Love, Death & Robots Season 3 starts with Delta Zero Three on the hunt for hostages, who have been led into a dark cave. With sundown imminent, they’re going in dark and forced to rely on their night-vision to get through this alive. In the cave, they find strange lichen up on the wall, and a dead body on the floor. The only thing left are the skeletal remains and a spatter of blood. Something has happened to them and we soon find out what. Strange spider-like creatures descend out the holes in the wall, coming in their swarms. A sea of flesh-eating spiders attack the squad, killing several different members in the blink of an eye. The few survivors make it out the tunnels into a large, open area. There, they find the two remaining insurgents, which Sarge kills in cold blood from afar. Those small spiders are soon replaced by larger, mechanically driven insectoids that attack the three soldiers left. Spencer is eventually killed, leaving Sarge and Harper left behind. As they progress on, a large monstrous creature shows itself, repeating “Release me.” When Sarge turns on Harper, hypnotized by this creature somehow, she kills him and eventually turns to face the creature. After unloading several bullets onto it, Harper stares, wide-eyed at the creature in shock. Cut to outside and Harper has had her eyes gouged out. She stumbles through the choked desert, whispering in an alien language as we fade to black.
The Episode Review
In Vaulted Halls Entombed is another really solid episode, one that takes ideas from House of Ashes, the Dark Pictures game, and blends that in with the choking, atmospheric dread of The Descent. This delightful cocktail combines to create a really interesting episode and one that leaves a lot to the imagination. What is this creature? Where has it come from? And what does it want with Harper? These questions are certainly interesting and I’m sure many people will come up with their own theories over the origins of this in the coming weeks. The CGI in this episode is absolutely insane and it’s testament to how far this artform has come. There’s a lot of clever details here, especially when it comes to the lighting or showing dust particles kicked up in the air. Photorealistic and well written, this is another very good episode.
