'Orphan Black' Gets Bloody When Sarah Is Reunited With... Mrs. S

SPOILER ALERT: This recap of the "Governed by Sound Reason and True Religion" episode of "Orphan Black" contains character and storyline spoilers.

When it comes to badassery, Sarah Manning really learned from the best.

Things got bloody in the season's second episode. Mrs. S not only borrowed a page from the "Homeland" interrogation playbook (Quinn skewering Brody's hand, back when "Homeland" was really good), she pinned both of a former ally's palms to the table. And the dinner plates hadn't even been cleared yet! Rude.

Here's what went down in "Governed by Sound Reason and True Religion" (this title, like that of the season premiere, courtesy of English Renaissance philosopher Francis Bacon):

C'mon, Get Happy

OK, so Sarah, Felix, and Kira aren't exactly the Partridge Family, but they are on the road, in a big ol' farm truck that with the right paint job (Alison?) would make a nifty touring vehicle. Then again, they're not really looking to draw attention to themselves, seeing as how they're on the run from... well, a lot of nasty people. Rachel wasn't lying (this time, anyway) when she said her DYAD group didn't kidnap Sarah's daughter. In fact, it was Mrs. S, which technically isn't kidnapping but it would've been polite to give the kid's mother a heads up. But as we learned, Siobhan Sadler isn't all that concerned with manners.

[Related: Get Your Clones Straight With Our 'Orphan Black' Recaps]

Keep Your Hands Off the Table

Maybe Brenda, part of the underground group who harbored Mrs. S and her kids when they first arrived in America, should have listened to Emily Post. And maybe she would have learned her lesson eventually if Mrs. S. hadn't BLOWN HER HEAD OFF. And her son Barry's too. To be fair, they totally deserved it — they were going to hand over Kira to Prolethean cowboy cult leader Henrik Johanssen, who probably isn't just looking for a milkmaid. Also, Brenda didn't have any intel on Project Leda, which as we know Mrs. S is veddy interested in.

Healing Helena

Religious extremist Henrik is studying more than the Bible: He's got Helena, and seems genuinely concerned about her welfare. (Again, probably not for a milkmaid gig.) In fact, Tomas the Self-Flagellating Psychopath explained why Sarah's bullet didn't kill her twin sister: her heart is on the wrong side. That's not a metaphor: her organs are reversed — a mirror effect not unknown in identical twins. The organ Henrik is specifically interested in is her uterus; he wants to know whether — like her sister and his cows — Helena can conceive. Tomas wasn't on message, so Henrik's assistant Mark put him down with a cattle gun in the stable. Can't say we'll miss watching him whack his flabby back with a belt — but when Henrik smiled and said "It's a brand new day" over his dead body, we weren't exactly waving a tambourine to "Sunshine." (Try to find another "Orphan Black" recap that mentions the Partridge Family not once but twice. Just try.)

Weird Science

Sometimes we hear our neighbors shriek during a football game; Saturday night we all raised the roof when Delphine said "I just want to make crazy science with you in our new lab" to Cosima. Rawr! Their scenes together are so hot we had to crank on the AC, and it's still April. Then again, there's nothing like Rachel to throw cold water on the feels. Before Cosima and Delphine had a chance to christen their new digs, she breezed into the lab with the results of Cosima's latest medical tests (so much for HIPAA). Bad news: like Katja, Cosima's not getting any better. (She sure looks great though. Better than Helena ever did, that's for sure; a diet of sugar packets and lollipops really isn't good for the complexion.)

[Related: 'Orphan Black' Bosses Tease What's Next for Sarah, Cosima, and the Clones]

Alison's Little/Plus-Sized Helpers

Really the worst part about Sarah and Kira being on the run is that they've dragged Felix away from Alison. We would happily watch an entire episode devoted to the antics of Alison and her "acting coach." He was the one she called when she saw several text messages on Donnie's phone incriminating him as her monitor. With Felix's coaching, Alison set up a sting for Donnie: While he eavesdropped on her call, she arranged to meet "Sarah" — her "plus-sized" (Donnie's words) castmate, not her clone — at the cemetery. Donnie lacks Hot Paul's finesse, and she easily spotted him, proving the worst: She let an innocent Aynsley die.

Wracked with guilt and jumpy about Donnie, Alison's sobriety went out the window. Over miniature liquor bottles and Felix's best efforts to reassure her, nothing could relive Alisn's "anxiety residue" — that's the diagnosis of her handsy director, after she flubbed the choreography during rehearsals. Even breathing techniques were no use, and when Felix said he had to get off the phone, Alison popped one of her "little helpers" again. An actress turning to drugs and drink — has Alison become a cliché? (Never!)

[Related: 'Orphan Black' Star Jordan Gavaris Previews Season 2: Felix Will Have 'New Allegiances, New Enemies']

Break a Leg

We must beseech the "Orphan Black" producers again to make Alison's entire play available somewhere. Here's the latest snippet from this week's episode:

"I know nobody likes to touch a dead body, but I was really hoping you’d help me clean up the blood," the leading lady said, before the cast sang, "We are blood buds till the end, it is written in our hearts; we will be together till the day that death takes us apart! Now we must heed the call: Clean the brains off the wall! The task may be unpleasant but it's ours."

Best Felixisms

"Now make it sound all dire." (coaching Alison on the phone, treating viewers to another view of his bare backside beneath his painter's smock)

"I've seen where that hand's been." (refusing the handshake of Alison's director, who'd just touched her "sacrum" to guide her breathing)

"You have a history of jumping to monitor conclusions." (to Alison about Donnie)

"Not really, you know, just like hardly." ("convincing" Alison that she's not a murderer)

"Aynsley wore a scarf in the kitchen." (a crime of fashion?)

"Orphan Black" airs Saturdays at 9 p.m. on BBC America.