THE SWARM – Season 1 Episode 3 – SPOILERS

Molecular biologist Cécile Roche (Cécile de France) discovers that Chef Bouquillon and his co-workers were killed by a new strain of vibrio vulnificus, a bacterium that produces a toxin when it comes into contact with blood. The Doctor explains that such infections are seldom fatal in humans, because human blood contains cells that consume the virus, but the new strain overcomes that by rapidly consuming the blood it contacts. Dr. Roche does not explain that some strains are bioluminescent, and that a close relative of V. vulnificus causes cholera.

From the increasing number of infections reported, Dr. Roche deduces that the bacteria have invaded the water supply. She packs her two children Isabelle (Vittorio Fiorini) and Louis (Alba Gaïa Bellugi) off to her house in Corbigny 800 kilometers to the northeast, and tells their father, who is in Belgium, to meet them there. (He agrees only after she explains that he is also in a potentially unsafe area.) Isabelle and Louis are instructed to boil tap water, and to use bottled water and disinfectant to bathe. Isabelle must drive, though she has no license. Her mother assures her that she “drives very well”.

In Geneva, Dr. Sigur Johanson (Alexander Karim) meets with Riku Sato (Takehiro Hira) who works for billionaire Tokyo shipping magnate Aito Mifune (Takuya Kimura). Johanson leaves information about that new species of ice worms (see episode 2) with Sato, who gets back to him to say that similar worms have been found on the continental slope off the southeast coast of India, and in the Nankai Trough which stretches from Suruga Bay to the sourthern coast of Shioku, Japan. According to The Japan Times: “The underlying fault, called the Nankai megathrust, has long been the source of disastrous earthquakes.”)

“The jellyfish in the Adriatic” are casually mentioned as being another problem. We hear nothing else about that, but in May of 2022, Extinction Rebellion FVG tweeted: “Too many jellyfish in the sea?…The proliferation of jellyfish and sea nuts, which we have witnessed in recent weeks in Trieste, is attributable to the increase in temperatures in the Adriatic.”

Johanson also receives evidence that Hovedstad (the company Tina works for) could be violating the terms of its exploration license in the North Sea by engaging in large scale dredging operations.

It also comes to light that the zebra mussels that encrusted the rudder of the freighter Barrier Queen (owned by Mifune) are twice as large as usual, and probably swam to the ship during their larval stage. Since the ship was only at sea for eighteen hours before finding its rudder inoperative, the life cycle of the mussels seems accelerated.

In the course of dialogue between Dr. Johanson and Tina Lund (Krista Kosonen), we learn that Mr. Mifune has an “interest” in medical science (only as an offshoot of his interest in biotech) and also that he “invested in the biotreatment of polluted environments – including the ocean – before anyone was even talking about it.”

On Vancouver Island, Leon (Joshua Odjick) autopsies one of the attacking orcas, and finds an unknown growth in the creature’s brain stem. He also observes that attacks on ships have all occurred along the whales’ migration route. To gather more data, Leon puts a camera on the back of a sleeping whale and retrieves it after it accumulates some footage. It is noted that the whales have never been known to dive so deeply. At the same time, Charlie (Leonie Benesch), has traveled to Kiel, Germany, and is viewing video of the Juno’s wreckage on the sea floor. Both video feeds have audio attached, and from each we hear a loud chittering sound. Behind and above the Juno, bioluminescent organisms are seen.

It will take Isabelle roughly eight hours to reach Corbigny.

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All 8 episodes of THE SWARM can be streamed on The CW website in the US,
on ZDF in Germany, and on Hulu in Japan.