Subconscious Patrol

"**Subconscious Patrol**" is the eighth episode of the third season of *Doom Patrol*. It premiered on HBO Max on October 28, 2021.

## Synopsis

While the fog obscures more than just the air, Vic, Cliff, Jane, and Larry must relive their most shameful moments until a breakthrough occurs, and Rita begins to better understand Madame Rouge.

## Plot

On some wires near the Doom Manor, the birds of the group fly away while one stays because his person got over his past. Vic flashes back to his childhood in a toy store, where he saw himself as a kid getting into trouble for looking for a black superhero and Silas found General Tony, giving it to Vic to be like him. Nostalgic for his past, Vic watched Tony come to life, switching places with him now with Vic as a toy. In The Underground, Jane, turned into a puppet, discovers an adult Kay playing with the puppet personas and a talking Harry. Jane expressed her confusion and Hammerhead argued with her to understand everything until Kay asked what the trauma was, before being picked up by Jane's bird. Cliff went to his old racing industry, surprisingly meeting his human subconscious, who reminded him of the memory they are in, showing Bump Weathers leaving for a party and the subconscious told Cliff that he had to face his past, disappearing with his bird and Cliff decided to enter. Larry heads to a church before his wedding day, meeting his subconscious, talking about his desire not to marry Sheryl and watching his subconscious disappear with his bird.

At the Doom Manor, Subconscious Cliff, Subconscious Larry, Kay, and Tony meet, wondering about the global situation, and Rita interrupts them, explaining that the Eternal Flagellation served to stop the world from hiding her true identity, switching places with her subconscious. Subconscious Larry views the acts of the Sisterhood of Dada as wrong, but Rita considers it art, mentioning that she plans to get revenge on Laura, aka Madame Rouge. In 1949, Rita discovers Laura joining the Brotherhood of Evil, introducing herself to Ultimax and Monsieur Mallah, who give her her villainous nickname and the mission to travel to 2021 to eliminate the Niles legacy. Larry sees his mother, Debbie, arrive happy about her wedding to Sheryl, but Larry told the truth about accepting himself as gay, although Debbie gave him a wedding ring for Sheryl, pitying Larry, who didn't feel comfortable reliving his wedding. Jane and the puppet personalities argue over the trauma, considering that Kay was seeking to heal, which would cause them to disappear and Harry confessed that Kay told him her greatest desire to live without them, angering Jane and the others, so in a fit of anger, they killed Harry. Vic argued with his child version about how he was now following orders like Silas said, losing his childhood so he wouldn't make mistakes.

The Subconscious group listened to Rita's plan to defeat Laura together, refusing because they weren't like their sentient versions to fight evil, though they ended up agreeing to refuse to talk about their problems. At the Sisterhood's old base, Laura is confronted by Rita before traveling to the future and Rita expresses her anger at betraying the Sisterhood, despite ultimately being fired by the Bureau of Normalcy, which Laura acknowledged. while Rita criticized her for sending innocent young metahumans to be weapons. Laura taunted Rita for thinking that she would change the world with art, before she tried to choke her until Laura scoffed, transforming into Malcolm DuPont, making Rita feel bad and Laura left, telling her she was sorry that they were best friends at the beginning of it all. Rita and the Subconscious group head off to find Laura inside Shelley Byron's mind, watching the talking water bike and the group decide to leave, leaving Rita on her own. In his memory, Cliff shows anger at Bump for fucking Kate while he was trying to figure out how to get out until he was tempted with a stripper brought by his friends.

The Subconscious group sets up a pillow and sheet fort in the manor to await the end of the Flagellation. Subconscious Larry talked to Tony about being able to discuss their problems moving forward, before meeting with the others to not talk about their embarrassments. Pretending to be an employee of the Ant Farm, Rita decides to use her time machine to travel to the future and stop Laura, remembering her entire life from her time as an actress until her accident, stopping in Codsville for Samuelson to kill the group and thus briefly reunite with Malcolm in the afterlife. Kay reveals that Subconscious Larry wants to talk about the problems of their conscious versions, something he admits because it was the group's duty to help their conscious ones, something that everyone denies talking about and Subconscious Larry tries to ask him to speak to Subconscious Cliff, because they were both parents, asking not to talk about Clara and they left without saying anything. Before enjoying the stripper, Cliff is informed that Clara was in her car, so he refuses to be unfaithful, observing a portal similar to that of Sachiko, which he crosses, leaving his humiliating memory. Larry is found by Cliff, walking him through another portal, leaving Debbie's ring behind.

Kay expresses his annoyance with fatherhood and Tony talks about how Vic honored Silas more than himself while Subconscious Larry and Subconscious Cliff discussed their failures as parents, before Subconscious Cliff criticized Kay for needing their powered personalities. Over a beer, Cliff Subconscious confessed that his party wouldn't last long because he's dying of Parkinson's, crying over killing his own wife, feeling like a bad person for finally dying, considering he filled the void in him with drugs and sluts, starting to cry in front of the group because he never did anything good for much of his life. Cliff and Larry manage to find Vic in the form of a toy, who asks to give him the stone that Elinore gave to his young version and then cross the portal. Jane and the puppets go berserk about killing Harry until Cliff, Larry and Vic show up to save her, mocking her size to go to the portal and Doctor Harrison mentions that they couldn't go on with Jane anymore. Through a portal colored with inspirational words, the group traveled in a small car made of cake, finally arriving at the manor, where they reunited with their subconscious and Cliff asked if they wanted cake.

While the group ate cake, Larry argued with his subconscious, talking about his wedding day with Sheryl and how his mother forced him to get married, but the subconscious stated that he was actually her memory from when she stopped looking for love, hiding behind his bandages, asking Larry to open up to love again, something he promised, holding hands and his bird picked up the subconscious. Cliff spoke to his subconscious, who, inspired by seeing Larry, revealed that every day when he went to have sex with strippers and returned to the car to see Clara, he felt no shame, scolding Cliff for having a second chance for Clara and Rory, which she ruined by the pills, starting to argue with Cliff, before the bird picked up the subconscious. Vic left the fort until Tony interrupted him to talk to him about how he lost his childhood by feeling like a soldier without fear of being wrong, so Tony encouraged him to make decisions, no matter if they are wrong, since Vic had to recover his childhood , making him cry because no one saw that he was a boy and he saw his bird pick up Tony. Jane talks to Kay about the trauma, discovering that Kay wanted them all to go out of her head so she could grow up, saddening Jane and she sees her bird arrive and take Kay away, turning Jane back into a person.

Filled with anger and rage, Jane began to destroy the pillow fort. A little later, the group left the fort, discovering that the Eternal Flagellation had ended upon seeing the fog lift, being returned to where they were before everything. Cliff was interrupted by Clara in his meeting with Ginger, returning his card and making a bad impression on his daughter. At The Underground, Jane finds everything alone, except for Kay, who reveals that all the personas are finally gone. Following his subconscious's loving advice, Larry hurried back into the woods, rescuing the parasite to care for as his own child. At Orsus Labs, Vic awoke from his operation, noticing Silas's presence and getting up from the stretcher, discovering that he no longer possessed his technological weaponry, looking like someone normal. Through the fog, Rita continued in her search for Laura, meeting her in the middle of the forest while they shared threatening glances.

## Cast

### Starring

* Diane Guerrero as Kay Challis/Crazy Jane
* April Bowlby as Rita Farr
* Joivan Wade as Vic Stone/Cyborg
* Skye Roberts as Kay Challis
* Riley Shanahan as Cliff Steele (physical)
* Matthew Zuk as Larry Trainor (physical)
* Matt Bomer as Larry Trainor and Larry Trainor (voice)
* Brendan Fraser as Cliff Steele and Cliff Steele (voice)

### Special appearance by

* Michelle Gomez as Laura De Mille/Madame Rouge

### Guest starring

* Phil Morris as Silas Stone
* Stephanie Czajkowski as Hammerhead (voice)
* Micah Joe Parker as Malcolm
* Richard Gant as General Tony
* Bethany Anne Lind as Clara Steele
* Catherine Carlen as Doctor Harrison (voice)

### Co-starring

* Hannah Alline as Pretty Polly (voice)
* Ana Aguilar as Balladeer (voice)
* Jonathan Lipow as Monsieur Mallah (voice)
* Erik Passoja as Shipley (voice)
* Alan Heckner as Bump Weathers
* JoAnn Willette as Debbie Trainor
* Braelyn Rankins as Young Vic Stone
* Deborah Michal as Jenny
* Nik Shriner as Harry (voice)
* Matthew Wallace as Store Employee
* Corey Young as Sub Newscaster

## Gallery

### Video

Doom Patrol 3x08 Promo "Subconscious Patrol" (HD) HBO Max Superhero series