List of The Tribe seasons
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This article is the series / episode guide of the TV series, The Tribe. All series (5 in total) have 52 unnamed episodes.
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[edit] Series 1 (1999)
At the beginning of series 1, we were introduced to the strong-willed, responsible leader Amber and her younger friend, aspiring doctor/mechanic Dal. They find a little girl called Cloe wandering the dangerous streets, then meet cute kids, twins Patsy and Paul who are being looked after by Salene. A peace-loving loner, Bray, is taking care of the heavily pregnant Trudy and looking for a place for her to give birth. Arrogant street fighter Lex, his sweet if slow friend Ryan, Lex’s material girl Zandra and confrontational Glen are trying to join the top tribe in the City, the Locusts (or Locos). In one way or another, all ended up in the Phoenix Mall (bar Glen who got caught by the Locos) and met Jack, the boy scientist who lived there alone. Soon, Asian spiritualist Tai-San and slippery young thief KC also joined the tribe.
A multitude of serious subjects were tackled in series 1. There was a power struggle from the start in the Mall between Lex, and Amber and Bray, and on the outside, between the Locos and Demon Dogs for the city. Lex killed Zoot, the leader of the Locos, who turned out to be the father of Trudy's baby and Bray’s kid brother (his real name is Martin, a play on words for 'martyr'). Lex tried to rape Zandra, but she ended up marrying him later anyway. Salene suffered from bulimia, only beating it with Ryan's help.
Jealousy was rife in the Mall - Lex of Zandra and Ryan’s friendship, Zandra of Lex’s trysts with Tai-San and Ebony, Trudy of Bray and Salene, and later Bray and Amber. The virus began to affect kids later in the series and Lex was infected with it just when his new wife Zandra told him she was pregnant. Bray and Amber finally found love with each other after an iffy start. The tribe went on a quest for the antidote at the end of the series, and the finale showed them finding pivotal information at the Eagle Mountain Observatory.
[edit] Series 2 (1999-2000)
Series 2 showed a much more overarching plot. The focus was less on the inner struggles of the tribe, and more on their struggles as part of the many tribes that make up the city. The series began with the Mall Rats dealing with the loss of Amber and Zandra who were killed in an explosion on Eagle Mt. Bray was distraught, but soldiered on. Lex took the opposite route, spiralling into alcoholism, and even attempting to rape Salene. This resulted in his being kicked out of the tribe until Ryan went to look for him.
With the addition of Bray's soon-to-be Amber replacement, the mysterious Danni, the Mall Rats struggled to bring a peaceful balance to the city, cleaning it up and trying to introduce a Bill of Rights, while also distributing the antidote to the masses free of charge. It was Tai-San who discovered the antidote recipe, memorised it, then burnt it to keep the other Mallrats from taking advantage of the other tribes with the knowledge, like Ebony wanted to do. When she shared the secret with Bray, Ebony plotted with the Zoot-worshipping tribe the Chosen to help them take Trudy and Brady from the city. Bray gave her the recipe in defeat, and Ebony later tried to poison Tai-San, killing Patsy and Cloe's dog Bob in the process.
In this series, the pasts of many characters were revealed. We found out in flashback how Bray’s shy brother Martin spiralled into insanity and became Zoot. It was also shown how both Ebony and Trudy fell for Bray, and also when Trudy and Martin conceived Brady. When Ebony was tortured by her ex-militia leader, Spike, after setting him up for Tai-San's attempted murder, we find out why she is so manipulative and power-hungry. Lex and Ryan's meeting in boot camp was revealed, as was Lex's affair with a vicious, much older female sergeant at the camp. Danni's shocking secret, that it was her father who accidentally engineered the killer virus while trying to make the Elixir of Youth, was also revealed by Jack and Ellie.
A double marriage took place as the series drew to a close, that of Ryan and Salene, and Tai-San and Lex. This series ended in a climactic face off between the Chosen and the leaders of the city tribes. Many of them, including Danni, were murdered or disappeared following this.
Bray and Lex escape the Chosen's wrath, but the series ends with them both falling victim to a car crash, their fates left hanging in the balance.
[edit] Series 3 (2000-2001)
Series three starts with some of the Mall Rats being held prisoner in the mall as the Chosen make it their head-quarters. However, the Mall Rats who were not captured (Lex, Bray and Ebony) leave the city. They come across a group called the Gaians, or Eco Tribe, whose leader is Amber (now called Eagle), previously believed to have been killed at Eagle Mountain with Zandra. It is revealed that Ebony met the injured Amber after the explosion and convinced her she had no future with Bray, as they (Ebony and Bray) had already had a child before the virus. Amber had agreed to let Ebony make the Mallrats think she had died. A resistance movement is set up by some members of the Mallrats and both the Supreme Mother (Trudy) and the Divine Child (Brady) escape the city. Eventually the rebels overcome the Chosen and win back the city with the help of non-city tribes. A city wide election is held, and Ebony craftily manages to elected herself as the City Leader. She expels several Mall Rats from the city, including Bray and Amber, and makes herself a virtual dictator.
This series heralds an almost mass exodus of many of the familiar and long-running cast members from series 1, including Patsy and Ryan (who are taken away by the Chosen) and Dal (who fell to his death). A trend of introducing expendable, short-term characters, such as Andy, Tally and Ned, is started.
Series 3 also shows two strong couples together for much of the series: Tai-San and Lex, and Amber and Bray. Tai-San and Lex struggle to maintain their marriage, despite Lex's blinding jealousy of Tai-San's bond with the Guardian and her problems with Lex's corruption as city sheriff. Amber and Bray mainly find solid ground and conceive a child together. They balance their private life with their public ones as leaders. Salene and Ryan also conceive a child but it is lost when Salene falls down the Mall stairs. Ryan is taken away by the Chosen after attacking the Guardian, because he was told he would not be allowed to see his baby under the religious rules.
The series ends on a cliffhanger, with Amber being left to deliver her baby alone in a barn and with the sight of aeroplanes flying over the city: a sight not seen since before the virus hit. Can it be the adults?
[edit] Series 4 (2002)
The planes and parachutes belong to an advanced tribe called the Technos. They are led by a germ-phobic paraplegic called Ram. He has two wives, Java and Siva – Ebony’s sisters. They have vehicles, planes, futuristic weapons and computers. They bring electricity, water and food to the City, but have an ulterior motive. They set up Virtual Reality (VR) and get many city kids hooked on it, almost like a drug, in return for working for the Technos.
The Technos also take Bray, Tai-San, KC and Alice among others from the City. It is presumed that the missing Mallrats have been used in certain horrifying experiments to test VR. Trudy finds Amber and helps her give birth to a baby called Bray Jr. Lex is frantic over Tai-San’s disappearance, as is Amber over Bray’s. Pride and Salene find love together, much to May’s and even Cloe's jealousy. But Cloe also fall in love with the techno Ved, and they are together for a while. Then Cloe dissaperes in these computer-games. Ram makes Ebony his third wife, but she loves his commander Jay. They eventually run away together but return to take down the Technos. Siva falls for Lex and leaves Ram and the Technos for him. Tai-San returns briefly, having been reprogrammed by the Technos. Mega – a Techno deletes her, but it remains uncertain as to if deletion means death.
The Mall Rats fight to bring the Technos down, and succeed by the end of the series. Ram is left to fend for himself on the outskirts of the City, alone and abandoned. The finale ends with the shock reveal of Zoot, apparently alive and well.
[edit] Series 5 (2003)
The fifth series sees the series split between several locations, both in and out of the city. In the city, the remaining Technos assure the Mall Rats that they are willing to cooperate. A new tribe, the Zootists forms and tries to take advantage of the weakened situation in the city. Meanwhile, a small Western-style village called Liberty turns into a hot spot as several new and old characters (including Ram, the deposed Techno leader) find accommodation in its saloon.
Pride is killed by Technos early on in the series, leaving a devastated Salene & May behind. Many long-running characters leave the city frequently, such as Trudy and Amber, and much of the action takes place with new ones like Slade and Ruby. When Java attempts to kill Ebony, she kills Siva instead. Ebony kills Java in revenge. Lex, once again faced with the loss of another loved one, finds himself the object of the much younger Gel's attraction.
As the series develops we discover that the Zootists are a ploy by the new Techno leader to regain control of the city. He plays a vicious game by publicly demonizing this tribe and advocating the need for a safe zone, fenced-off with secure exit and entrance points. He gradually extends the safe zone to gain a stronger control of the city.
In Liberty, a resistance with the goal of taking the tyrannic city leader down is set up. The overthrow is successful; however, even though the Mall Rats are back in control, there are things happening beyond their reach.
Ram had secretly developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI), which he lets loose on the Techno hardware. The AI develops too quickly and comes to the conclusion that human beings are a threat to the environment. During its roaming of the Techno networks, it comes across Mega's most secret project: a new, very lethal virus.
The AI's attempt to eliminiate humankind is prevented, but not before a generator next to the virus-container goes critical. The Mall Rats inform the rest of the city in the hopes that people will evacuate themselves before the generator blows up, thereby releasing the virus.
The entire series ends on a triumphant but sorrowful note. The Mall Rats manage to escape the city by sea, but are sad to be leaving the home they've known for so long behind. The ending shots show the longest-running characters Jack, Amber, Ebony, Lex, Ellie, May , Trudy and Salene, standing at the back of the boat, casting their final glances at the city as they leave it behind for an unknown future.
