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The Island On 'Orphan Black' Holds Strange Secrets

Orphan Black is back for its fifth and final season, which promises to bring the show's persistent The Island of Doctor Moreau motif to life as we explore a real-life (well, in the universe of Orphan Black, anyway), secluded research compound. In the Season 5 premiere, viewers watched Sarah and Cosima explore the island where Rachel was held captive, and discovered a bustling village called Revival. It's where Delphine has been working, alive and well, along with the founder of Neolution, who is mysteriously still alive after 170 years. So what is Revival on Orphan Black? It's going to be a big point of focus this season.

Revival is the name of the encampment on the island where Rachel was recovering from her strange eye transplant. It's a collective research living community founded by P.T. Westmoreland, a Victorian scientist who wrote the book on Neolution in the 1800s. He's still alive, presumably due to the genetic research he's been able to accomplish on the island, and he's collected scientists from all over the world to live in captivity with him and further his work. Delphine is one of those scientists, and so was Susan Duncan. The LEDA clones are also being studied there.

As Cosima gained her bearings in Revival, fans learned that it's an almost completely self-sufficient compound, with self-generated power, a private communications system, a greenhouse, livestock, a fish farm, research labs, and a school (yes, there are children living on Revival). It's also heavily cultish, with the followers of P.T. Westmoreland basically worshipping his every word. Cosima is deeply skeptical and pretty dismissive of everything she hears, but in their last moments together, Delphine whispered to her to "follow the crazy science." She's obviously a believer.

We also know that, as part of their genetic tests to manipulate the longevity of humans, Revival has created some unholy lifeforms and apparently unleashed them on the island. In a preview screening of the Season 5 premiere at PaleyFest, showrunner Graeme Manson revealed that "mysterious creatures" lived on the island, and we caught glimpses of one of them in the season premiere. While sleeping in the woods, Sarah was attacked by a seemingly primitive, animalistic human — one who is sophisticated enough to build a hunting spear, but apparently doesn't have language. Members of Revival are clearly frightened of the creature, but we don't know much about him just yet.

It looks like much of Season 5 is set to take place on the island and inside Revival, so the village likely holds all the answers we've been waiting for.