The season two finale of Fubar revolved around Luke, Tally, Chips, Emma, Barry, Roo, Aldon, Farkas, Reed, and Dr. Pfeffer stopping Dante from unleashing a nuclear armageddon. Initially, it was assumed that Dante wanted to cause the collapse of the American economy, which would set off a domino effect and lead to the destruction of the global economy. How? By attacking the four main points of the power grid that supplied electricity to the United States of America, located in Kodiak, Litchfield, New Mexico, and Colorado.
Dante, with the help of his trusty assistant, Greta, had managed to take down three of them, thus making the Carson Hydroelectric Dam his latest target. But just as Luke finished securing the dam, Greta arrived, threatening to undo all the work he and Chips had done. Emma and Roo also appeared, leading to a standoff. Luke persuaded Greta to back down by convincing her that if they tricked Dante into believing they had destroyed the American power grid, he would pay her fee. This would reveal Dante's location and allow Luke and his team to catch him. However, as soon as they temporarily shut down the power grid, the country's entire nuclear system was activated, as the blackout was deemed a threat to the nation.
Creator: Nick Santora
Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Monica Barbaro, Milan Carter
As soon as the United States entered DEFCON 1, Luke and his team realized that this had been Dante's plan all along. The threat of economic collapse was just a ruse. He wanted to shut down the power grid to activate the nuclear weapons. Since every country, especially Russia, knew who was preparing their nuclear arsenal, they would do the same, and this would inevitably escalate to the annihilation of humanity. Chips theorized that since nuclear weapons couldn't be digitally disabled due to electrical reset, there must be a physical backdoor to the nuclear operating system that would allow authorities to stop an apocalypse caused by a glitch like the one they were observing. Luke revealed that, back then, four agents had been given the password to one such backdoor that would disable nuclear weapons, and that Luke was the only one alive who used it. Since one of the only ways to enter the password into the system was through voice recognition, Luke would have to be present inside one of the many nuclear silos. Since all the silos were interconnected, shutting down one would shut down all of them.
Back at the CIA facility in Newark, Barry, Farkas, and Reed feared that, in the time it would take Luke and the others to reach that silo, Russia could launch a nuclear attack. Since contact with the Kremlin was impossible, they had to resort to the next best thing: SVR agents Volek and Tina. Tina knew Volek had betrayed her and used her abilities to help Dante, convincing her that whatever he did, he was doing it for Russia. So she didn't hesitate to reveal Volek's location to the CIA.
Meanwhile, Luke and his team arrived at the silo and motivated the veteran to remember the password, which served as an excuse for the series to compile a list of movie references. Here are the ones I caught: Total Recall, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Survivor, Star Wars: A New Hope, Terminator, and Titanic. And the one that cracked the code was the Budweiser "Wazzup" commercial. While all this was happening, Aldon broke into Volek's house. With Barry's help, he tried to repair the satellites Volek had programmed to jam all communication so that Reed could contact the Russians and prevent them from preemptively launching their nuclear weapons. But Volek knocked out Aldon to keep Dante's nuclear annihilation plan alive, and at the same time, Chips revealed that he was actually Dante as he pointed his pistol at one of the two airmen stationed in the silo.
Since Luke, Emma, Greta, and Roo weren't entirely convinced that Dante was capable of killing someone, he shot the airman while still treating the airwoman as if she were his hostage. Volek was about to kill Aldon, but Barry remotely controlled his car and crashed it into Volek's house, crushing the Russian to death and saving Aldon. As far as I recall, Fubar had never shown that any of its cars had this capability.
But since the series isn't built on the simple concept of traps and bounties, I can't fault it for something it can't do. Back at the silo, Dante began his "villain pep talk" session, where he explained that he learned about Luke from his father. When Luke and Greta averted the Y2K disaster, Dante discovered the voice-activated nuclear missile control mechanism, and that Luke was one of four people who could use it. So, Dante allied himself with Greta and began heading toward Luke, which eventually led them all to the silo. Sure, there are some missing pieces, but if the show didn't use Dante to explain how he went from Luke fanatic to legendary spymaster, it's not my fault. Make up your own imaginary story and justify Dante's decision however you want; I'm sure the showrunners won't care, because even they don't care whether anything in the show works or not.
Anyway, Dante entered the order into the system to launch all the nukes, but Roo disconnected the line connecting all the silos to the characters' silos. That didn't ruin Dante's plan, as the order had initiated the launch of the missile they were near, and he knew that as soon as it reached the stratosphere, Russia would respond in kind, then the United States would follow suit, and the war he'd always wanted would begin.
He destroyed the computer, injured Luke, and then headed to the nuclear shelter where he would seek protection while the world burned. Emma went after Dante. Roo and the airman tried to find a way to stop the missile's fuel, as without fuel there is no launch capability. Luke and Greta reached the warhead to see if they could disarm it before it took off. Emma tried to get Dante to back down and prevent him from taking out his anger on the world just because his father had been used and then killed by his superiors on a fake mission to protect a politician involved in a sex scandal.
Dante clarified that while he and his father went on a mission to cover up a politician's crimes, his father was not killed by those who framed him; he was killed by Dante himself. He said his father was afraid Dante would "give up his position" during the shootout, as Dante was shot and likely cried too loudly in pain, which was why he tried to suffocate his own son. In retaliation, Dante killed his father. Apparently, on that day, Dante realized that the world didn't deserve to exist because it had become a place that forced a father to try to kill his son and a son to successfully kill his father. Again, I don't quite understand the logic, because the series doesn't have the space to delve into the villain's motivations after spending all the available time on the most absurd schemes imaginable for humanity. In theory, yes, of course, a patricide leading to the creation of a genocidal maniac makes a certain amount of sense. But in practice, it's just confusing. At this point, you can take it or leave it.
While chasing Dante, Emma stumbled upon the airman the supervillain had shot and decided to take him to safety before resuming the chase. Roo and the other airman's plan failed. Aldon managed to unlock the satellites, allowing Reed to order the Russians to stand down, but they didn't believe him because they saw the Americans preparing to launch one of their nuclear weapons. This meant that even if Luke and Greta disabled the warhead, the Russians would consider it operational and retaliate.
Therefore, they would have to prevent the missile from leaving American airspace, and to do so, Luke or Greta would have to be inside the missile and shoot it down safely. Greta chose to sacrifice herself because Luke had a family to take care of, while she didn't have much to live for. At the end of Fubar's second season, Roo warned everyone in the silo that 15 seconds before launch, the blast doors would automatically close. Therefore, they needed to clear the space before the missile took off. Emma used this opportunity to trap Dante in the silo. Since there was no way to open the blast doors, Dante burned to death. Yes, I know that in the previous season, Boro (a much more established villain than Dante) miraculously escaped when a bomb exploded near him, only to be shot dead moments later.
Meanwhile, Greta prevented the missile from leaving US airspace, and the deactivated warhead landed on the shore of a lake in Utah. When Emma and Luke went to inspect it, Greta emerged unharmed, having used special foam—the same one that supposedly clogged the aforementioned dam—to protect herself from the impact. Although Emma had promised to arrest her for collaborating with Dante, she gave Greta free rein because she had just saved the world. After Greta left, Luke proceeded to explain how he, Tally, and Dr. Pfeffer had concocted this plan to fake the Brunner couple's breakup. They believed that if Greta thought she had even the slightest chance of getting back with Luke, she would defy Dante and save the world.
I don't understand the point of this scene, since Greta had already revealed that she almost sacrificed herself so Luke could live a full life with his family. I know it's futile to expect the show's creators to make emotional or logical sense; nevertheless, I keep trying. Back to the plot, during the final moments of the series, Luke announced his retirement and remarried Tally. Emma had rejected the acceptance letter from Unit 9 and was ready to date Aldon. Everyone (well, almost everyone) was given the green light to return home after living together for months in a CIA-sanctioned safe house. That didn't make much sense to me because Boro had revealed the true identities of Luke, his family, and his friends, which had to be available in some form to all (there were many) of his enemies.
It was hinted that Greta had eliminated everyone who had bought that information from Boro to protect Luke and his loved ones. But that sounds absurd even by the show's own standards, which makes me think this "return to normal" is just one big ruse to get Luke to let his guard down. We'll see. Meanwhile, Aldon gave his pet pig, Hamsteak, to Luke's granddaughter, Romi. Reed sent Carter and Donnie to a CIA listening post (likely an homage to what they did to Donloe in Mission: Impossible) for four years for being involved in the death of a biker gang member, stun-gunning a cop, stealing a patrol car, and doing drugs.
Roo got the position of CIA regional director. Barry and Aldon traveled to Finland to deliver Tina to the Russians in exchange for Great Dane, who had been inexplicably kidnapped by them. Back in the States, Great Dane told Barry and Aldon that he'd noticed many anomalies in Tina's work, indicating that she was helping the CIA rather than the SVR, which meant that she was still in love with Barry, despite acting as if she had betrayed him for her country. After learning that, Barry was elated, but the elation suddenly turned to dread when the Great Dane revealed that he had pointed out the discrepancies to Tina's superiors, and that meant she was going to be killed for siding with the Americans, thus setting the stage for the inevitable third season of Fubar, which would involve the CIA entering Mother Russia to rescue Tina.
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