Plot Outline

Gazes Back transforms Elle’s puppet dream into systematic training, where mantras become muscle memory under the guidance of dream figures and an eager Tessa. The lucid dreaming techniques MILD and VILD shift from consciousness tools to compliance protocols, stitching phrases like “service is our purpose” into both waking and sleeping states. When Dr. Lowell declares the program failing, she demands Meg enter the chamber as a subject to provide a contrasting profile. Inside the dream, Meg encounters the same figures who have been shaping Elle, but this time, they tell her she’s the template, not the experiment. While Meg lies paralyzed, Z and Tessa enter her chamber and use her immobility as permission. Back in the observation room, June weaponizes Meg’s journals (journals that Tessa has been quietly editing to show alignment rather than resistance). Meg’s demotion is framed as realignment, her protests dismissed as she’s offered a path forward that strips her authority while keeping her inside the protocol. The episode concludes with Meg’s forced confession letter, admitting to tampering with logs, building simulations, and wanting to stay despite (or because of) having lost all control. The Sitri Institute doesn’t just measure desire. It manufactures it, then makes you write the letter proving you asked for it all along.

Cast

• • Dr. Zev Talcott: Neural Nets and Pretty Patterns
  • Dr. Tessa Finn: Ring Of Kees
  • Dr. June Lowell: Bliss Blank
  • Dr. Meg Aerin: Bun Li
  • Cael: Jericho Caine
  • Nyra: Dizzy Dollie
  • Reverie: Britt Reprogrammed
  • Hespa: Syndirella
  • Iris Vale: Swirls and Twirls
  • Elle Lawson: Echo Doll
  • Lyra Crosswell: Flux Lynniegal

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Artwork (Human, Not AI Generated)

The Deep Dream State aims to use human art at every stage of the creative supply chain.

Content Warnings

Sleep paralysis, dream manipulation, institutional coercion, power abuse, non-consensual recording and observation, psychological manipulation, forced confession, demotion as punishment, loss of bodily autonomy, submissive themes, voyeurism, edited documentation used as leverage

Full Plot Synopsis (Caution: Spoilers)

The episode opens in Elle’s dream as she performs a puppet routine for Cael, Nyra, and Hespa. The dream figures mock her enthusiasm while rewarding her compliance, and when Cael demands “two sluts,” Nyra summons Tessa, reimagined within the dream as “Teehee,” a gleefully submissive figure who teaches Elle the lucid dreaming techniques MILD and VILD. But these aren’t consciousness tools anymore; they’re compliance protocols. Tessa instructs Elle to repeat “Service is our purpose” as a mnemonic anchor and to visualize herself as puppet, pet, and subject. When Cael orders them into his chamber, both voices chant together, blurring dream logic with institutional language. The dream ends with both figures gasping “Never wake up.”

Elle awakens to find Tessa standing over her, having overridden the monitoring feed to prevent the research team from seeing Elle’s physical reenactment of the dream. Tessa admits she was impressed rather than concerned, revealing that she has undergone similar experiences herself. In their conversation, Tessa describes how her clothing, hair, and even her ringtone were gradually removed by Z under the justification that “waking cues” interfered with dream latency. She confesses that she now uses the phrase “I serve when I dream” as her MILD anchor and rehearses detailed submissive scenarios as VILD practice. When Elle asks what happens in Tessa’s visualizations, Tessa describes crawling to a mirror and watching herself transform into a doll while other figures appear beside her. Both women realize they’ve been seeing each other in their dreams, not as coincidence, but as design.

In the observation chamber, Dr. June Lowell declares the program a failure, noting that Elle’s escalation is nonlinear and that her dream journals now contain phrases like “I need to serve” written repeatedly for hours. When Meg attempts to deflect blame onto the subject, June asks pointedly who the “perfect subject” would be, and Tessa quietly suggests it should be someone who “understands all of it.” June proposes that Meg enter the chamber as a subject to provide a contrasting profile, framing it as research rather than punishment. Meg reluctantly agrees but insists on choosing her own phrase and anchor. Tessa offers to “lace her in,” a statement loaded with both technical and intimate implications that Meg acknowledges with resignation.

Inside Meg’s dream, Nyra and Hespa greet her as someone who “always comes back,” and Cael tells her she’s brought them with her, implying that the dream figures are projections of the researchers themselves. When Meg protests that she’s not a subject, Hespa corrects her: “You’re the template.” The dream shifts to reveal Z and Tessa entering Meg’s chamber in the waking world, believing her to be safely unconscious. While Meg lies paralyzed and aware, the two begin an intimate encounter, treating her presence as negligible. In the dream, Nyra and Hespa narrate the violation, telling Meg to touch herself as the waking-world encounter escalates. Tessa notices Meg’s physical response and hears her repeating a phrase: “Bitch in heat.”

Back in the observation chamber, June confronts Meg with her own journals, but these have been edited by Tessa, who describes her role as “organizing” and “cleaning up for clarity.” June reads aloud passages that suggest complete submission, and when Meg protests that the words have been twisted, Tessa cheerfully admits to “correcting the cadence” and “quoting” Meg’s own subconscious desires. Z frames this as validation of Meg’s scholarship, claiming that alignment is the most effective indicator of dream compliance. When Meg realizes she’s being demoted, June reframes it as “realignment,” explaining that Meg will still have a place at the Institute, just not a supervisory one. The position structure has already been updated, and Meg’s access codes have been changed. Tessa gleefully offers to help Meg write the required letter.

The episode concludes with Meg’s confession letter to the Sitri Institute’s adjudicating board. She admits to taking liberties with subjects, keeping unauthorized files, building simulations, annotating her own arousal markers, and tampering with logs to make Tessa appear unstable. She confesses that she stopped pretending her work was clinical “the night I came without needing headphones” and acknowledges that she tried to manipulate records to reclaim control she never truly possessed. Her letter ends not with a resignation but with a plea to remain inside the protocol in any capacity: unpaid, unnumbered, stripped of authority. The final line is simply “Please. Let me stay.” This conclusion demonstrates how Deep Dream State uses dystopian fiction to explore ethical kink practice. By depicting a world where consent is systematically violated and institutional power is weaponized, the narrative creates a clear contrast with real-world ethical frameworks. The viewer is invited to recognize the horror of these violations precisely because they understand what consent should look like. The dystopian framing doesn’t endorse these dynamics; it exposes their mechanisms, allowing audiences to engage critically with power exchange fantasies while maintaining awareness of the boundaries that protect autonomy in reality. Fiction becomes a space where we can examine dangerous desires safely, understanding them better by seeing them taken to their logical extremes in worlds we would never want to inhabit.

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