Diksha Sundriyal
AMC’s ‘Nautilus’ begins with a hostile takeover. The setting is in the late 1850s, when the British East India Company had within its reach the eponymous submarine that would allow its power to grow tenfold. The project is headed by Gustave Benoit, but it is being built by the sweat and blood of the slaves that the company has been exploiting at the prison of Kalpani. Nemo happens to be one of them, and he has a plan. He and his friend are going to stage an escape a few days later. However, when they discover that the British plan to get it out into the water within hours, they are forced to execute their plan immediately, and things take a very unexpected turn. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Captain Nemo Takes Control of the Nautilus
In an attempt to take control of the Nautilus, which he had christened himself, Nemo calls out to all the slaves onboard to help him fight back. He is joined in the endeavour by Benoit, who agreed to the rebellion when he discovered that the ship wouldn’t be used for exploration, as he was led to believe, but for the company’s nefarious motives. Other people, like Boniface, Turan, Kai, Suyin, Jiacomo, Ranbir, and Jagadish, join the fray. Each of them comes from a different background, but all hold the desire to be free. Nemo’s main ally is his friend, Aadesh, but he sacrifices himself to help Nemo and the others escape.
Once in the water, Nemo takes command, and Benoit discovers that he was pulled in by a lie. He was led to believe that they would be headed to the French colony, where they would hand over the ship to them. But Nemo has other plans. He wants to sail to the Pillars of Halvar to find the lost treasure because he knows that the company will never stop looking for him, and the treasure will buy him the wealth and the influence to fight back. He promises Benoit that once the treasure is found, the ship can be his again. Meanwhile, the ship sails into open waters, but it soon collides with another company ship.
Nemo and his crew believe that they will be attacked, but they don’t know that the ship mainly holds people who are completely oblivious of the Nautilus and its daring escape. In an effort to save themselves, Nemo and his crew damage the other ship, forcing all of its people to seek refuge on the lifeboats. One of these people is Humility Lucas, a young woman who was supposed to be on his way to Bombay to unite with her fiancé. She is being accompanied by Loti, who was tasked by Humility’s parents to look after her.
When the Nautilus comes to the surface, Nemo decides to rescue the women and the children on the lifeboats, which means that Humility and Loti get to board it, along with a young boy named Blaster, who also brings his dog, Archie. Meanwhile, the rest of the men, which includes the drowned ship’s Captain Youngblood, are left to fend for themselves. On top of this, Nemo also forces the British men he had been holding captive to disembark the Nautilus and go to the lifeboats. As the ship sails away, Director Crawley vows to chase after Nemo to the ends of the Earth.
The Ship Faces a Major Setback
Flashbacks reveal that before being a prisoner at Kalpani, Nemo was a prince. He had a wife and a daughter, but both of them are gone now, courtesy of the East India Company. While they threw him in prison, they couldn’t contain his brilliance, which he used to help Benoit bring Nautilus to life. Now, he wants to use the same thing to bring down the company once and for all. But before that, he has to iron a few kinks. To begin with, as the ship descends towards the seabed, it turns out that it is sinking faster than it should because the power has failed.
The more fathoms it drops, the worse the situation gets because soon the air will run out, and everyone will die at the bottom of the ocean due to suffocation. This is when Humility offers a solution. She suggests that they should make the drain the ship’s tanks, but that means pumping whatever air they have left. With no other option, everyone gets to cranking the lever, but as they lose the air, the suffocation starts to get to them, and the tanks are nowhere near being drained. Luckily, one of them notices a leak in the pipe, and when that is fixed, the plan starts to work, and soon they are all back on the surface.
Meanwhile, Crawley and Youngblood find their way to Bombay, where the former inducts the latter in the search for Nemo and Nautilus. They are joined in this quest by Captain Billy Millais, who interrogates the men once trained by Nemo, who don’t give him anything of consequence. Crawley reveals that they will be chasing after the Nautilus in a behemoth of their own, called Dreadnought. It is fairly new and has not been tested as well, but this is their best chance to catch Nemo, and Crawley is ready to take it.
Nemo Struggles to Keep the Crew Together
As soon as the Nautilus is on the surface, a lot of people start thinking about jumping ship. Considering the expertise that Humility showed earlier, Nemo tells her that he cannot let her leave because she is too valuable for the ship. She tells him that she has no intention of leaving because exploring the sea with Nautilus is an opportunity of a lifetime. However, when the time comes, she and Loti jump into the sea as they try to make it to the shore. They are joined in this quest by Blaster, Ranbir, and Jagadish. However, as soon as the company men see the Nautlius, they launch an attack, forcing all of them to swim back to the ship and save themselves.
Meanwhile, Nemo and Benoit try to fix the ship’s electricity issue, which caused them to come so close to the shore, apart from the fact that they needed to replenish their supplies. But then, it turns out that Humility had messed up one of the wires. As soon as she is back on the ship, she fixes it, and Nautilus is good to go again. This exhibits her technical knowledge, but it also irritates Nemo, who believes that Humility’s actions put everyone’s life at risk. When she reveals that she will try to escape again, he assures her that should she mess with the ship again, he will abandon her at sea.
The Nautilus’ sighting is relayed to the Bombay HQ, which leads Crawley to put the Dreadnought full steam ahead. While Youngblood takes control of the ship, Millais is found in his room, where we see a picture of young Nemo in a group of schoolboys, suggesting that there might be a closer connection between the former prince and Millais. We also meet Lord Pitt, who is onboard the Dreadnought as one of the major investors in the company and whose primary motive is to rescue his fiancée, Humility. Only he doesn’t realise that she is not very keen to meet and marry him.
Nemo Tries to Inspire Hope and Confidence in the Crew
With five of his people having attempted to abandon ship, Benoit warns Nero that he must give them a reason to stay. Nemo starts by explaining how they will all be executed if the company catches up with them. He believes that the desire to not get killed should motivate the crew, but he has a lot to learn. On the way, they see a pod of whales, but then come the whalers. At first, Nemo decides to ignore the whole thing, but his crew argues that the creatures are innocent and must be protected. He is particularly moved by the fact that one whale is trying to protect its calf. This leads the captain to intervene as he jumps into the water to free the whale, and then trades Humility’s bracelet for the calf’s life.
While everyone is happy that they saved the whale and its baby, Humility is angry with Nero because he traded her bracelet, which was given to her by her father, who has passed away. Realising what he has done, Nemo expresses his remorse, but there is nothing that can be done about it now. Meanwhile, a new problem emerges when it is noticed that someone is stealing the biscuits from the pantry. This is not a good thing because they are already low on food and must ration everything to ensure that they make it until they are able to restock. Blaster and Archie are seen as the primary suspects, but this makes them even more adamant about clearing their names.
Meanwhile, the Dreadnought catches up with the Nautilus, which promptly goes underwater to protect itself. Nemo gets the crew to go radio silent in the hopes that the enemy won’t be able to pinpoint their location. But then, Archie starts barking after he finds the person stealing the biscuits, who turns out to be a British soldier hiding on the ship. The dog’s bark leads the Dreadnought to locate them. Crawley tells Youngblood to throw underwater bombs at Nemo’s ship, not caring that Pitt’s fiancée, Humility, is in there as well. As one bomb after another is thrown at Nautlius, Nemo gets deeper in the water until they hit the seabed. Eventually, there comes a time when they have nowhere else to go, but fortunately, Crawley’s bombs stop working as the Nautilus is too deep in the water for the bombs to work. While they survive this encounter, there is a new problem at their hands now.
Read More: Is Nautilus Based on a True Story?
