"Sex and Drugs" Episode 106: Billy Burke star in the locally filmed NBC series "Revolution." (Photo by: Brownie Harris/NBC)

Thus far, NBC’s “Revolution” has basically been “Beasts of the Southern Philadelphia Wild” — until last night, when it became a little “Zero Dark Thirty.” Though this episode, which shares a name with the Led Zeppelin album “The Song Remains the Same,” is lacking the mood music of last year’s Zeppelin-themed episode “Kashmir,” we did get quite a bit of plot advancement and questions answered (as well as some romance!) so I’ll take it.

To start the episode, Gen. Monroe sends Maj. Neville on a major mission. As Neville passes by some rebel scouts, they capture him and bring him back to Miles. Pretty much everyone wants Neville dead, but Miles brings out a cart of rusty tools and tries to Guantanamo some intel out of him first.

That doesn’t work, so the rebels try torturing Neville with guilt. They send in his son, Jason, who switched sides somewhere in between getting the crap beat out of him by his dad and getting kicked out of the family a few episodes ago. Jason “frees” his dad and finds out where they are headed before it’s revealed that Miles and backup have been listening in the whole time — gotcha! Of course, later in the episode Neville will use a little nail sticking out of the floor to untie himself and escape anyway, because he’s freaking Giancarlo Esposito and that’s how he rolls, but at least they got some info out of him.

So Charlie, Miles, Nora and Jason head out to the cement factory that Neville accidentally told them about. There, they find Randall getting into a car with some sort of briefcase. In an attempt to stop him, a firefight breaks out, of course. The rebels basically resemble the Avengers, using their signature weapons to wage war on the militia (Charlie, who’s been working on perfecting her stabby sword technique; Jason and his bow and arrow a la Hawkeye; Charlie and Nora immediately mastering whatever guns are within reach, etc.) but Randall gets away unscathed. Inside the factory, the Revolutioners find plans that show the militia is building a nuclear bomb, which Miles helpfully informs us is very, very bad.

As for the brains of the show, Rachel and Aaron, they’ve been chatting this whole time about why exactly the blackout happened. Years ago, Rachel was part of a team that built quadrillions (that’s a lot) of teensy weensy itty bitty computers as tiny as a virus that are programmed to either absorb electricity or replicate, basically the stuff conspiracy theorists have been warning us about forever. Something went wrong at a mysterious place called “The Tower” that made these little things replicate and then destroy the world’s power supply, and Rachel decides to go there on a suicide mission to try and reprogram them.

Rachel, who just as recently as the conclusion of last week’s episode has reconciled with her daughter Charlie, decides she’s a self-loathing terrible mom and makes Miles promise to look after her progeny when she’s gone. Miles decides to try and convince Rachel (who is his sister-in-law, by the way) to stay by hardcore making out with her. They definitely have a history, but Rachel is only digging it for a minute before she backs away. She eventually heads off to the Tower, leaving Miles behind in the friend zone.

OK, safe to say that just about everyone got a little tortured this episode.