While reading an article by Heidi Venable on Cinemablend that asks if Sage is doing something we all do in lobotomizing herself to relax and deal with the horrific stuff she witnessed that day, I realized it hadn't hit me yet what the writers are doing.
I feel stupid not getting it until now.
Sage is using lobotomy the way we use alcohol or THC. Not, as I had thought, to make herself stupid so she could appeal to the Deep in a grand plan of setting him up for something. She is coping.
It didn't feel like a happy, go out with friends and have a beer once in a while event. It felt like the "I just saw some really bad things happen and I don't want to think about it any more" or the "my life is horrible and I can't do this anymore" drinking.
So how does that are go in life when someone is stuck in a box where if they leave they get lasered in half, they can't talk to anyone about it, and the stress and pressure and dissonance and horrible things you need to do are just going to get worse? We all know someone who has walked that path. Using alcohol becomes more and more frequent. They start using when it isn't safe in ways that aren't safe because they need it for it and not just the original reason.
Some people die from it in horrible ways. Some people ruin their most important relationships. Someb screw up their whole lives with bad mistakes. Some just become a broken shell of their former self. I bet Sage uses lobotomy more and more frequently to deal with the crap she is doing until she makes mistakes and it undermines her health, until even watchers like me can't miss the alcoholism parallel.
Could be wrong, but that's my current theory, what do you think?