Pathways 2x04 'Into The Wild'

by Guy Uhler

Feeling as though he is stuck in a routine, Gabe gets the chance to mix things up when Jacob asks him out for a night of fun. But is too much of a good thing...too much? Meanwhile, Anna and James must attend a fundraiser event at Brighton Academy.

Pathways is a funny little series thus far. With a well-fleshed out cast and some snappy writing, all it's lacking thus far is stronger plotting for each episode. As it is, we're three episodes in and precious little has really gone on, but there's enough here to keep coming back to for a while yet, what with all the dramas and micro-crisises that make up the average Crestview student's day...

We open with Mr. Greyson offering Gabe a spot on the Crestview Banner, the academy's newspaper, which Gabe seems pretty taken by. The Banner offices are well-equipped and pretty appealing for anyone with an eye for journalism (another Veronica Mars nod, perhaps?), but Gabe's attention is also caught by Jacob, whom the stage direction refers to simply as a 'tanned God.' Nooch. Jacob's already graduated and is just helping out so he can use the academy's computers for his own work, and as he exits Gabe seems to have found one more reason to work at the paper!

Gabe and Dom find Charlie and Sam manning her Gay-Straight Alliance stand, putting on a recruitment drive that sadly seems to be raising very little interest. Gabe signs up but Dominic is less keen, fixing a pout firmly on Gabe's face as Dom heads off to class. Sam keeps up his best Logan Echolls impression to tease Gabe about the trouble in paradise, but it seems Gabe's paranoia about how long he and Dominic will be together isn't going to go away any time soon. Anna meets her friend Sarah, who's busy fretting about letting herself fall for her new boyfriend (just to prove that the love lives of the adults on this show are as erratic as those of the kids), and over with Alanna and Mark, they're busy casting for the academy's production of 'Romeo & Juliet.' Logan takes centre stage to win the part of Romeo, making with the googly eyes at Mark for his heartfelt speech. The group have a discussion in Blaze to end the Act - which ends on an odd note, like we're in the middle of a scene.

Act II has some dialogue between Jacob and Gabe. There's an obvious mutual attraction here, but their conversation flows pretty well, showing that these two can obviously bounce off one another quite well. Should be an interesting dynamic - with Gabe obviously losing confidence with Dominic (already! bloody kids), you can see where his interest is going next. Parker seems set on using his knowledge of Gabe's sexuality to break up the happy Jones household one day, but for now Julie's keeping him clear of it. Gabe and Dom are out at the Blaze, but as Jacob shows up to whisk Gabe onto the dance floor, it seems things are about to get a little complicated for Crestview's worst kept secret!

Act III has James and Anna now punting Gabe and Dom off the Cutest Couple pedestal, while over at the Blaze Sam is busy sweating about the evening's impending charity event, which will bring all the students' parents together for a gala ball - although as Anna was just pointing out, it's more like a rich contest to see who can look the most wealthy. Charlie lets Sam in on something the rest of us should have worked out long ago - Julie's jealous of Sam spending time with Charlie because she's in love with him - and Sam seems genuinely clueless about the whole thing. Gabe and Dom have a falling out - Dom knows that if the two go public they're going to cop a lot of flak for it, and seems to be frustrated with Gabe's more idealised view of the situation. Gabe storms off and (surprise, surprise) runs into Jacob (although his description of the row as a 'huge fight' is perhaps exaggerating it a tad), who invites him off to a club in LA and Gabe jumps at the chance to get out of there. The little hussy!

Act IV brings us Anna and James heading into the gala at the gymnasium, setting up a 'signal' so that they can rescue each other from the kinds of dull conversations that always occur at these events. Anna bumps into Frank, some guy who hit on her a long time ago - who just so happens to be Alanna's dad! James finally makes it over but not before Frank's managed to throw an insult at James - and James throws a punch right back. Go James! Over at Club Trix, Gabe once again shows his inner party animal (remember how much fun he was having at the start of the season when he was off partying with Sam?), while James gets a chance to finish his fight with Frank, laying the drunkard out cold before he and Anna make a rapid exit. Gabe sneaks back home to find Parker ready to bust him - but what's this? Parker lets him off? He blames Julie for making him play nice, but it's such a surpise move from Parker that you can't help thinking there's more to his motive here. We close on breakfast the next morning with Anna and Gabe - and it's mentioned that Anna is 'bothered by Gabe's lie' when he says he didn't do much last night. Have to ask - how would she know?

Well, that's episode four down then, and unfortunately it suffers from exactly the same problems as last week. Several smaller plots bounce around the screen, but there's no central story of the week here. If Pathways picked one of the many stories it progresses each week and focused on that, using the other stories as ways to break up the main plot, you'd get a better sense of development with each episode. Instead, each episode is more a series of scenes pulled together than an actual story in itself. While the dialogue is a little flat in places, lacking the usual sparkle of Lamkin's snappy phrasing, there are a few good moments here - but others that are curiously underplayed, which saps the drama out of several bigger moments. Gabe seems a little out of character to start getting angry with Dominic quite so quickly, and God only knows what Parker's up to! So overall, another somewhat muddled episode - Pathways has some great stories brewing here, it just needs to start picking one at a time and bringing it to the surface instead of trying to push along a half dozen plots all at once.

ZPM RATING:

Afterlife 1x03 'Twin'

by Jon Nyqvist

As Jonathan is relentlessly hunted by Raven thugs, memories of his past life resurface. Memories of a sister who taught him a valuable lesson.

It's a fantastically-written series that displays a real flair for snappy dialogue and balletically-choreographed fight sequences, and is doing a good job of juggling the two very different sides of its premise with flashbacks to the ultra-moden 'real' world alongside a more traditional fantasy setting. With two excellent lead characters who can both carry a show single-handed if needed, let's hope Afterlife keeps up the momentum of its two great opening episodes as we settle into the season.

A touching opening moment, focusing on Jonathan's funeral, is rudely broken by a more slapstick Breakfast Club homage, as Jonathan falls through a straw roof and finds himself in someone's house - and an armed mob closing in outside. Jonathan cracks a customary joke as a dozen goons burst in and surround him, and things do not look good for our kung fu hero...

Act I takes us back in time four years to Jonathan's apartment as he wakes for a new day. His spartan living quarters tell us a lot about him - namely that he doesn't give much of a toss about life's little luxuries. Slurping apple juice from the barren fridge, he takes a phone call from his girlfriend Joan, who already seems far too good for the likes of him. A nice shot of Jonathan spacing out whilst taking a shower leads into Jonathan meeting his twin sister Jenny, who remarks on his unemployed status ('Aah,' we say, as the dingy apartment starts to make sense), and that Jonathan appears to still be keeping up with his Jeet Kun Do lessons despite not having a job. His sister appears to be involved in some kind of unsavoury business that has Jonathan worried about her, but she's confident she can stay ahead of the cops. Can you say Dramatic Irony, kids? Back in the Afterlife, and the setting of Silver City no less, Jon is on the run from the goons he was last seen throwing down with. There's a cracking moment as he dodges a hail of crossbow bolts on their way up and down, before he flips a thug over a rooftop, grabbing his sword as he does, and facing down another goon who chooses to jump rather than take on our hero's Neo-like fighting talents. Jon takes a hit at last, and as he falls we cut back to the past, with Jon out on his date with Joan. He's obviously having to swallow his pride a lot to keep her sweet, not something he's comfortable doing, and we end the Act on another of his forced smiles. It's not a great point at which to end the Act, though, given the teriffic fight still raging in the Afterlife.

Act II opens with a man stranded on a rooftop in a flooded city, water rising all around. A mysterious woman wreathed in shadow approaches him - and then falls into the water, and try as he might Jon can't get to her before she's sucked away. As a wall of water hits our helpless hero, he wakes up - back in the past. Jon's in bed with Joan, waking her up with his freaky dreams, but his sister Jenny is having an equally interesting evening - she's doing her cat burglar thing over on the wealthy side of town. Jenny proves she's an experienced hand at this thievery business when a security guard's stray cigarette burns her but she still stays silent, before she sneaks into a bedroom and discovers a safe behind a hidden painting. Even she appreciates the cliche here. She's about to leave when she hears a piercing scream ring out, and against her better judgement she goes back to investigate despite having a clear exit. Jenny peeks in on a woman being tortured in one of the mansion's rooms, with none other than Aurora's mentor Lynn looking in on her. The unfortunate captive is being interrogated, but a bullet from Lynn ends the conversation. Jenny gasps and is spotted, taking a bullet as she vaults over a pair of guards to escape. Lynn promises a swift end for the unlucky burglar, and that's where we end Act II.

Back in Silver City for Act III, Jonathan takes down another of the thugs on his trail but finds a wanted poster with his name on it in the goon's pocket. Uh oh. Back in the flashback past, a gloomy Jonathan clearly feels like Joan isn't the one for him, as she shoots down his daydreams of doing something interesting with his life (like, say, jumping out of a plane). The couple head out for a party, just missing Jenny, who breaks into Jon's apartment nursing a bullet wound from her attempted robbery earlier in the evening. Jon and Joan arrive at the party, a bash held at a huge mansion by millionaire Daniel Marking, which Jonathan doesn't appear to be looking forward to all that much. Joan sashays off with Daniel leaving Jon to find his way to the bathroom, before we get a nice cross-cut from Daniel's pristine white bathroom to Jenny, busy digging the bullet out of her side. At the mansion, Jonathan barges back into Daniel's private party, tells the smug rich boy exactly what he thinks of him and then gets himself thrown out - now that's the Jonathan we're more used to. As one chase begins in the past, we're back with the Silver City Free For All, as Jon reaches the edge of the forest and then remembers that there are things lurking in there with a taste for human flesh... Diana pops up again, the Number Six to his Baltar, and warns Jonathan not to jump into the darkness - again. Hmm! A bit of a cryptic bit, that one. It's followed by a vision of something nasty which convinces Jon to head back to the city - and it's lights out as the thugs catch him at last.

In a neat bit of match cutting (which has happened several times this episode, and to good effect), Act IV opens with a punch as well, but now we're back in the past as Daniel and his boys teach Jonathan a lesson. Meanwhile, Lynn appears to be on Jenny's trail, but now she has Jonathan's name, and the net appears to be closing in! Seems that the lives of Jonathan and Aurora are more interwoven than either of them realise, which should make for some good stuff later on in the season. Lynn listens to the message Jenny left for Jon (with a neat moment as he leaves Daniel and his goons out cold at the mansion), and it makes for quite a touching montage as Jenny tells Jon she has to leave him, 'just like everyone does.' I'm assured we haven't seen the last of Jenny, which is A Good Thing as far as I'm concerned. We end the episode with Jonathan in the dungeons of Raven Hill - a prisoner of Trias!

So that's episode III. Not bad, but uneven in terms of structure and pacing. Nyqvist still demonstrates an excellently visual flair to his writing, with the match cut scenes and the choreography of the action sequences as entertaining as ever, but the split nature of the story is a little unsatisfying. Jonathan's time in the Afterlife consists solely of running, fighting and then getting caught, and after three episodes it's only Aurora who's done anything to push the Afterlife half of this show's story forward. Jonathan's an excellent character but he hasn't really been given anything to do. That said, the flashback story is an engaging one, bringing in an appealing character in Jenny and giving us some much-needed backstory on Jon himself. So while this episode is a little wonky in terms of what it's trying to do, there's enough here to make it still worth the read. Afterlife needs to balance the two sides of itself more evenly, though - perhaps less focus on flashbacks for now, because the environment of the Afterlife itself is still very underdeveloped. We should have a clearer idea of what's going on by this stage.

ZPM RATING:

The DSR 1x04 'ESP_ionage'

by A.J. Black

When two CIA agents are murdered by Patrice Lombasa, a renegade African war criminal, Jai & Ethan are drawn into danger when the DSR encounter a remote viewer who wants to help them. Meanwhile, Carson is blackmailed by a mysterious man...

The DSR is a show that after three episodes still hasn't quite tapped into its potential, but after two slightly shaky opening episodes it hit back with 'Demons,' a much stronger story that's built up some good momentum for the season now, particularly in the case of tightly-wound Ethan Watts. Let's hope 'ESP_ionage' follows this trend, and bucks some of the less appealing trends of the series like Jai's typecast characterisation and the typos that littered the last script.

Opening in a hotel in Djibouti, as a big black dude named Patrice Lombasa steps out onto his balcony for a spot of air - while across the street, a pair of mercenaries line up their target in their rifle sights. Lombasa is joined by a chap named Ratner, who has an odd little moment of sensory overload (and yes, we know a Plot Point when we see one), before the would-be assassins are rudely interrupted by a gaggle of security guards. Tch! Well, our two mercs get taken out, and as we skip to PBH Kendall informs us that they were indeed contract killers, and pretty high-profile ones at that. Kendall informs Jai and Mia that Lombasa is ex-African military, a brutal warlord run into exile and looking for a way to freedom, but that's not all - an insider in Lombasa's group has contacted DSR agents to offer them help in taking Lombasa down. Mia raises a valid point - how did the insider even know about the DSR? Kendall is equally concerned and knows that the situation has to be resolved quickly, and before a major security risk is created. Kendall tells Jai that Ethan's about to leave hospital and return to active duty, which Jai is less than happy about, before we catch up with Carson. She's over at a Federal morgue in Ohio to investigate the body of Walter Hinds, the doctor involved in the drug trials that created Falen in 'Demons.' Thing is, Hinds was cremated. Bah! She stomps back to her car but finds a cryptic message waiting for her, pointing her to a meeting place if she wants to get her answers. And the plot thickens once again...

Ethan returns to work for Act I, but he's clearly still rattled by recent experiences, and Jai's thunderous glare can't be helping his nerves all that much. Jai is unrepentant as he and Mia fly out to Africa, but Mia takes a moment to remind Jai that maybe Ethan feels more disappointed than anything else that he wasn't made team leader, managing to break through Jai's Sawyer-like layers of indifference for once. Mia remains probably the strongest character in the show for her ability to do things like this - intelligent, quietly confident and surprisingly observant, with stacks of hidden depths and stories to tell, she's the glue holding the team together and I think she knows it. In Nairobi, the DSR meet their mystery insider - and it's Ratner! Hmm. He says he'll hand Lombasa to them but expects ten million for the service, before another trippy moment - Ratner sees visions of an ambush, and seconds later, there it is. Hands up anyone else who's worked out what the Freak Of The Week can do this time! But hang on - techno music! You know what that means. One nicely-choreographed fight later (during which Jai cracks his first actual joke, and even though it's a throwaway line it honestly feels like the real Jai for the first time all series), tossing in some John Woo-tastic gunplay along the way, Ratner is gone and the dynamic duo have to beat it before more goons show up. Carson meets her contact, a smooth-talking man named Jonas, who appears to be blackmailing her into working for the shady 'inside government' group that he works for. Back in Nairobi, Jai's team are discussing their next move when they get a surprise visitor - Ratner!

Ratner begins Act II in DSR custody, with the rest of the team debating what to do with him. Anton volunteers to interrogate the guy (as we get a little aside of Carson acting shifty - what's on that CD?), and finds that when Ratner was 15 he took part in medical research into the brain organised by - wait for it - Dr. Hinds. Carson's CD is full of biometric info on Falen, which appears to match that of Ratner. Ratner tells the team that he developed the ability to project his consciousness as a result of the trials (which Ethan confirms as Jai takes another pop at him - and I must say, I'm admiring Ethan a little for taking so much stick thus far), and Carson gets a call from the shady Jonas again - seems she's getting blackmailed into doing something fishy here, against her better judgement. Ratner's story tells of how the experiment broke down after months in isolation for the subjects, and the now psychically-awakened subjects wandered back out into the real world, trying to adjust to their new abilities. In Ratner's case, it led him into the employ of Lombasa, and his mention of 'second chances' sparks another spat between Ethan and Jai - but this time it's Kendall who steps in to bitch slap Jai down. And it's a fair play - Jai's been a real arse about this whole thing, and to be honest after four episodes I'm still thinking the guy's an idiot! Seeing him and Ethan sparring like schoolkids is quite comic but I think we need to have this tension resolved before it gets old. Anyway, Sara sets up an experiment to monitor Ratner's abilities, but Carson seems to know something the others don't...

Act III opens with a slightly wonky bit of para-science (tracking astral projection via satellite relays? hmm...), with Ratner scanning out Lombasa's African hideout so the team know where to go looking. It feels a tad deus ex machina, I'll admit, but I'll allow it this time because Black's clearly tried to ground the whole thing in reality, even if it doesn't work perhaps as well as he'd hoped. The team prepare for their strike but Ratner insists on coming along - he's created a few more remote viewers among Lombasa's men, you see, so without his help the DSR strike team'll be spotted a mile off. Ethan asks to take Mia's place and ahe sgrees - to her, she's probably thinking it'll force Ethan and Jai to get over their issues. Let's hope she's right, eh? Carson meets a Caribbean guy and hands him a photo of somebody located in Nigeria (which just happens to be where the DSR team are headed - coincidence?), deepening her part in whatever unsavoury business she's messed up in. Carson doesn't strike me as the sort to suffer fools gladly, so if she's being blackmailed it must be over something pretty major. Anyway. Out in the Nigerian desert, the DSR team find Lombasa packing up and ready to leave his facility, with Jai favouring a stealth strike instead of an all-out assault due to the superior opposing numbers (with another groan-inducing Sawyer-ism along the way). The trio sneak into the base - and it's a set up. Lombasa was waiting for them and Ratner was the mole all along. Surprising? Well, not really, considering the world of espionage we're working in, but's a good moment to end Act III on as Jai and Ethan get their asses handed them by the guards. Something tells me we've got a Wash/Mal 'War Stories' moment in the offing here!

Act IV brings us Jai and Ethan tied up in Lombasa's custody. Are we going to get some interrogation room bonding between our boys here? The PBH team have just worked out it was a set up so it'll soon be Mia to the rescue, but back in Nigeria it's Jai doing his bit to try and escape. It provokes a good outburst from Ethan where he finally tells Shaw what he honestly thinks of him, before they're led outside to await their fate at Lombasa's hands. Lombasa, hacksaw in hand, makes his choice and swipes - and we black out. A cliffhanger! Another tried and tested Alias device but it does the trick here.

So it's another improvement for DSR, then, with a solidly-written episode that continues to build on these strong characters and relationships. A few elements are still taking their time to work out - the parascience elements feel a little clunky, for one - but old bugbears like Jai's Sawyerisms are becoming far less frequent, and Ethan's actually showing good signs of growth at last. Carson's blackmail sub-plot helps break the episode up, and all in all we're starting a good snowball effect here. Let's hope the next few episodes continue to build on this recent upswing in the show's standard!

ZPM RATING:

Pathways 2x03 'Exit, Stage Right'

by Alden C. Caele

After the school changes its policies, requiring extracurricular involvement for certain 'privileges' the gang start to fill their schedules. Mark is invited to try out for the Drama Club, where he meets shy and sensitive Logan; Gabe and Dominic try to cross a milestone in their relationship again after a disappointing first try; and Charlie convinces Sam to help her start up a Gay-Straight Alliance.

Back to Crestview, then. While Pathways still isn't the kind of thing I'd typically read, I think it's a good thing for me to read. If that makes sense. It always helps to be familiar with all kinds of genres, I find, and if I'm only going to be reading one soap-y kind of show it may as well be a well-written one, eh? Besides, the characters here are all engaging and interesting and it means that their stories are things I do actually want to know. Must be the same guilty part of me that watches [i]The OC[/i].

Mark staggers out of bed and downstairs to find his more hyped up mother making an unusual request - she's got the weekend off, so suggests going to Africa. *blinks* Right... is she on medication? I think Mark's suggestion of the movies was more what he was expecting, but anyway...

Act I then, and over at Chez Jones, Anna gets a romantic breakfast in bed from psuedo-husband James while Gabe is busy getting ready. James tries to have the awkward 'I'm not trying to be your dad, but...' conversation, but thankfully Gabe makes it easy on him. Everybody's always so darned happy in Crestview, aren't they? Must be something in the water. Maybe the drama queen in me always looks for ways to wring the most conflict out of any given situation, but at times I'm still finding too many of the relationships in Pathways are just too blummin' nice. Thank goodness for Parker - he's using every moment he can to widn up Gabe, looking for any excuse to get a fight out of him and have a reason to push James to move them both back out. Thing is, as Gabe heads off to meet Sam, what do we get? Parker looking a bit jealous! Oh dear, oh dear. Now this can't end well. Over at Brighton Academy, we meet the engaging art teacher Mr. Mead, who earns brownie points by throwing a Veronica Mars reference into his opening speech, before the more straight-laced Mr. Greyson announces the launch of a 'Brighton Points' scheme. Rewarding students for extracurricular activities, it sounds like another way to widen the divide between the school's social classes to me, but then again higher education's never been something I've understood. Anyway. Some random guy slips Mark a note inviting him to a secret meeting, which understandably confuses the young lad, before we get to the first lunch of the new term. Starting on a Friday must be an American thing - or maybe just something the more exclusive places offer! Sam still keeps coming out with lines that make him sound far too much like Logan Echolls, though. Always a risk when you cast such a strong character, I guess. Mark chirps about needing to find an excuse to get out of going to Africa (and he and Sam bounce off each other really well, especially with that Frankenstein line), until there's mention of a 'Gay-Straight Alliance.' The boys sound horrified, but we do get a few comic lines from Token Straight Guy Troy out of it all.Over on the basketball court (blimey, how long is this Act anyway?), Parker's blowing off some steam when Kaia intrudes on his workout, taunting him in that delicious way that only good soap opera bitches can, and Mark heads to his meeting to encounter a new girl called Alanna. She's already set off the Crazy Alarm for me - all she'd need is a twitch to complete the picture - but all she seems to want is to get Mark into the Drama club. With several hints to emotional baggage just waiting to be searched by Customs (a 'rough year' and some trauma with her brother), Alanna invites Mark into the club and he's only too happy to sign up.

Act II finds Sam and Charlie petitioning the Dean to get their Alliance set up (oh, and Sam name drops a 'Mr. Echolls' - bah!), before Charlie bemoans Julie's animosity towards her again. Sam plays it diplomatically, but as we cut over to Julie she's far less restrained with her tongue-lashing. Heckling Charlie for not seeing that Sam's gay (which prompts a little awkward shuffle from Parker), Julie's going to be in for a shock when she finds out how Parker really feels, eh? Gabe and Dom meet up for a chat and start talking about the 'hem-hem' again, both seeming too eager to get round to it again. They're obviously trying to say what they think the other wants to hear, which is a nicely human moment between them. Gabe casually mentions the 'hem-hem' to Sam and Mark to some nicely comic reactions, and after Julie gets a few lines in (and everybody's been drinking their Wisecrack Juice today) it's back to Mark's house, where he sighs with guilt as his mother clears out for the weekend.

Gabe's doing a little homework at the start of Act III when Alanna shows up to drag him away. There's an obvious 'thing' between Alanna and Parker here - I'd even go so far as to say they have 'history,' making little speech marks with my fingers. Parker seems to be the one trying not to admit he misses her out loud, hiding it (as always) behind a few loudly vocalised insults. Turns out little Mark's been hurt by a falling stage set (and working in a theatre myself that's something I've seen happen!), and Alanna's whisking Gabe over to the hospital for some moral support. Mark seems to be reluctant to bother Sam for some reason, but as fellow drama club guy Logan (and again with the Veronica Mars!) pops in to see Mark, Gabe ducks out to see Alanna. She claims to be checking up on her 'Aunt Ruth' but the name on the patient card reads 'Edward O'Neill.' Hmm! Why would Alanna know Eddie? This girl has secrets. Me likey. There's a sweet moment as Gabe shows up, before Gabe runs into Julie and waits for Anna to come pick him up. To be honest, the end of this Act seems to peter out a bit - ending on Gabe discovering Alanna's lie would have been a better moment, but anyway.

Act IV, and Gabe finally makes up with Anna. Aww. But out of the Hallmark moment we do at least get some insight into Parker's chip on the old shoulder - his absentee mother. Well, that explains some of his issues, anyway. Back at the hospital, Mark assures a guilty Alanna that his injury wasn't her fault. He dreamily recalls the audition and you can't help but think we were looking at all the wrong scenes this episode. Mark's audition and subsequent accident would have made for some good drama, as well as character development, and instead we've just had a lot of people chatting absently to each other in the background from start to finish. This is even more apparent when Mark's mom Lily shows up to tell her how proud she is of him - how come she got to see his big moment and we didn't? Anyway. Gabe and Dom are still nervously arranging their next bout of 'hem-hem' when Gabe intercepts a call from Alanna - she's pissed that Dom moved Eddie to private care without telling her. Aha! So how does she know Dominic? We will have to wait and see. Luckily, Gabe and Dom's little rendezvous goes better than planned, despite Gabe still having a big hang up that Dominic isn't officialy gay. And that's where we leave them.

So! A curiously drama-less episode here. Alanna stands out as an interesting new addition to the cast, obviously full of secrets and with lots of stories to tell, but by missing out on seeing Mark's audition or accident, which seems to have been a pretty major thing, all we're really left with are a bunch of conversation pieces that don't really push any of the plots forward that much. We needed to spend more time with Alanna - seeing her lead the audition would have been ideal - and the Gay-Straight Aliiance sub-plot gets forgotten about, presumably to return in a later episode. And there's still this annoying feeling that everything's so bloody nice all the time. There's stacks of potential avenues for conflict and drama here, but this show seems a little too comfy with most of its cast being loved up and happy to start setting up any big plots here. You could mark this down to simmering tensions, but even Gabe/Parker seems more like mild irritation than actual resentment. A disappointing third episode, then, in a series that has plenty of room to take some risks with its well-presented and written characters and needs to start taking advantage of that.

ZPM RATING:

The DSR 1x03 'Demons'

by A.J. Black

Ethan is left distraught when an old friend and CIA agent is killed in capturing a criminal in Panama who has psychic abilities, who begins torturing Ethan’s mind from his prison cell...

Back with The DSR then, and hoping for this promising show to start unlocking some of its potential and start moving away from being an Alias spin-off. While I had my issues with the first two episodes, I can see great things for this show once it nails down its characterisation and develops its own sense of style, so let's see what 'Demons' brings us, in an Ethan-centric episode.

Opening in a bar in Panama that seems to be Bad Guy Central, where we meet Ritchie and Falen who would appear to be our Guest Villains. Ethan's there too, keeping an eye on things, but when Ritchie follows him into the restrooms we discover Ritchie is an inside man, and in my experience that suggests he'l be dead inside the next three pages. He may as well be wearing a red shirt! A slightly clunky 'Six months undercover is no picnic' line sets the scene here - it's a big operation and the ever-impatient Ethan wants to close the deal. Ethan hints that there's more to Falen than meets the eye, but as Ritchie retakes his seat it's clear Falen is on to him. Ethan's strike team gather outside, ready to move, but to Ethan's horror the ice cool Falen orders Ritchie to pull his own gun and shoot himself - which he does! Falen is caught as the strike team pile in, but the 'abilities' Ethan mentioned earlier have just been demonstrated with sadly fatal consequences. I'll refrain from making another Redshirt comment...

Act I has Sawyer - sorry, Jai - meeting the others as Ethan gets chewed out by Kendall. So he sanctioned the op himself, eh? That's an odd thing for the typically protocol-conscious Ethan to do, and suggests his beef with Falen goes back some way if he was prepared to risk his career to get him. Ethan's snappish remark about Jai tells us he's clearly frustrated with the double standard Kendall seems to be applying to the team, but he can't help looking like a naughty schoolboy as Kendall dismisses him. At Ritchie's funeral, however, Ethan sees a vision of Falen watching him, and the guilt over Ritchie's death is clearly weighing heavy on his conscience. Ethan sees Falen again as he tries to avoid Ritchie's family, and realises at last that he's going to have to face his demons and pay Falen a visit if he's to have any hope of getting closure on all this. Ethan pays a visit to Falen at a maximum security prison in Virginia, trying to get a rise out of Falen by taunting him, but Falen's cool silence turns the tables on Ethan and it's him who starts losing his cool. He's clearly rattled by Falen as he leaves - looks like we're in for a long standoff here!

With Falen still haunting Ethan, Act II opens with news that Falen's smuggling operation has moved into organ trafficing, and with the homeless population of Mexico targeted as unwilling donors it's down to the DSR team to cut off the head of the operation by bringing down its new leader, Hector Certez. Anton speaks to Ethan after the briefing, commenting on Ethan's loss (although this does lead to some slightly cheesy dialogue) but making an interesting point - has Ethan been feeling sidelined since Jai was given control of the team, and could this have been affecting his judgement? Carson puts in a request to study Falen, mentioning that she feels the DSR's focus has shifted from research to field work lately, and as she's given Anton and Sara to help we switch scenes to Mexico City. The show's central double act, Jai and Mia, are busy infiltrating Certez's compound when they see Certez talking to a mysterious figure described as 'every inch the Shaman.' That line stuck out for me - it's not exactly a very vivid description and jars the scene a little bit. Jai and Mia make it into Certez's office and are getting hold of data from his computer remotely, with Ethan waiting outside to run fake biographies to fool Certez's security system. He's distracted at the last moment by a set of visions that throw him off whack, and to everyone's alarm he fails to set up Jai and Mia's cover stories before the security system clocks them as US government employees. Oops.

Act III opens with our duo rumbled by Certez, but after some gunplay and a neat little fight sequence, they're back out into the wider world and running for their skins. Back at PBH, Jai gets a chance to do something he's always wanted - chew out Ethan! It's another role reversal and a good example of how much Ethan's screwed up here. Ethan watches the angry conversation and we get another hint at Mia's past with a seemingly throwaway remark - the girl's got a lot of layers to get through yet. Good stuff. Makes for a more rounded protagonist, because we know that in time we'll start seeing those layers get peeled back and her motivations will be revealed at last! I hope. Over in Sara's lab, after Carson puts on the Exposition Hat so Black can get across the way DSR approaches psychic abilities (and nicely done too - I always appreciate a little effort going into grounding supernatural elements of a show into reality), Sara hypothesises that Falen's psychic powers could be genetically engineered. A GM bad guy? And here was me thinking they were going to stop with potatoes. Of course, Sara thinks Falen's involvment in LSD trials in the 80s was the probably cause, so now we have a raver for a bad guy. Rah. Certez has been tracked down to Chile, where he's hanging out with his buddy the shaman, so the DSR crew have to go in and finish the job Ethan ballsed up for them earlier - and Ethan's not invited. Ethan suffers some more disturbing dreams, but he knows where to go to tackle the problem this time - Falen. Falen creepily tells Ethan he's going to put him through some hell, and to be honest it looks like Ethan's pretty screwed. Anybody wound up as tight as he is doesn't take much picking to pull apart, and Falen knows that. So let's gear up for the freak out! I think I can hear 'White Rabbit' starting to play in the background...

Act IV brings us Carson going to see Dr. Hinds, the man behind the drug trials that may have created Falen's powers, but the cuddly old man she meets is a long step from the mad scientist we were expecting. What's more, seems that Hinds knows Carson, or at least her father, so he may be the innocent party in all this after all. And there's more backstory here - how great a plot device is the word 'unpleasantness'? There's some bad stuff in Carson's past about her dad. Goody - future character development! Go team. Hinds tells Carson to drop it, but seems like he's more afraid of Falen finding out than anything else. Over in Chile, our double team of Jai and Mia give us a good character moment with Jai - everybody's obviously rushing to defend Ethan's actions and bringing up the loss of Rithcie, but Jai's finding it hard to feel sympathy given the circumstances of his induction into the DSR - and why should he? It's a valid point, and well made too. As they look in on Certez's hideout and find a voodoo ritual about to take place, Kendall receives some alarming news - Falen has broken out and it looks like Ethan helped! The voodoo ritual is in full Temple Of Doom mode before Jai helpfully blows away the shaman, and just as the DSR team get things under control - Ethan shows up, a gun pressed to Mia's head!

Woah, woah, hang on. Falen was imprisoned in Virginia, right? That's a fair way away from Chile. It's a bit of a stretch to say that Ethan and Falen have escaped from maximum security and gotten down to Chile in the short time he's been free, let alone been in a quote unquote 'remote mountainous village' in time to ambush the DSR squad! Hmm. The thing about time lapses like this in scripts is they can sometimes feel very contrived, especially if they happen too close together, so while it may be possible, I'm afraid I must hereby thwack this script with the Plot Hole Stick.

Thing is, back in the action there's another great moment as Falen sneers at Jai, telling him that it was easy to bend Ethan to his will - he just exploited Ethan's loathing of Jai and used it to manipulate him. It's spoilt a little by a slightly camp last minute save from Mia, tackling Falen and shooting him, leaving the shattered Ethan to recover. There's a nicely creepy moment as it's clear Falen's ghost is hanging around for a bit yet just to close the episode off.

Right! I'm getting behind on my reviews so let's get cracking on summing this chap up then. While 'Demons' is a much more solid episode than the two openers, with a more believeable premise, good focus on character development, a worthy guest villain and less of the typecasting problems that hindered the last two shows, it really does shoot itself in the foot with that Act IV moment where Ethan and Falen show up. I may be missing something and I'll admit my geography isn't great, but it just feels like getting Ethan to the village in Chile in the timeframe given isn't plausible, so we're left with a deus ex machina to bring about the pivotal moment of the episode, and that always bugs me. There's a fair few typos, missing words and grammatical errors here, too, that suggests a lack of proof-reading before the script went to air. It's not a big deal, admittedly, but it saps a little atompshere from a script when you spot errors like that, so it's something I'd advise the DSR team to watch out for in the future. That said, this is, as I just commented, a much more solid episode all round, and signs of more good things to come. DSR's still got a lot to learn but it seems to be learning fast.

ZPM RATING:

Pathways 2x02 'Throw Me A Bone'

by Brian L. Lamkin

Tensions build between Anna and Gabe as they prepare to merge homes with James and Parker. Sam is thrown for a loop when Mark and Julie both question the future of their friendships with him. Gabe and Dominic's relationship takes another twisting turn.

And so we're back with Pathways. The drama series is still a big hit on MZP, so after a season opener that spent most of its time re-introducing everyone instead of having any real plot per se, I'm interested to see where we go now. Some great characterisation in 'The Boys Of Summer Are Gone' means I feel I know the regulars pretty well already, which is a big bonus given that I'm an entire season behind the loop on this one!

Gabe and Anna are still on very tense terms. She's dealing with his vanishing act in the most human way possible - ignoring it and letting her anger simmer over. Lamkin's eye for sharp dialogue brings a lot out of this scene, even if you can't help feel some vocal direction would have helped the atmosphere even further (you know, just a (tense) or (snaps) before the lines here and there).There's some handy 'In case you missed last season...' dialogue that covers the story of Gabe's dad making his unexpected comeback, before we switch to Mark and Julie. Julie's still moping about Sam not calling her (and I'm guessing here that she doesn't know he's bisexual, because she seems like quite an innocent girl all round), and despite encouragement from Mark is still putting off calling him herself. It's refreshing to have characters in a drama behaving like actual humans - The OC can capture this sometimes, but mainly accomplishes the awkwardness of teen years by having its four leads mumble all their lines. Here, we get some very human dialogue with people back-pedalling, stalling, avoiding subjects and getting their words completely wrong, all of which helps you relate to each character a great deal.

Act I, then, and Gabe and Dominic go for another Cutest Couple award as Gabe sneaks away to the park to see him, before we switch to the local arcade to find Mark and Sam getting their video game on, with Mark playing Devil's Advocate over the whole Julie thing. He's clearly stuck in the middle of two people he cares about here, but Sam's pride is too hurt to accept any kind of reconciliation with Julie. Maybe deep down he's seeing this as a chance for some freedom? Anna seems to be stuck in a similar dilemma as James asks her again about moving in together, and although she says 'yes' it's clear she's far from sure yet. She knows there's a lot of baggage to get through with Gabe yet but doesn't want to risk losing James because of it. Parker seems similarly unimpressed at the prospect of the move - but that's more through his intense dislike of Gabe than anything else. And I've just noticed how I'm analysing these characters - I'm going to put that down to the intelligent writing here. The storylines are all rattling along at a fair pace but there's stacks to read between the lines of each one.

Act II has Charlie trying to cheer up a glum Sam at The Blaze when Julie shows up. Uh oh! Insert dramatic musical sting here, especially when Julie says they all need to 'talk.' If that isn't girl code for 'drop some crazy postal ravings on your unsuspecting arses' then I don't know what is. True to form, Julie explodes at Charlie who stomps off in a haze of indignation, and a tearful Julie has to watch a less-than-impressed Sam get up and leave. Kids, eh? The Sam Bashing doesn't stop there, as Mark is the next to lay into the loveable rogue with a well-administered rant about Sam's somewhat selfish focus on his own problems. I imagine Mark was lacking in backbone for most of Season One so this is a good moment for him. Sam leaves, presumably to lock himself in his room and listen to some angsty teenage music or other, and we switch back to the Jones household, as Gabe awakes to find the move of the McMann family in full swing. Gabe is clearly less than happy about it, given that he doesn't feel like he's had a say in things, but when James tries to assuage Gabe's fears he makes the mistake of using the phrase 'I won't try to be your father.' James obviously means well, but the 'f' word is bound to make Gabe more than a little twitchy at the moment, and the conversation ends as Gabe 'clumps' up the stairs. And what a well-chosen word 'clump' is in this instance! You can almost hear Gabe pouting from here, and it's no surprise when Gabe shows up at Dominic's, looking for some kind of sanctuary.

Act III, and Anna rings Sam and terrorises him into helping locate Gabe, who is busy tucking into some pie over at Dominic's place. Parents away for a few days, eh? Hem hem! A guilty Sam manages to get Julie and Mark along to help with the search, Sam believing that his bad influence on Gabe may be having more serious consequences. Seems to me more like he's just scared of what Anna's going to do to him if he doesn't track Gabe down, but from the sounds of what Anna tells James I'd be more worried if I was Gabe at the moment! Still, over at Dominic's, Cutest Couple 2006 look like things are about to progress to the next base...

Act IV brings us back to the aftermath. That's right, kids, Gabe and Dominic have done The Deed. The beast with two backs. The horizontal tango. Et cetera. And what follows is some brilliantly awkward dialogue between the two of them, so full marks to Lamkin for capturing the mood of the scene so very well. But uh oh, Sam's shown up to come looking for Gabe - this can't end well! Sam thankfully is only moderately surprised instead of fully wigged out, and so the drive back to Chez Jones seems to clear a lot of the air between them. And, luckily, Anna is also just glad to see him again, saving any bottled up anger she has over Gabe skipping out again for another time. And love is in the air as Sam, Mark and Julie have a big old Group Hug. Everybody saw 'aww' then. Meanwhile, back at the Blaze, Sam's ex Shawn is approached by a character called Dylan, the two guys both having a beef against Sam over recent events. We leave Crestview for another week as the two begin to plot their revenge against the show's resident Lothario...

So! An oddly underwhelming episode this time round. The Gabe and Dominic moment at the start of Act IV was genius, but throughout the episode things just seem a bit too... nice. For want of a better word. Potential conflicts between Anna and Gabe and Sam, Mark and Julie are all settled and wrapped up with gift-wrapped hugs without any real fuss or drama, and you feel as though you've spent the whole episode watching through rose-tinted glasses. After all the promising set-up of 'The Boys Of Summer...' it's something of a cop out to have so many of the juicy, conflict-ridden storylines smoothed out and fuzzied up so quickly. The return of Shawn and Dylan right at the end adds some promise, but overall this is an episode that feels like something of a missed opportunity. A lot of the dialogue seems to be missing the sparkle of the opener, too, so the episode overall falls a little flat. It's a shame - these are still an engaing bunch of characters, and I'm intrigued by what Dylan may be plotting for Sam, but I hope some more dramatic tension is injected into the next few episodes to take advantage of the strong writing and characterisation.

ZPM RATING:

Afterlife 1x02 'Rude Awakening'

by Jon Nyqvist

Aurora, who has risen to leadership within a ruthless league of assassins and bandits named the Ravens, faces the dangers of multiple challengers, as well as mysterious nightmares and painful memories that further weaken her hold of her position.

The opening episode was fantastic, if it did struggle a little to mesh the breathtaking chemistry and action of its first half with its more medieval second, but we've got two engaging leads in Jonathan and Aurora, and as this story is all about the hitwoman herself I'm looking forward to getting stuck into it. So! Let's press on.

We're watching news footage of the aftermath of the shooting at the church that left Jonathan, Aurora and a handful of thungs dead and gone, with Detective Gordon making a suspicious phone call to someone that further deepens the mystery behind Aurora - there's obviously something bigger going on here, which we'll hopefully learn more about in due course. Gordon examines Aurora's corpse and clearly knows who she is, but he's at pains to keep this quiet. Hmm! Aurora's unflattering body is our conduit back into the Afterlife, and Aurora has a similarly traumatic introduction to the world as Jonathan's as she finds herself underwater, pushing to the surface in the middle of a big, black sea...

There's a great little twist as we start Act One, however. Aurora has a vivid nightmare about Jonathan shooting her in the church gunfight (with a telling reference to 'trust' that hints at more backstory), before she wakes up in a bed - and it's almost a year later! It's an excellent little move, one that instantly gives the show a wealth of backstory to dip into and develop at its leisure. Aurora is greeted by a visitor who tells her 'another one is here,' and as the tired Aurora moves on into a large hall, it's clear she hasn't been sitting on her hands for the last eleven months - far from it, in fact! She addresses a room of thugs who she appears to be in charge of, with a figure named Trias stepping forward to challenge her. Seems they were lovers - although Aurora brushes it off as just a fling - and as the two fight it looks like Trias' taunts that Aurora's lost her edge is on the money. The fight isn't going her way, and she's getting a real paasting when she pulls a hidden dagger and stabs Trias in the neck, leaving him bleeding on the floor as an example to the others. Brilliant stuff. Aurora tries to recover, but is then forced to kill her assistant Liana when she tries to literally stab her in the back. Seems Aurora's weary features are making more sense now - she may be the ledaer of a powerful group of thugs, but the constant threats on her life are taking their toll. Liana's replacement Vergil arrives the next day, treating us to some great panoramic shots of Aurora's new domain, and he brings his new boss news of the death of Marius the Cutter, who as we know was taken out by our very own Jonathan last week. Vergil produces a sketch of Jonathan, leaving Aurora in a stunned silence.

Act II has our freaky dream of the week, with Aurora exchanging cryptic words with a small boy in the setting of the church once again. The boy warns Aurora that the darkness she surrounds herself with will one day consume her - and is he implying that she could turn into one of the shadowy ghouls that we saw pursuing Jonathan through the forest last episode? Very interesting - throws in a whole karmic angle to proceedings that really brings in a load of new potential for character development! Aurora shoots the boy and is literally consumed by darkness, having blamed the boy for what she's become (so who is he?), but realising that she has to find Jonathan again. We're treated next to a flashback of Aurora laying down the law in a shootout at a penthouse suite, with Nyqvist's cinematic treatment of action sequences again blasting off the page - it's a hundred per cent Matrix as she jumps, slides and dodges around, laying waste to anything shooting at her with consumate ease. Heck, there's even a shot labelled as 'Ultra Cool' as she strides forward through a shower of falling glass... before casually shooting the last surviving thug dead. Fantastic. Aurora strides into the suite - and finds a terrified mother and her child. The same child she had the freaky dream about. Aha! Aurora calls her employer to protest, but is told in no uncertain times that she has to kill them both. After some agonising, she finally shoots - but her own reflexes betray her, her shots all going wide and forcing her to run. Her spent gun clatters to the floor (another brilliantly visual moment), and the story becomes a little clearer!

Act III has Vergil telling Aurora that the Ravens (her merry band of goons) are combing the area for Jonathan, with strict orders to bring him in alive. Vergil heads off ( on 'his little horsie' as Aurora puts it), but there's a nasty surprise lurking in the shadows once he's gone - Trias! He's still alive and out for some payback.Relaxing in the bath, Aurora daydreams of speaking to a woman called Lynn about her failed assassination, revealing that Lynn was the woman who took Aurora in and turned her into an assassin - something she regrets, wishing she'd given Aurora the chance to be something more meaningful than a hired killer. Lynn sours the moment, sadly, by ratting Aurora out with an understandably cool view of her own survival, and the potentially cheesy Hallmark moment gets turned on its head. Nice work. Lynn gives Aurora a head start at least, and as Jason arrives to find Aurora gone, Lynn warns him that Aurora is now more dangerous than ever now that she's alone at last. It's a big character moment that doesn't even need Aurora around!

Act IV opens with Trias holding Aurora at knife point, but she uses the best weapon to hand - her body - to throw him off guard and then kick him square in the face. Gotta love it, especially as she leaps from the bath, grabs a robe and ties it round herself in one continuous motion! This time, however, Trias' raw strength gives him the advantage, and he brutally batters Aurora out onto the balcony before punching her over the railing and down into the water below. Vergil is out on his trek, approaching the village Jonathan was last seen in, when who should approach him but Marius! Thing is, we know he's dead, so this must be one of those evil shadow thingies that nearly made a meal out of Jonathan... does this mean they can take on human form? Aurora washes up on a beach, and another visit from Creepy Dream Kid warns her of the darkness inside her just waiting to consume her, before she snaps awake again, and we end on the creepy shot of Aurora finding a small patch of literally living darkness on her palm...

So, another good episode, this one benefitting from a more constant pace throughout, with the flashbacks to the real world fitting into the Afterlife action more smoothly than last week's two-sided affair. Aurora is an absolutely fantastic character - as well as possessing a dry wit and some Wachowski Brothers style kung fu moves, there's real depth to her character, from her upbringing and training to the guilt weighing on her soul, and the very real threat of her past sins consuming her in this new world. The time delay between her arrival and Jonathan's is also interesting - why did she get an extra year before he showed up, considering they died at the same instant? The actual story itself doesn't take up too much space - this is more of a character-establishing piece, and does its job well for that, but the focus is perhaps a little too heavily on Aurora's character instead of a standalone story for the episode. Don't get me wrong, what we get to see of Aurora is fantastic, it just feels like we're two episodes in now and not all that much has actually happened with the series - that said, there's a sense of things starting to build up, so now that our leads are established the next few episodes should start to pay off for all this set up.

And here's the line of the week:

AURORA
Good. You did specify that he was
to be taken alive?

VERGIL
I won't lie. The men had a bit of a
hard time with that one.
But I'm sure they wouldn't cross
you in any way.

AURORA
Right, 'cause it's not like they are
a bunch of murderers and thieves.

ZPM RATING:

Homeostasis 1x02 'Fake ID'

by Jordan Hyman

Quint meets a stranger in Eureka, Missouri, that claims to have been his best friend three years before.

So it's back with episode two of the wonderfully abstract Homeostasis, with a positive start to the series filling us with questions about the mysterious journey of Quint Burroughs. Is he crazy? Does he have a split personality? Why is his view of the world so warped and bizarre? And will the show continue to tease us with hints at what's left him this way, while throwing up a separate story each week for our bewildered hero to trek through? Man, I hope so...

We open with a teenager, Greg, and a middle-aged cafe owner, Marie, watching a dreadful Christian band hammer their way through messages of love for the Lord. The tongue-in-cheek dialogue here seems to put Hyman on a similar anti-religious wavelength to myself, so points for that. Marie also demonstrates an interesting talent - she appears to be able to read people's minds, a talent she and Greg appear to have turned into a scam. Marie puts the fear of God into a local teenager, seemingly for shits and giggles, before the link to the story comes out - Greg knows Quint, and he's just arrived in town. His car has run out of gas and left him stuck here - but as Quint screams at it for dying, you can't help but wonder if the car conked out on purpose, or Quint short-filled without realising...

With Greg setting up what sounds worryingly like a massacre in the cafe at the start of Act I, Quint finally bumps into the guy, who claims to be one of his 'best friends' back from Springfield. Quint makes a show of acting like he eventually recognises him, but I'm not so sure he actually does. Seems like Quint's after any small hint of validation of the haze of his life at the moment, so it's logical he'd latch onto Greg whether he actually remembers him or not! Greg leads him to a St. Louis-themed restaurant, where a guarded conversation takes place. I get the impression that Quint is trying to get more answers out of Greg without weirding him out, while Greg appears to be purposefully testing him. It's a good little moment - it enhances Quint's paranoia but also raises the feeling again that the people he meets know a lot more than they initially let on, as seen with Addison in 'Still.' Greg is quick to lead Quint away from the aftermath of the shotgun bloodbath at the diner (which Greg set up, let's not forget), but I'm also reading something into Quint's focus on the flashing ambulance lights. A link to another hidden memory, perhaps? Or maybe I'm seeing something that isn't there? Who cares. That's all part of the fun with this series, and I personally love not knowing what's going on as long as I have enough information to make reasoned guesses! The Act ends as Greg suddenly drives himself and Quint off the road, leading them to an eerie graveyard of similarly trashed cars. And the weird-o-meter jumps up another notch...

Act II has Greg leading Quint onto an old football field, where he meets some of Greg's college buds having a midnight kegger. Trent, one of the friends, suddenly says something very interesting, when he says he knows Quint - and says his father-in-law tried to kill him because 'he thought he was somebody he wasn't.' Hmm! The way the line is suddenly delivered, and the fact that nobody else reacts to it, makes me think Quint 'saw' that but it didn't actually happen. Is this his subconscious mind peeking through again? Trent's next line of 'what's the point of a story without pictures or conversations?' line is a reference to something, I believe (Alice In Wonderland), but it again hints that a large chunk of what we see Quint experiencing isn't actually happening, and his own mind is filling in the blanks. The fact that Greg's mother doesn't seem to know Quint and his little sister Elle runs a mile when she sees him deepens the mystery here. Again, I'm feeling like Greg's been told by Curtis to slow Quint down, stop him from keeping up by freaking him out and throwing him off the scent. Greg and Quint attend a party, where we get something interesting - somebody recording the occasion and an angry Punk stomping around. This is obviously the video footage Quint was watching in the attic of his house back in 'Still,' although it's playing out very differently here. An off-handed remark by the Punk about 'his brother didn't even go to Iraq' adds another notch to the bizarre score, as does Greg's sudden frenzied beating of Quint - but it was all a dream! So was everything we just saw actually Quint dreaming and going over a past memory? I think so. I think it explains a few things about how odd Greg's been acting if the last time he and Quint saw each other ended in a fight like that!

In Act III, Greg is picking up a new car from a dealer (presumably to trash out in the woods again so he can continue his bonkers religious experience - the guy does seem to think he's indestructible, doesn't he?) when Quint spots a black Mercedes that he identifies as belonging to Curtis, only for Quint to see the car smash itself to pieces (and disturbingly ooze blood) - before it turns into a different car. Another repressed memory seeping out there, then, and a story involving that Mercedes that we need to find out about at some point. There's an equally messed up scene in an alleyway where Quint sees some guy missing his hands through a window, before Greg drags him to another freaky party. Quint finds himself in a makeshift opium den upstairs, where his frustration boils out at last - and one of the resident stoners answers him back with dialogue that again suggests none of what we're seeing is actually happening, before things finally start to come together, just as the heavily fragmented storyline was finally starting to lose me. Quint finally says he remembers Greg, so Greg knocks him down, drugs him and drags him into his car. Greg seems suitably pissed at our young hero, and this can only mean the dream Quint had earlier (about the violent confrontation with Greg at the party) actually did take place - and the wounds from that event are a long way from healed!

Act IV gives us Freaky Dream Sequence Of The Week #2, with Quint having a worryingly erotic meeting with Greg's fourteen year old sister (although I suppose he's only 17 himself) before waking up in... the bath. He staggers out, back round the freaky house until he finds Greg, trying to saw his own hands off. Lovely. Quint says thet he 'remembers the future better than the past,' a nice bit of subtext-laden dialogue, before he wakes up. Again. Yes, it's one of those episodes, where the characters keep waking up and you realise you've been suckerpunched into thinking Quint's dreams were real once more. I'd get annoyed if it wasn't so annoyingly clever about it - I'll get you next time, Hyman, next time... Anyway. Quint staggers downstairs to meet Greg, who acts like he doesn't know him again before urgently whispering for him to leave. Aah. Things are starting to come together at last. Quint gets back to the used car lot - and it's empty. As disjointed as ever, he hops on a bus and takes off, leaving this whole bizarre town behind.

So! Defying a quick explanation as always (and we love the show for it), this is a shorter and yet more complex story than last episode, with half a dozen dead ends, lucid dreams and flashbacks interspersed with the actual narrative to throw you off. My personal theory that Quint is reliving his own memories without realising it starts to gain more credence here - it's the final shot of the empty stolen car lot that does it - but I'm still drawing up a few blanks as to what part Greg played in it all. The fact that we saw Quint experience the party where he was videotaped (seen in 'Still') with a different outcome throws things into more confusion, but also strengthens one theory - there are two distinct timelines in operation here. The one that actually happened, and the one that Quint remembers, with events and situations from the 'real' timeline seeping into Quint's own memories but getting drowned in all the garbage data flooding his fractured little mind. So while this episode is entertaining to read, it's perhaps a bit too complicated for its own good in places.I must flag up the grammar and spelling here, though - the script is littered with typos which jar considerably, affecting the atmosphere throughout. A few typos is fine, but there's too many to turn a blind eye to here, and that's an unfortunate flaw in an otherwise brilliantly-written script. Hyman's eye for tongue in cheek descriptions and stage direction really makes these scripts bounce along. And finally I have to mention my favourite exchange of the episode:

HECTOR
Ahhwww!!! Quint, nice to meet you, man. I'm Hector; this is Trent.
That's Alison, that's Alison, and that's Alison, and...
I don't know who the fuck those people are.

TRENT
Yeah, fuck those people.

HECTOR
Yeah, fuck you guys.

RANDOM GUY (O.S.)
What?

Genius.

ZPM RATING: