Surfing SF: Eureka – “The Story of O2″

Eureka spoilers of an indeterminate nature are about to get you high…

On the surface, this week’s Eureka episode is so slight it threatens to blow away in the wind. However, the lack of a real solid story to anchor our interest is somewhat mitigated because the episode’s heart is really in the smaller character moments. I was reminded why the show has never really made me take it seriously before, while at the same time the elements that are starting to make me take it seriously were in evidence as well.

The themes here continue to center on our time travels dealing with how things have changed, or in this case perhaps its better to say have not changed. Jo is desperately trying to prove Zane is still the guy she fell for, and she’s given a ray of hope in the end. Briefly. Allison is finding she has no idea how to be a parent to a normal teenage boy, and discovering it can be just as hard as parenting an autistic teenage boy. And Carter is heading off to Harvard to visit Zoe. It was nice to see Jordan Hinson again (though her hair is no longer colorful! Unacceptable…), but this was the biggest let-down. I realize that the point of the storyline was to keep Colin Ferguson away from the main action so he could direct the episode, but in the end I was left with, “So… you brought her back so that she could chase after an invisible cat in a bathroom for seven minutes of the episode?” And while it was fun to play with expectations (ours and Carter’s), spending the episode wondering what would be different about her to find there really isn’t anything, I was left thinking it would have been better for them to actually change something about her to keep my interest.

The other bothersome part of all this was how much the plot hinged on smart people doing incredibly stupid things. Allison putting oxygenating fluid in her kid’s rocket. Carter not calling ahead of time for no reason except to create an artificial conflict, Larry not putting a destruct mechanism on his rocket, and while we’re on the subject, the very dumb rocket race around the moon, which just felt like needless begging for trouble from these people. Still, we got enough smaller moments to keep me going through a near-total failure to construct a plot.

Bits:

-Who on the writing staff decided that this would be “Let’s Torture Jo Year”? What was the point of blowing up her house? I hope what comes out of this is that she moves in with Carter and they end up making out. I would be okay with that.

-Fargo actually came off pretty well in his commander job here. It’s nice to see the development of his character this year, because before I was getting so that I couldn’t stand him, regardless of how big a Buffy fan he is.

-The random elephant in the room in this episode was Deputy Andy being played by Kavan Smith out of nowhere (and it sounds like he won’t be back next week, either). I’ll bet there’s a story here. Smith did a decent job, though.

-And we come to Jamie Kennedy’s three scenes, in which he essentially played his character from Malibu’s Most Wanted as a scientist. I guess all I can say is that he didn’t overstay his welcome. It’s hard to find stunt casting more gratuitous than this.

So were you happier with this week’s episode than I? Sound off!

About Dan

Dan Joslyn grew up in Ohio but now lives in Las Vegas, NV with his lovely ginger girlfriend, Tiarra, where he works as an office monkey. He enjoys reviewing movies and television for the site, and over-analyzing such things. He may be the Chosen One… but he probably isn’t.

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