Eureka, Season 5, Episode 6: "Worst Case Scenario" answers the question: “Is there ever a good time for ‘premature evacuation?’”
Spoiler Alert!!
The best parts of “Worst Case Scenario” aren’t the simulated disasters, the gas attacks, the drones getting all up in people’s grilles. Rather, the best part is that Douglas Fargo (Neil Grayston) finds out that Dr. Holly Marten (Felicia Day) is still alive and kickin’ it inside of Beverley Barlow’s computer simulation, all of which gives Douglas Fargo (Neil Grayston) a case of computer stimulation. He gets to visit her, but in true Eureka fashion, only in bite sized segments. How fitting. Visitus Interuptus.
Now I ask you: Is Superman ever really dead? How about Batman, or Green Lantern, or Sherlock Holmes, or Doc Savage, or Captain America, or even friggin’ Ron Paul, Lassie, or Rin Tin Tin?
No.
The characters are too valuable, to the comic, novel, TV show, or movie. And to their fans, as well.
So to the great credit of Eureka's crack team of writers, neither is Holly dead.
She’s too damned valuable. The love interest to end all love interests.
And that makes my heart go all flippy floppy. Why? Because the world won’t spin correctly in its orbit until Fargo and Holly are reunited, regardless of whether it is in the real world (and just what IS the real world, anyway?) or in the simulated world of the Global Dynamics mainframe computer. While it might matter to the legions of fans of the Fargo/Holly thing, the fact is that we’ve grown accustomed to their face(s) in the show and the fact that their love is purer than pure. We’d grow comfortable to them being together regardless of whether it was real or simulated.
But if anyone out there in readership land is like me, and who wouldn’t like to be like that?, then we all hope they get together in a way where they can share some face time with all the zany inhabitants of Global Dynamics. IMHO, that would be the happiest of happy endings.
What happened in the rest of the show, you might ask? Really, who cares? Disaster simulations to wrong, forcing everyone to figure stuff out in a prescribed number of stress filled minutes, eventually coming to the right conclusion with just enough seconds on the clock to avoid a warp core breach, or a reactor meltdown, or a serious case of the intergalactic heebie-jeebies.
The love story is what counts, and that includes the wonderfully quick resolution of the Allison / Jo deception (where Jo approached Jack, who is actually Allison in Jack’s body via the Episode 5 body swapping plot device, and asked him/her: “Well, Jack, did you really ever have the hots for me like I did for you?” and threatened, jealous Allison, inside Jack’s brain, says, ”Well, actually no …”) was really well received on the part of this reviewer. I was not, and I mean NOT, looking forward to spending even a modest half paragraph within subsequent reviews trying to keep track of how this wrinkle was going to be ironed between the Jo/Jack/Allison triangle. It was simply smashing that Jo stood up at the diner at the end of the episode and did a full on mea culpa without ever admitting to anyone (except Allison) what it was really all about.
So “Worst Case Scenario” was a very well rounded episode that offered scope beyond the rather mundane been-there done-that kind of stuff. It emphatically set in motion a plot thread that will keep ardent fans dialing in Syfy on Monday nights for the remainder of the season (take a clue from next week’s trailer, mon ami), and will probably bring new fans to the show for a last minute stretch run.
Oh, in case you really need to know, the answer is no to: “Is there ever a good time for “premature evacuation?’” Check out the episode to see why that phrase is so seriously funny coming out of Jack’s pie hole. You’ll crack up, too.
Tom Carroll is a writer and artist who has worked in video games, online media, and comic books. Most recently he worked for Interplay Entertainment (Giants: Citizen Kabuto for PS2) and Rockstar San Diego (Midnight Club series and Red Dead Redemption). He wrote P.O.D.: The Nexus (2008, Zondervan Press, a division of Harper-Collins), and has his own comic property, The Gun Nose Chronicles, in development. He currently writes for Game Developer magazine and Comics Bulletin.