Journeyman Episode 5 Review -- "The Legend of Dylan McCleen"
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Jason Toomey
A talented--though still aspiring--fantasy novelist, Jason spends many hours a day lost in dark, tumultuous worlds filled with magic, adventure, and cute sword wielding girls. Born the humble son of a shipper, his affinity for math paved the way for his ascension to dual-class Engineer/Writer (levels 20 and 25, respectively), allowing him to pay the mortgage as a technical writer while he awaits the publishing deal that will one day declare him, once and for all, the Pumpkin King. [Jason's Blog] By Jason Toomey
Published on 10/26/2007
Dan's involuntary trips through time become something more than an inconvenience this week as they begin to interfere with his ability to care for his son (spoilers beneath cut)...
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Overview:
Dan's involuntary trips through time become something more than an inconvenience this week as they begin to interfere with his ability to care for his son. While the whole "Zack is lost at the fair!" plot that was teased in the previews is (thankfully) only the focus of the first few minutes of the episode, The Legend of Dylan McCleen has a very Cats In the Cradle theme as Dan explores both his relationship with his own--we learn mostly absent--father and with his son.
Taking another page from our world's actual history for the second time this week, Dan's "putting right what once went wrong" task is to aid the mysterious skydiving bank robber, Dylan McCleen--known to most of my generation through a particularly memorable episode of Unsolved Mysteries and apparently known from now on to you kids as that guy from the fifth episode of Journeyman.
The episode starts off a little slow, spending a worrying amount of time in the past dealing with Dylan and his efforts to rescue the family that nursed him back to health behind enemy lines in Cambodia. But it all pays off a little before the half hour mark, when we discover--through Livia's quiet coaching--that Dan is going to have to enlist the help of his father to get through this one.
We see an interesting dichotomy of sorts this week. Dan's frustration at failing to be there for his son is underscored by his own father's glib attitude toward putting his career ahead of his family. "Comes with the job," his father says with a mischievous, almost cheerful tone as Dan shifts uncomfortably in the seat in front of him. It's a very nice bit of characterization, and another example of the disciplined writing we're seeing in this show.
The episode introduces the complicated wrinkle standard to nearly all time travel stories--with the notable exception of Back to the Future--the kid. While Dan (I am suspecting) will grow to accept that his feelings for Livia never went away and that perhaps Katie really should be with Jack (his brother), putting right what once went wrong in his own life will mean sending little Zack off into the ether.
While Dan's away repairing the past, Katie is struggling to hold the present together. It seems Dan's ill timed return to the present--waving a gun in the air in the street near a recent robbery--isn't going away. Katie does her best to keep the police at bay, not helped in the least by Dan's unexplained absence and Jack's lack of faith in his brother. The situation is hardly helped as Dan returns home at the end of the episode, his pockets lined with the cash left over from Dylan's great escape.
Thoughts:
A literary agent (Rachel Vater) once gave me a brief but powerful writing lesson. A likable character making a hard, but clearly obvious, choice is boring. We all know that the hero will sacrifice himself to save the girl. Was anyone really that moved in the Poseidon Adventure remake, for example, when Kurt Russell sacrifices himself to spare his daughter's boyfriend? Sad? Sure. A little touching? Okay, maybe. Surprising and exciting? Not so much.
What is interesting, is the hero who does both: saves the girl and lives to kiss her at the end. A likable character defying fate and winning out in the end is exciting and something to cheer for. With that in mind, I wonder if Journeyman will eventually play out to this end. As the wrinkle has been introduced this week, and the stakes seemingly set, I would like to see (not right away, or even this season, obviously) Dan find a way to take some control of this time leaping and perhaps find a way to set things right for everyone without tossing little Zack into the quantum leap accelerator to vanish.
Though it was ultimately reined in as the larger issues of the episode took over, it was fun to see Dan almost enjoying his task this week. The reporter in him found an opportunity for an amazing story. I think there is a fine line between watching Dan lament every week about how hard the leaping is and watching him just accept it and go with the flow (as Sam Beckett's "swiss cheese memory" allowed him to do). I think this subtle excitement over breaking this decades old story really kept this episode on that line.
I was also very pleased by the appearance of the professor this week. He put my fantasy writer mind at ease, distinctly not slipping into a wild explanation of technobabble as he quietly hinted at the possible causes for Dan's time travel. His nonchalant act of naive professor, just trying to provide information, was almost chilling.
Great Moments:
Dan's involuntary trips through time become something more than an inconvenience this week as they begin to interfere with his ability to care for his son. While the whole "Zack is lost at the fair!" plot that was teased in the previews is (thankfully) only the focus of the first few minutes of the episode, The Legend of Dylan McCleen has a very Cats In the Cradle theme as Dan explores both his relationship with his own--we learn mostly absent--father and with his son.
Taking another page from our world's actual history for the second time this week, Dan's "putting right what once went wrong" task is to aid the mysterious skydiving bank robber, Dylan McCleen--known to most of my generation through a particularly memorable episode of Unsolved Mysteries and apparently known from now on to you kids as that guy from the fifth episode of Journeyman.
The episode starts off a little slow, spending a worrying amount of time in the past dealing with Dylan and his efforts to rescue the family that nursed him back to health behind enemy lines in Cambodia. But it all pays off a little before the half hour mark, when we discover--through Livia's quiet coaching--that Dan is going to have to enlist the help of his father to get through this one.
We see an interesting dichotomy of sorts this week. Dan's frustration at failing to be there for his son is underscored by his own father's glib attitude toward putting his career ahead of his family. "Comes with the job," his father says with a mischievous, almost cheerful tone as Dan shifts uncomfortably in the seat in front of him. It's a very nice bit of characterization, and another example of the disciplined writing we're seeing in this show.
The episode introduces the complicated wrinkle standard to nearly all time travel stories--with the notable exception of Back to the Future--the kid. While Dan (I am suspecting) will grow to accept that his feelings for Livia never went away and that perhaps Katie really should be with Jack (his brother), putting right what once went wrong in his own life will mean sending little Zack off into the ether.
While Dan's away repairing the past, Katie is struggling to hold the present together. It seems Dan's ill timed return to the present--waving a gun in the air in the street near a recent robbery--isn't going away. Katie does her best to keep the police at bay, not helped in the least by Dan's unexplained absence and Jack's lack of faith in his brother. The situation is hardly helped as Dan returns home at the end of the episode, his pockets lined with the cash left over from Dylan's great escape.
Thoughts:
A literary agent (Rachel Vater) once gave me a brief but powerful writing lesson. A likable character making a hard, but clearly obvious, choice is boring. We all know that the hero will sacrifice himself to save the girl. Was anyone really that moved in the Poseidon Adventure remake, for example, when Kurt Russell sacrifices himself to spare his daughter's boyfriend? Sad? Sure. A little touching? Okay, maybe. Surprising and exciting? Not so much.
What is interesting, is the hero who does both: saves the girl and lives to kiss her at the end. A likable character defying fate and winning out in the end is exciting and something to cheer for. With that in mind, I wonder if Journeyman will eventually play out to this end. As the wrinkle has been introduced this week, and the stakes seemingly set, I would like to see (not right away, or even this season, obviously) Dan find a way to take some control of this time leaping and perhaps find a way to set things right for everyone without tossing little Zack into the quantum leap accelerator to vanish.
Though it was ultimately reined in as the larger issues of the episode took over, it was fun to see Dan almost enjoying his task this week. The reporter in him found an opportunity for an amazing story. I think there is a fine line between watching Dan lament every week about how hard the leaping is and watching him just accept it and go with the flow (as Sam Beckett's "swiss cheese memory" allowed him to do). I think this subtle excitement over breaking this decades old story really kept this episode on that line.
I was also very pleased by the appearance of the professor this week. He put my fantasy writer mind at ease, distinctly not slipping into a wild explanation of technobabble as he quietly hinted at the possible causes for Dan's time travel. His nonchalant act of naive professor, just trying to provide information, was almost chilling.
Great Moments:
- Zack watching his father leap back into the past was just raw, non-chill filtered awesome. No other words for it. And it was nicely capped at the end with Zack telling Dan what he saw.
- I sat up straight on the couch when the professor showed up at the newspaper. His quiet, knowing explanation was chilling. Despite Dan missing it, I don’t think the audience was supposed to doubt for a second that this guy knows exactly what is going on. "I dabble in fiction myself."
- Dan's shocked, almost pained reaction to his father's glib justification of putting his job ahead of his family ("Eh, puts a roof over their heads.") was subtle, but telling. Planes to catch and bills to pay, Dan learned to walk while Frank was away. One wonders if we'll see more of Frank in future episodes.
- Jesse eagerly stepping up to play Jimmy Olson was a nice touch. I think that will go a long way toward explaining how Dan manages to keep his job through all this as Dan's trips become more and more intense.