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- Journeyman Episode 109 Review -- "Blowback"
Journeyman Episode 109 Review -- "Blowback"
- By Jason Toomey
- Published 12/1/2007
- Journeyman
-
Rating:
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]
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Overview:
Things pick up right where they left off last week, as the kidnapper Dan put away (Aeden Bennett) comes looking for revenge. Dan is shot in the shoulder in the opening minutes and narrowly escapes a second, likely fatal shot by journeying back to the past--unfortunately leaving Bennett alone in his house.
After a quick trip to a 1980 hospital, Dan finds himself desperately trying to help a seemingly neglected boy so he can return back to the present before Bennett can do any more damage. He soon learns, however, that the young boy is actually Bennett just beginning the dark journey of abuse that will lead to the events we witnessed in last week's episode (Emily).
In the present, Bennett grows tired of waiting for Dan to return and finds a way to trick an unsuspecting Katie into returning home. She soon finds herself a hostage struggling to find a way to explain Dan's disappearance.
Guilt ridden, Dan struggles with the obvious solution to the problem (in 1980, Aeden is a bit more defenseless) as he tries to understand why he has been sent back in the first place. Livia moves around in time, and at one point finds herself in the present where she enlists Jack's help, proving to him once and for all that Dan is not out of his mind.
In the midst of all this, Jack and Hugh discover that our mysterious FBI agent has gone rogue, and his investigation on Dan is something less than official. As Jack presses him, we discover that the FBI agent isn’t so much interested in solving a decades-old bank robbery as he is in tracking down a time traveler. This all seems to become a moot point, however, as the agent is shot to death in the next scene (by Bennett) when he storms into the Vassers' home looking for Dan.
In the end, Dan returns back home, not having found a way to save Aedan from the abuse he will suffer growing up but having learned enough of the boy hiding in his room in the past to talk some sense into the man with the gun in the present. Ultimately, this week is about Dan putting right all he set wrong last week and learning that his trips won't always quite wrap up with a nice, neat bow--or Spider-findeR screen shot--in the end.
Thoughts:
Any inkings left that these trips into the past (or the future, in Livia's case) are in any way random have been finally dispelled this week. Whatever (or whoever?) is guiding Dan and Livia through time, seemed to be intent on giving Dan a chance to fix his mistakes this week, as Dan's trip back seemed to serve no other purpose. I was pleasantly surprised that Dan didn't find a way to save Bennett's childhood in order to fix everything. Leaving things as they were really fit the theme that, despite his best intentions, most things are to be left unchanged. Of course this raises the weighted question: just who is deciding what should and should not be changed?
Journeyman played like the second half of a two parter this week, and I loved that there was no real "putting right what once when wrong task." In the first few minutes, as it became obvious just who the strange boy was, I worried that we'd spend forty minutes watching Dan save him only to discover in the end who he was really helping. I guess that would have worked, but it just felt...cheap.
I gave the writers a little mental high-five, though, when Dan found the envelope early in the episode, and it became clear that they weren't taking such a predictable path.
Still, even with what we knew of the situation, watching Dan seriously contemplate just killing Aeden in 1980 and being done with it was beyond dark. I found those scenes disturbing, but I think they did well to communicate the real urgency of the situation. And the fact that there was nothing to be done to save Aeden--or perhaps I should say nothing that should have been done to save him--went a long way toward setting the tone of the world Journeyman is building.
I was thrilled to discover that the FBI agent was interested in more than the McCleen cash. His rambling tirade to Jack as he dropped any pretense of an official investigation was chilling. Although it seems we've likely seen the last of him (in the present, at least), I doubt this will be the end of this plot line. A semi-secret organization less than pleased with all of this timeline meddling is exactly what I'd be writing into this--not that I'm looking to cross any picket lines, mind you, but still.
I'm also so happy to see Jack finally onboard, seemingly for good this time. Ever since Keepers, I've just not been able to look at him as a "bad guy," even with all his talking to the Feds. My guess is Katie will find herself a little less alone through Dan's disappearances as the weeks go on.
Livia's quiet acceptance of all of this (insisting that Dan is being given a chance to "learn a lesson" and that he needs to focus on his "mission") is interesting. She almost plays the role of the jaded old prisoner, helping the new guy learn to just accept things and go with the flow. This seems especially true of her theory that her entire relationship with Dan was just a mission. I wondered this week just how much she's done wrong in the past, and just what these "much worse" outcomes were.
Not to be pessimistic, but was anyone else concerned by the "in two weeks" tagline on the rather generic previews for the next episode? I am wondering if the WGA strike is coming home to our little version of San Francisco. Good luck to those writers if that is the case. For myself, I'm happy to wait for new episodes if it means they can return to the writing room on fair terms.
Great Moments:
Things pick up right where they left off last week, as the kidnapper Dan put away (Aeden Bennett) comes looking for revenge. Dan is shot in the shoulder in the opening minutes and narrowly escapes a second, likely fatal shot by journeying back to the past--unfortunately leaving Bennett alone in his house.
After a quick trip to a 1980 hospital, Dan finds himself desperately trying to help a seemingly neglected boy so he can return back to the present before Bennett can do any more damage. He soon learns, however, that the young boy is actually Bennett just beginning the dark journey of abuse that will lead to the events we witnessed in last week's episode (Emily).
In the present, Bennett grows tired of waiting for Dan to return and finds a way to trick an unsuspecting Katie into returning home. She soon finds herself a hostage struggling to find a way to explain Dan's disappearance.
Guilt ridden, Dan struggles with the obvious solution to the problem (in 1980, Aeden is a bit more defenseless) as he tries to understand why he has been sent back in the first place. Livia moves around in time, and at one point finds herself in the present where she enlists Jack's help, proving to him once and for all that Dan is not out of his mind.
In the midst of all this, Jack and Hugh discover that our mysterious FBI agent has gone rogue, and his investigation on Dan is something less than official. As Jack presses him, we discover that the FBI agent isn’t so much interested in solving a decades-old bank robbery as he is in tracking down a time traveler. This all seems to become a moot point, however, as the agent is shot to death in the next scene (by Bennett) when he storms into the Vassers' home looking for Dan.
In the end, Dan returns back home, not having found a way to save Aedan from the abuse he will suffer growing up but having learned enough of the boy hiding in his room in the past to talk some sense into the man with the gun in the present. Ultimately, this week is about Dan putting right all he set wrong last week and learning that his trips won't always quite wrap up with a nice, neat bow--or Spider-findeR screen shot--in the end.
Thoughts:
Any inkings left that these trips into the past (or the future, in Livia's case) are in any way random have been finally dispelled this week. Whatever (or whoever?) is guiding Dan and Livia through time, seemed to be intent on giving Dan a chance to fix his mistakes this week, as Dan's trip back seemed to serve no other purpose. I was pleasantly surprised that Dan didn't find a way to save Bennett's childhood in order to fix everything. Leaving things as they were really fit the theme that, despite his best intentions, most things are to be left unchanged. Of course this raises the weighted question: just who is deciding what should and should not be changed?
Journeyman played like the second half of a two parter this week, and I loved that there was no real "putting right what once when wrong task." In the first few minutes, as it became obvious just who the strange boy was, I worried that we'd spend forty minutes watching Dan save him only to discover in the end who he was really helping. I guess that would have worked, but it just felt...cheap.
Still, even with what we knew of the situation, watching Dan seriously contemplate just killing Aeden in 1980 and being done with it was beyond dark. I found those scenes disturbing, but I think they did well to communicate the real urgency of the situation. And the fact that there was nothing to be done to save Aeden--or perhaps I should say nothing that should have been done to save him--went a long way toward setting the tone of the world Journeyman is building.
I was thrilled to discover that the FBI agent was interested in more than the McCleen cash. His rambling tirade to Jack as he dropped any pretense of an official investigation was chilling. Although it seems we've likely seen the last of him (in the present, at least), I doubt this will be the end of this plot line. A semi-secret organization less than pleased with all of this timeline meddling is exactly what I'd be writing into this--not that I'm looking to cross any picket lines, mind you, but still.
I'm also so happy to see Jack finally onboard, seemingly for good this time. Ever since Keepers, I've just not been able to look at him as a "bad guy," even with all his talking to the Feds. My guess is Katie will find herself a little less alone through Dan's disappearances as the weeks go on.
Livia's quiet acceptance of all of this (insisting that Dan is being given a chance to "learn a lesson" and that he needs to focus on his "mission") is interesting. She almost plays the role of the jaded old prisoner, helping the new guy learn to just accept things and go with the flow. This seems especially true of her theory that her entire relationship with Dan was just a mission. I wondered this week just how much she's done wrong in the past, and just what these "much worse" outcomes were.
Not to be pessimistic, but was anyone else concerned by the "in two weeks" tagline on the rather generic previews for the next episode? I am wondering if the WGA strike is coming home to our little version of San Francisco. Good luck to those writers if that is the case. For myself, I'm happy to wait for new episodes if it means they can return to the writing room on fair terms.
Great Moments:
- Livia and Jack's scene in the elevator...HAWESOME. Pure, 180 proof, HAWESOME.
- Dan disappearing at just the right moment to escape Bennett in the kitchen seemed like something right out of Heroes. Though I realize, obviously, that escaping into the past was involuntary on Dan's part, I don't believe the timing was merely a coincidence.
- Livia and Dan's conversation about their relationship being just a "mission" was brilliantly done. Watching both of them try and convince themselves to accept her theory--along with all that it would imply about the two of them--was touching. It also reinforced to me, again, that these two will end up together in the end.
- "Now you are either gonna die from a lethal injection or my brother over there is going to blow your head off." This was such a great way to show Jack finally onboard, and it was nice to see the Vasser boys working together for once. I hope this foreshadows more direct involvement from Jack in future episodes.
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Article Series
This article is part 2 of a 3 part series. Other articles in this series are shown below:
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Journeyman Episode 109 Review -- "Blowback"
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Comments
Comment #1 (Posted by Jack Yan)
Rating:
One of the best reviews of this episode, echoing my own sentiments. Let’s hope Journeyman continues beyond its 13th episode, somehow. (Let’s all watch an old one on nbc.com when Life is on this Monday.)