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Gretchen Egolf in JOURNEYMAN - SEASON 1 - "Year of the Rabbit"
Television:
Review: JOURNEYMAN - SEASON ONE - 'The Year of the Rabbit'
In 1995, Dan helps a woman on a blind date, though he can't help his own marriage
Grade: AStars: Kevin McKidd, Gretchen Egolf, Moon Bloodgood, Reed Diamond, Charlie Wyson, Brian Howe, Brittany Ishibashi, Matthew Humphrey
Writer(s): Joan Binder Weiss
Director: Laura Innes
Release Date: 10/15/07
Rating: TV-14
By TONY WHITT, Contributing Editor
Published 10/22/2007
Things are tense between Dan and Katie since she discovered that he’s seen Livia in the past, and they’re not helped by the fact that she’s organizing a major charity event and needs him there. Despite all this, he still finds himself back in 1995, helping a woman go through with a blind date, though he soon discovers that the blind date may have put her in more danger than she’d have been in otherwise.
I have to say, I’m coming to the conclusion that JOURNEYMAN is one of the best shows of the season, especially when it can produce episodes like this. I’m also sure it’ll be annoying to us later when we’re trying to explain to friends or relatives who have seen later episodes (‘No, no, this is before he knew about that…’), but the way the larger plot details are unfolded so slowly makes this show as much a mystery as it is a ‘science fiction romance’, or whatever it is that NBC has been calling it.
In this episode, for instance, we discover that there actually is someone or something behind Dan and Livia’s time travel. Dan starts looking into the theory of tachyons, which puts him in touch with a researcher named Elliot Langley, and one of the loveliest bits of this episode comes when Dan gets his second call from the professor – while he’s in the past, and on his old cell phone. That’s all we get – but as far as getting us to stay tuned for next week’s episode, that’s also all we need.
What’s also refreshing is how confident this show has been right off to bat at being playful with the time travel element. In the teaser, Dan seemingly wakes up in a church in the past, but he has a wrench with him. It takes us all the way to the end of the teaser to find out exactly why the wrench is with him, and the payoff is well worth it. And at one point the ‘present-day’ Livia runs interference with the 1998 version of Katie so that she doesn’t see him, a move that wouldn’t have worked had they tried it further back in time – as it is, Katie points out that Livia’s ‘new look’ makes her look more ‘mature’.
But the real pleasure from this episode comes in the way the writers make it clear that, as cool as traveling back in time might sound, having no control over it is having serious repercussions on Dan’s life, from nearly being arrested for carrying a gun that’s he brought back from the past to slowly losing his wife to her former boyfriend, his complete jerk of a brother. When it comes down to it, it’s never the past that’s the important thing in JOURNEYMAN, it’s the present - as it should be.
Next week: Dan ‘leaps’ at the worst possible moment – while he’s alone in public with his young son. Hoo boy.
I have to say, I’m coming to the conclusion that JOURNEYMAN is one of the best shows of the season, especially when it can produce episodes like this. I’m also sure it’ll be annoying to us later when we’re trying to explain to friends or relatives who have seen later episodes (‘No, no, this is before he knew about that…’), but the way the larger plot details are unfolded so slowly makes this show as much a mystery as it is a ‘science fiction romance’, or whatever it is that NBC has been calling it.
In this episode, for instance, we discover that there actually is someone or something behind Dan and Livia’s time travel. Dan starts looking into the theory of tachyons, which puts him in touch with a researcher named Elliot Langley, and one of the loveliest bits of this episode comes when Dan gets his second call from the professor – while he’s in the past, and on his old cell phone. That’s all we get – but as far as getting us to stay tuned for next week’s episode, that’s also all we need.
What’s also refreshing is how confident this show has been right off to bat at being playful with the time travel element. In the teaser, Dan seemingly wakes up in a church in the past, but he has a wrench with him. It takes us all the way to the end of the teaser to find out exactly why the wrench is with him, and the payoff is well worth it. And at one point the ‘present-day’ Livia runs interference with the 1998 version of Katie so that she doesn’t see him, a move that wouldn’t have worked had they tried it further back in time – as it is, Katie points out that Livia’s ‘new look’ makes her look more ‘mature’.
But the real pleasure from this episode comes in the way the writers make it clear that, as cool as traveling back in time might sound, having no control over it is having serious repercussions on Dan’s life, from nearly being arrested for carrying a gun that’s he brought back from the past to slowly losing his wife to her former boyfriend, his complete jerk of a brother. When it comes down to it, it’s never the past that’s the important thing in JOURNEYMAN, it’s the present - as it should be.
Next week: Dan ‘leaps’ at the worst possible moment – while he’s alone in public with his young son. Hoo boy.
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