Timeless 2.3: Orson, Hedy, and Lucy

A thoroughly satisfying Timeless 2.3 tonight, which featured, among other good things: Orson Welles (or, at least Citizen Kane), Hedy Lamarr, Lucy singing "You Made Me Love You," Lucy and Wyatt finally together, Flynn out of prison via an inter-temporal gambit, and a surprise ending I won't mention until the end in case you don't like spoilers (which, by the way, were mentioned, literally, in this fine episode - as was, come to think it, "fake news," too).

Now Lucy and Wyatt finally in bed together is something that's almost happened a bunch of times already, so that was no big surprise.  But it was nice to see, anyway.  And the same for Flynn out of prison, but it happening via time travel - or, at least, the means of his escape - was a nice touch, too.

But Lucy singing and therein declaring her love to Wyatt was unexpected and great.  Kudos to Abigail Spencer for singing the part, and don't tell me it wasn't really her singing, I won't believe you.  And Orson Welles, even though we didn't actually see him, is a worthy subject of any tine travel story (I thought this so much that I made him the central character of the third novelette in my Ian's Ions and Eons series.)

And now to the ending:  after Wyatt and Lucy make tender love which left both happy and even more in love, what does Timeless do?  It somehow allows Wyatt to find his lost - as in deceased - love.  Very much alive.  Poor Lucy!

But, hey, this makes for a good story.  And we also have some significant developments with Jiya, which I didn't mention in the first paragraph because I wasn't sure what they meant.  A doctor tells her off-camera that she's in fine condition - in better condition, even, then before she started having the visions of the future and passing out, because she had a heart murmur before then which is now gone.  But is Jiya telling the truth?  I think so.  Was her doctor telling her the truth (and who was he or her)?  Impossible to say, because we didn't see this doctor.

So ... though Timeless made some great progress with Lucy and Wyatt, the future is by no means bright for them, and Jiya is more unknown in her future than ever.  I'll be back after the next episode to tell you what I think about where this series - now undeniably much better than in its first season - goes with all of this.

See also Timeless 2.1: "Mein Kampf, by Philip K. Dick" ... Timeless 2.2: The Nod

And see also Timeless 1.1: Threading the Needle ... Timeless 1.2: Small Change, Big Payoffs ... Timeless 1.3: Judith Campbell ... Timeless 1.4: Skyfall and Weapon of Choice ... Timeless 1.5: and Quantum Leap ... Timeless 1.6: Watergate and Rittenhouse ... Timeless 1.7: Stranded! ... Timeless 1.8: Time and Space ... Timeless 1.9: The Kiss and The Key ... Timeless 1.10: The End in the Middle ... Timeless 1.11: Edison, Ford, Morgan, Houdini, and Holmes (No, Not Sherlock)! ... Timeless 1.12: Incandescent West ... Timeless 1.13: Meeting, Mating, and Predictability ... Timeless 1.14: Paris in the 20s ... Timeless 1.15: Touched! .... Timeless 1.16: A Real Grandfather Paradox Story

Timeless 1.1: Threading the Needle

Hey, it's not easy to do time-travel, even pretty well, without being trite, too easy, on the one hand, or original and true to the intensity of paradox to the point of incomprehensibility, on the other.  If your characters are traveling to the past, do you allow them to change it?  If so, with what consequences for the present - what consequences that allow the travelers to go to the past in the first place, to change what their change of history has now already changed?  And, if nothing changes, or not much, you better make the story of how this happened still riveting enough to make it worth the viewing or the read.

Timeless, which debuted on NBC on tonight, threaded this needle pretty well.  The only arbitrary aspect of the set-up to make it all work, and keep the characters on track, was the stipulation that you can't travel back into a time in which you're alive, lest you run into yourself and cause all kinds of havoc in the time-space fabric.  This is a standard ploy - I've used it in some of my own stories - and I think every story is allowed at least one arbitrary convention, as long as the rest works on the tightrope.

The first episode features our characters trying to do something about the Hindenburg disaster, presumably to stop it from exploding after its transAtlantic journey in New Jersey, in 1937.  In a well-spun story that keeps you sufficiently off-kilter, something does stop the explosion - another time-traveler bent on doing far more damage to America in history by blowing up the Hindenburg on its return voyage to Germany, and with it some people to America's upcoming Second World War effort.

The good guys - actually three, an agent, a scientist, and an historian (Lucy, played by Abigail Spencer, who was so good in Rectify) - do manage to save the important people on the return voyage, but not the Hindenburg, which explodes anyway, for other reasons.  A nice bow to the resilience of history to change.

There's personal loss as a result of the time travel, especially vexing to our heroes, since, again they can't travel back to a time in their own lifetimes. This rolls an excellent counterpoint to our central stories - stopping this or that major calamity, or maybe making sure it happens - the deeper personal goal of bringing back what was lost, either as a result of the time travel or for other reasons.

So we have the makings of a good series here, and I'm looking forward to more.   There are some paradoxes that are not addressed or explained away by standard moves - such as the time travelers having recollections of what they changed (hey, that's a second arbitrary construct) - but it's impossible to do time travel without them, and at least they're mentioned or otherwise indicated in Timeless, rather than ignored.

Rectify: Sheer and Shattering Poetry

My wife and I saw the first four episodes of Rectify on the Sundance Channel last night, and found it one of the most extraordinary reels of television to come down the pike in years.

The basic story is about the release of Daniel Holden from death row after 19 years.  His release, based on DNA evidence, is a "vacated" verdict, which means he can be brought up on the same murder charges again (double jeopardy does not apply for vacated verdicts).  This would be a powerful story in itself, as Holden's lawyer Jon Stern (played by Luke Kirby of Tell Me You Love Me) and his sister Amantha (played by Abigail Spencer of Mad Men fame) square off against law enforcement who are still convinced that Holden is guilty, and intent on putting him on death row again.

But the real payoff in Rectify is the care it takes and the depth it offers in showing the impact on Holden of being locked out of the real world for 19 years.  This ranges to obvious things like not being confortable with smartphones to subtler but even more profound losses like not being aware of seasons and the pleasures of rain on a hot summer's day when you're locked away.   The dialog and acting in these scenes are sheer poetry, and Aden Young as Holden gives a quietly tour-de-force performance.

He's highly intelligent, and, due to time in prison with nothing else to do, incredibly well read.  His explanation of St. Thomas Aquinas and his attempt to reconcile - or rectify - the material and the spiritual worlds was as spot-on as you'd find in any philosophy class.   The writers deserve kudos for this level of erudition rarely if ever seen on television.

Holden is also a fascinating disquisition for anyone interested in the likely psychological impact of being frozen in prison for 19 years - locked away when was just a senior in high school.   He's most comfortable riding a bicycle and listening to music 19 years or more older, on cassettes.   He has to learn how to feel about being touched - after gravitating from the revulsion he felt for that in prison to a part of him even wanting that, because he was only human, and yet he nonetheless felt guilty about.   The dialog and the acting for these scenes are as also sheer poetry and philosophy, but on a scaldingly personal level that will touch your soul.

In a television world of cops and spies and villains and heros, Rectify is a series which transcends and shatters these genres and tells a kind of a story you've never seen before.

  


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