Bionic Woman VS Journeyman, Round 2
Monday, October 15, 2007 at 12:33pm by GeekBoyI finally got myself caught up with the first 3 episodes of both Bionic Woman and Journeyman this weekend, and I think I’ll be able to keep up with both in real time for the foreseeable future. When I posed the question last month of which one I should recap this season, the response I got wasn’t nearly as decisive as I was hoping. So for now, I’m going to take a stab at recapping both in the same post for a couple of weeks, and see which one gets more chatter.
Let’s start with an overview of the first 3 episodes of each show …
Bionic Woman is a classic story of girl (Jamie Sommers) meets boy (Will Anthros), boy gets girl pregnant, boy asks girl to marry him, rogue agent of boy’s clandestine agency hits boy and girl with a truck, girl almost dies, and boy saves girl’s life by replacing some of her blood with nanites, installing some chips in her brain, and giving her a bionic ear, eyes, arm, and legs. Then boy gets shot by rogue agent and dies — end of romance. Further complicating the equation are Jamie’s bratty sister, Miguel Ferrer’s incessant cynicism, and Sarah Corvus, the first bionic woman, played by Katie Sackhoff with pitch-perfect crazy, desperate, dangerous precision. There are some other main characters, but they’re all kind of boring to me — the icy blonde woman, the Asian martial arts guy who’s in love with Sarah, whoever Isaiah Washington is supposed to be, and the forgettable IT dude who upkeeps Jamie’s bionics.
The show is dark, both literally and figuratively. Lots of black clothes, scenes at night, scenes in bars, scenes that take place in poorly lit windowless rooms of the Wolf’s Creek facility. Figuratively, there are all these dead people weighing down the storyline — Will, Jamie’s mom, Sarah’s sister, the 14 agents that Sarah killed, 200+ people in the town that gets gassed by some terrorists. And did I mention Miguel Ferrer’s incessant cynicism? The happy-fun scenes between Jamie and her sister seem obtrusive somehow, and the closest thing to an active romance is Sarah & Jae — and considering that Jae once “killed” Sarah, that one is dysfunctional at best. And what are we supposed to make of the fact that Will kept a dossier on Jamie for 2 years before he met her? Creepy.
Still not sure if I care about these characters yet, and that may eventually keep me from sticking with the show long-term. Even the dangers these people are saving the world from seem two-dimensional. But I’ll give it till the mid-season break and let the current plot arc play out before I decide. I just have a hard time believing there’s a plot twist coming that will really surprise me all that much.
Journeyman is a classic story of boy meets girl, boy dates girl, girl disappears and is presumed dead, boy steals his brother’s girl, boy marries that girl, boy starts jumping around in time, and boy learns that the first girl has also been jumping around in time. And really, it’s as simple as that. The main cast is minimal — Dan the time jumper, his amazingly understanding wife Katie, his cop brother Jack, and his ex-fiancee (also a time jumper) Livia.
Through exposition in the most recent episode, we learn that Dan has overcome a gambling addiction and that his boss Hugh has overcome a drinking problem. And details like this seem to establish a tone of redemption for the show. The jumps that Dan makes sometimes literally force him to look at who he used to be, and force him to reflect on both himself and his marriage. Complicating this process is the fact that his not-dead ex Livia keeps popping up at some point during every one of his jumps, being mysterious, making it hard for him to concentrate on the task at hand, and indirectly creating rifts with his wife.
This show is light where Bionic Woman is dark — again both figuratively and literally. Lots of daylight scenes, and most of the sets have tall ceilings and/or lots of windows. The relationship between Dan and his wife (and their son) is a central plot point, and despite their difficulties, the tone is always positive. To punctuate this, in the first episode, Dan follows a man through time and ultimately prevents him from killing his own wife and child in a fit of jealousy — the child goes on to become a doctor and save lives. In the second episode, Dan helps deliver a baby girl on a plane, and follows her through time, indirectly causing her to donate bone marrow to a pilot who now flies humanitarian missions. In the third episode, Dan jumps repeatedly to 1989, the day of the big San Francisco earthquake, and saves the life of a lawyer who now defends wrongly accused convicts. So it’s kind of a “pay it forward” theme — helping people who help other people.
So far, I have to say, I’m enjoying Journeyman a bit more than Bionic Woman. The characters are better developed and more sympathetic, and I get the impression that there are some interesting plot surprises awaiting us in the coming months. And while I have no problem watching a “dark” show — Battlestar Galactica rules! — I’m not convinced that it works for BW tonally. It seems a bit put on. “We’re saving the world. But we’re really broody and serious and cynical (Miguel Ferrer) and we listen to The Cure and we don’t really know why we’re saving the world, because life sucks.” On the other end of the spectrum, it’s very easy to accuse Journeyman of being too optimistic and hopeful. And maybe it is. But so far, it works for me.
1. Pammysue said ( Monday, October 15, 2007 at 3:52 pm )
I totally agree with your assesments on both shows. It took me about 30minutes into Journeyman to even grasp what was going on, I almost shut it off, but I am glad I stuck with it, because I think it has a lot of potential. Plus I really liked Kevin McKidd in Rome so I hope this does well for him.
2. Jason said ( Monday, October 15, 2007 at 4:59 pm )
I’m into Journeyman. I didn’t think I would like it as much as I do but the quality of the way it’s shot and the acting is pretty solid, plus, conceptually, it isn’t paint by numbers. It’s like Cold Case but with less exposition and more action.
I’m thumbs down on Bionic Woman at this point and have replaced it with Criminal Minds in my Wednesday lineup after last week’s episode. The concept is promising but it lacks…something. Even Katee Sackoff’s wonderfully over the top acting in this can’t quite save it. The secret government organization feels campy. Sarah Corvus seems far too complex in a not-complex world. And, most importantly, the actress playing Jamie Sommers isn’t nearly compelling enough.
I’m not rooting for her at all.
3. Greater Czarina said ( Tuesday, October 16, 2007 at 7:51 am )
I’m hopping on the Disappointed train with all of y’all regarding BW. I can’t watch an episode without sighing, “If only Katee were playing Jamie.” They made a big mistake casting the competent but unthrilling Jamie and then putting such a dynamo as Starbionic opposite her to accentuate how unthrilling she is.
I’m glad to hear Journeyman is better than I first thought it would be, but I don’t think I’m going to add it to my roster of shows. That’s already too full this season, and I just don’t have the energy for another series with, as bunnies say, mysteries and surprises.
4. Jack said ( Tuesday, October 16, 2007 at 6:00 pm )
Episodes 2 & 3 of BW sit unwatched on my Tivo. I haven’t really had time to watch them, but I haven’t made time either, which probably isn’t a good sign for my long-term relationship with Jamie Sommers.
Maybe they should bring back Lindsay Wagner?
5. Michael said ( Tuesday, October 16, 2007 at 9:15 pm )
And fembots?
GC, great use of “as bunnies say”!
I have a question about Journeyman. Dan is tethered to the present day in 2007. He jumps back in time (only BACK so far), but always returns to now and his family. What about Livia? She doesn’t know about present day Dan’s life, so she doesn’t exist past a certain point in time? Before she was with Dan she was jumping, and then she said it stopped for a while, and then when her plane crashed she wasn’t seen again. Is she tethered to some point prior to that? Or untethered? Will Dan be cut loose at some point? I know we don’t know, but I’m wondering about any thoughts y’all have.
6. GeekBoy said ( Wednesday, October 17, 2007 at 9:05 am )
Michael, with the caveat that I still haven’t watched Monday’s episode yet, I’ll say that I’m equally curious about the “physics” behind Dan’s & Livia’s jumps. There’s certainly some kind of structure to it that we’re not aware of yet, and I’m really hoping that the writers know what that structure is. I can’t imagine they wouldn’t, in this day and age.
A lot depends on the nature of why and how they jump. For instance, do they really both have the potential to jump backward or forward at will, but because they’re still new to it, they’re limited by their imaginations? My guess (based on nothing but conjecture) is that Livia used to have a “tether” as well, but grew out of it. It would make for a dramatic season finale to have Dan become untethered, and for him to realize that he can no longer live up to the promise he made to his wife in the pilot that he’ll “always come back” to her.
For now, I’m happy that we’re not getting too many answers. I like having the mystery play out as slowly for us as it really would for Dan.
7. Michael said ( Wednesday, October 17, 2007 at 9:18 am )
I get the sense that always coming back to his 2007 life is like training wheels and that eventually he’ll be untethered (whether he likes it or not?)
Monday was GOOD, I thought. Get watching! And recapping. You have to do Journeyman.
8. Michael said ( Wednesday, October 17, 2007 at 10:06 am )
There’s a new wrinkle!
9. Jason said ( Wednesday, October 17, 2007 at 1:22 pm )
Monday’s episode was very good. And, without hitting us over the head, added to the sci-fi geekery of the show. They pack an awful lot in in an hour on that show. And I really like that Dan’s life is falling apart because he can’t control the when of the time travel and that he loses equivalent(?) time in the present.
10. Michael said ( Wednesday, October 17, 2007 at 3:49 pm )
And it’s not always equivalent, right? I thought I remembered that from one of the episodes?
11. GeekBoy said ( Wednesday, October 17, 2007 at 4:04 pm )
Yeah, in last week’s episode, he made a point of telling his wife that he lost a disproportionate amount of current time compared to how long he was in the other timeline.
Which makes me think all the more that the tethering is a limitation on Dan’s part — that maybe he’s subconsciously “bookmarking” where he is before he jumps, and thinks he needs to lose time, because his brain couldn’t process the time jumps otherwise? But sometimes, his subconscious gets the math wrong.
If the show is a metaphor, then it would be interesting to find out that Dan was responsible for his own time losses and all of the indirect life dilemmas caused by them.