Hasn’t Cutter read or seen any single alternate timeline story in his life?!
Synopsis with Spoilers
Cutter is still having a hard time reconciling Claudia Brown and Jenny, the new PR person working at the ARC. He spends his time staring crazily at her. When he tries to talk about it, everyone dismisses him as a nut job. All but Conner, who advises him to keep quiet.
In the Cretaceous, Helen Cutter is wounded in a fight with a Pterosaur. She heads for Steven’s flat where, instead of turning her in, he treats her wounds and, it would appear, tickles her fancy a bit.
Meanwhile, Conner looks like he’s got a bird who fancies him, which appears to be a new thing for him. So much so that he completely misses the signs that Abby might be jealous.
Before the soap opera rides gets too intractable into the story, an anomaly opens up in a high-rise office complex. Noxious fumes begin to pour out, forming an eerie mist on the floor. Inside the mist are the nasty worms that eat people.
Cutter and Stephen, who fails to mention Helen has arrived and is sleeping naked in his bed, go into the high rise and get separated by the worms.
Meanwhile, Jenny is getting her first taste of her job. She’s officious and bullying. Cutter doesn’t care for what he sees.
Cutter postulates that the mist is pre-Cambrian, perhaps earlier, atmosphere seeping in from the anomaly. He tasks Conner to find a way to clear the mist.
The mystery at the ARC deepens when Conner recognizes the so-called maintenance worker who he thought was killed (but later disappeared without a trace) in the last episode. The man is one of the soldiers at the ARC.
Conner and Abby arrive with leaf blowers to help disperse the mist. It works for short periods of time, but to clear the building, they have to get to the climate control system, which is right where the anomaly is. They take to the air vents and are able to start the venting by increasing the building temperature.
Stephen, meanwhile, has managed to get himself trapped. Cutter goes to rescue him despite Jenny’s protests that he’s too important to the project. Jenny accompanies him, and they share some warm human moments while saving each others lives.
As they reach Stephen, the worms start to die. The heat causes them to explode, launching hundreds of baby worms out which try to attach themselves to the nearby humans. Hilarity ensues as they keep ripping the little buggers off. A quick activation of the sprinkler system saves the day.
Later, Cutter goes to Jenny’s home, he tries to explain about how they’re from two different timelines. His heart is way out on his sleeve when Jenny’s significant other comes to the door. Cutter walks away, devastated. Unbeknownst to him, Helen watches from a nearby car.
Analysis
I thought last week’s episode failed on many levels, this week, they surpassed themselves – and not in the good way.
Let’s start with Cutter and his complete inability to come to grips with his new timeline. This would be traumatic, no doubt, but Cutter is a brilliant man. He doesn’t demonstrate it here. At the end of the episode, he looks at a picture of himself and Claudia in his wallet. (When, in series 1, did they have the time to take wallet photos?) No one in this universe believes him, yet he’s got the picture to prove it. And why don’t they believe him? They deal with the realities of temporal anomalies every day. They’ve discussed the possibility. No one – at least no one at the ARC – should dismiss Cutter’s claims out-of-hand.
Let’s move to Steven. OK, he had an affair with Helen, but with all the anomalies opening up and killing people, would he really just let Helen off the hook the way he does? Would he really betray the team the way he is? Considering the scale of the problem, it really doesn’t seem likely. He asks at the end if they really should be trying to contain the anomalies. Is that question of philosophy really supposed to make us think Steven isn’t quite sure about which side he’s playing on?
Another question about Helen and Steven: Was their affair in this timeline or last series’ timeline? Is this Helen from the original or the new timeline? Presumably, she’s from the original, just as Cutter is. Steven is clearly from the second timeline. The likelihood of that permutation seems incalculably small.
They’re playing faster and looser with the the paleontology. Cutter is awfully fast to identify the atmosphere as pre-Cambrian or earlier. I could be wrong, but I thought the preponderance of evidence was that there was no plant or animal life on the surface in the pre-Cambrian. All life was aquatic. Even at the start of the Cambrian, plants hadn’t colonized the land, and the possible evidence of land fauna would just indicate things taking brief strolls upon the barren land. A paleontologist like Cutter wouldn’t jump to such a radical conclusion that there was life that could live on land instantly upon seeing the creatures.
Perhaps they can argue evolution was different in this world, but, any changes occurred after Cutter’s incursion in the Permian – long after the pre-Cambrian. Even if it was after Cutter’s time shift, Cutter’s knowledge of paleontology would still be firmly grounded in our timeline.
While on matters paleontological – birth by explosion? That must have been one of evolutions blind alleys.
One thing is certainly different in this new timeline. Lawn blowers are enormous! Arnold Swartzenegger would be proud to carry one of those bad boys around.
Last time I complained that Cutter and Co, went into the mall without backup. This time the stupid twonks went into the building completely unarmed also! If Cutter and Steven had only given each other a big French kiss, it would have been an episode of Torchwood.
Meanwhile, back at the ARC, Conner had noticed the special forces man as being in disguise at the mall. Could there be something wrong here? Is there some dark conspiracy? Yes, Conner, I think there is something amiss. How about let’s not worry about a secret conspiracy and let’s concentrate on what are these special forces guys doing back at the ARC? Why aren’t they out shooting some worms?
Come to think of it, Conner, surely you don’t really believe that girl is interested in you, do you? And she just happened to strike up a conversation with you? And she just happens to know which type of geeky movies you like to watch? You are cruising for a fall, mister.
Oh the humanity! The first series of Primeval had its problems, but they seem to have excelled themselves at screwing it up as much as possible? Yes, it’s a fantasy, but you’ve got to at least make a half-assed attempt to suspend disbelief in the audience. It feels like they just said, “ah, why bother, they’ll watch anything. I’m too lazy to bother trying to work out the plot.â€
Technorati Tags: Dinosaur, Dinosaurs, Primeval, Review, Television, UK, Video