Schrodinger's Bomb

DVD, BUGS S2 (Schrodinger's Bomb)

'Neville Schrodinger's Cat' doesn't have quite the same ring to it as the title they actually chose, but it does link back to the first time we saw Jean-Daniel, pushing around Mr. Neville at the beginning of 'Pulse,' so I wonder if this innocent little joke on Ed's part was given to him as an inside joke by writer Stephen Gallagher, the man who gave us JD in the first place and now writes his emancipation? Gallagher's fingerprints are all over this, the best episode since 'Out of The Hive,' a culmination of the arc this season and a gelling of philosophy, action and character, not to mention some serious series continuity. While we finish out the arc of the Prison Governor (finally named as Governor Holstock), the Prison Guard (never given a name), and JD's incarceration, we also bring back Roland Blatty and his Bureau of Weapons Technology, both of which Gallagher created for the second episode of the series, 'Assassins Inc,' so it's easy to see why he's so associated with the series despite not being the show-runner - he probably contributed the most and the best ideas, and he wasn't done yet, one reason why his absence hurt Season 4 so much.

We're thrown off-balance right from the first scene with what I presume is stock footage of a vehicle travelling in a desert land, then we're inside what we learn is the lost tomb of King Katran and I'm getting visions as diverse as 'Uncle Jack & Cleopatra's Mummy' and 'Stargate SG-1,' both made within a few years of this episode, before and after, for its fascinating desert tomb decor and style. The unknown players form an alliance (why did General Maliq have to shoot off his super-duper better-than-a-rifle gun at the seal, I'm sure it would have been worth something!), the Neumann's, Father and daughter, with this foreign warlord (of the 'Kingdom of Oroman' according to his bio seen later on a computer screen), who speaks with an impeccable English accent (I assumed he was educated in England). But post-credits we plunge right in with Ros undercover as 'Princess Rosalia,' working with the Bureau to uncover the Neumanns as weapons dealers, when things go wrong, Bureau agents have to be sent in and Dr. Neumann is able to secure the vital evidence in his vault which will explode unless they exit the building. Hence the philosophical quandary of Schrodinger's cat: either the evidence isn't in there, in which case they have nothing on Neumann, or it is, but it'll explode meaning they'll have nothing on Neumann, the old cat in the box trick of a cat with a vial of poison having the probability of 50/50 whether it's alive or dead in a sealed box.

Confused? I thought it was very well presented and much more intelligent than the average Saturday night entertainment, I like that they were able to introduce interesting concepts such as this, not just run around and blow things up. Which they did admirably as well! It really opened the series up to have our team working with the authorities, and it was quite different to the Bureau's first appearance when they were merely dealing with intellectual property rights, albeit for deadly weapons and devices. Here it's guns drawn at dawn, the agents storm this fantastically ornate building (was the huge fan something they recreated for the internal set, or did they film inside the building we saw?), that looks rather out of place in a series usually so dedicated to the ultra-modern steel and glass constructions that marked it out as futuristic. I don't know whether it was just designed to be a contrast and continue the middle eastern or African desert theme, or whether the script changed and they decided to move the Neumann's museum, or whatever it was, to our own country. It wouldn't have been an issue if it was only the building itself, but then the Bureau show up driving these really old cars that wouldn't look out of place on the streets of Egypt or some other developing nation, and yet here we are in the middle of what we assume is London (they even reuse various locations already seen in other episodes, such as the stretch of road where Ros and Roland tail Maliq, the top of the car park where they trace Cassandra's car, and the large arena, all of which would be reused again), on a series usually intent on cutting edge tech, and the Bureau are running these outdated cars?

That's why I thought it could possibly have been originally planned as an overseas operation, not that that would make a lot of sense since the Bureau's authority is implied to be in the UK, but it was perplexing. It is very exciting to see our team working with this big organisation that had previously been established, not that I understood all that at the time. As I probably mentioned in my 'Assassins Inc' review, back when I first watched it I had the impression Season 1 was all about the team working with Blatty as if he was their boss, since I hadn't seen it and came in on episode three of Season 2. The way Roland just shows up here and knows them and they know him, and the strict and authoritative tone he takes with them suggested it, even though he is made to look a little pompous to the point of overconfidence in his authority, such as when Beckett has to push him down to stop him being shot when they're surrounding the ship at the end. Blatty is a good man, he's all about the law and stopping dangerous criminals, but he's there to show the advantages our team have of working outside of the rigid structure of a government organisation. As Blatty says, these 'consultants' have the tendency of taking over operations, and we'd see in Season 3 what a blending of being part of an organisation, yet also having a great deal of autonomy and a more fluid way of working, would look like.

I'd love to know how much of the season was plotted out, whether they knew Jean-Daniel was going to buy his way out of prison by making it an acquisition in a hostile takeover, or not. They must have known that was the trick as he'd been making money from the first time he appeared and it was such a clever idea to use the Gizmos team as the tool to leverage all this cash flow and investment, typical of such a devious mind. But had they worked out how the season was going to end up, had they decided on artificial intelligence, or was that something they came up with as the Big Plan of JD, knowing he'd have some kind of world-dominating evil to carry out? Similarly, did Gallagher plan to bring back Roland and his Bureau or was it just a neat slotting together of the pieces, because there didn't have to be connection to past stories, it's just that this makes it so much more satisfying if you're someone who's paid attention? Equally, if you didn't know all that backstory you enjoyed it for being thrilling adventure (never before has a man shaving his head been so full of tension!), constant twists and double-backs, it's absolutely full of a bright, rich, yet dangerous series of situations. I noticed especially that Ros seemed back to her best - I've mentioned in some reviews that Jaye Griffiths sometimes came across as a little removed compared to Season 1, whereas here she has all the verve of old.

Perhaps it was meeting JD again after all this time, and one moment that really stood out for me was when they do first lay eyes on each other when she's in the back of the van and JD is in control. There was something that linked to the final ever scene of the series, the very end of 'The Enemy Within' where Ros and Beckett are kidnapped and meet someone they apparently know. I think it was the scene in this episode that makes it seem more plausible that it could be JD there as it's the way he greets Ros here. There's no surprise between them, though Ros is shocked. We also get the best episode for JD so far. Granted, he'd been locked up in a prison cell for all but one of his previous appearances, and in 'Pulse' it took a while for us to realise that he was actually the brains behind the operation, not the brawn we took him for. But here he's the wolf uncaged - lean, hungry and ready for his plans to come to fruition after long planning and waiting, and he is an extremely dangerous man. His presence makes certain scenes even more tense, since he's always so icy cool and calm that when he starts to look and sound slightly worried as batty old Dr. Neumann shaves his head to reveal the key code tattooed on top of his head, they're right down to the last second before the whole place is going to go up in their faces and you can see in JD's highly expressive eyes that it's crossing his mind that his whole plan, his whole life, could be scuppered by the bumbling of his associate.

Could it be this incident that gives him reason to shoot Neumann in cold blood (mind you, everything he does seems to be done in cold blood - he'd have made an excellent Cardassian!), or at least a toll against the man? JD is a complex villain. He's unquestionably evil, but then he saves the life of Cassandra when her Father is going to shoot her, presumably for being a liability after her blinding by Beckett. His rationale is that, "Only rats and insects eat their young," which, coupled with the fact he worked with his own brother in 'Pulse' and seemed to be motivated by revenge against the team that 'killed' him and put JD away, suggests family ties are important to him. But then he claims there's no percentage in revenge when speaking to Ros. And it's not like he looks after Cassandra, he just leaves her in the middle of the road, half-blind, with the corpse of her dead Father sprawled in front of her. Was that a kind of test? How does she deal with being put in such an untenable situation? My theory is that JD was brought up in a strict crime family, where honour among the family was of the highest importance. But he also has a malevolent enjoyment of playing with power that makes him a fascinating adversary, not just in terms of opposition to our team, but as a compelling character on his own. It's simply fascinating to wonder about his motivations, his past, and what drives him.

It's telling that I haven't talked much about our heroes yet, because the shadow of JD dominates the episode. When he's not there you're wondering what he's doing and when he is, he tends to draw you in, even though he's with other villains. Maliq, too, has a strong personality, but not the deviousness of JD, as when he fails to carry out his ally's strict agreement on the First Century Bactrian gold artefacts from the tomb, another moment when JD's cool demeanour is rattled - he wanted the ugly grey stuff as it contained this special Niobium 5 which is a low temperature superconductor, for what purpose we can only speculate on at this stage, but that would become fully apparent in subsequent episodes. Again, I love that we don't know what JD's future plans are, his goal here is just to get out of prison. But he does seem to have lost some of his bite when he's in the surroundings of Maliq and his men, because how can anyone stand up to a small army? But Maliq underestimates him, has no understanding of the kind of mind he has, sending one puny soldier to take out the great JD? Ludicrous! And of course he never learns his lesson as there seem to be no second chances in JD's world: you either contribute what was agreed, or you're fired. That's fired upon, the roar of the gunfire echoing through the ship's hold as he takes down Maliq.

I do wonder how he was able to get his hands on a 'ton' of this mythical Red Mercury (which sounds a bit like the unexplained McGuffin in 'Star Trek XI': Red Matter, except that in Trek you expect higher standards of scientific plausibility, or at least you used to…), which is what he and the Neumanns barter for the Bactrian artefacts, but we have to assume JD has all kinds of criminal connections. He also has previously unseen skills - I'm not talking about the electronics or the manufacturing capability, but his untold ability to somehow get behind the rather gullible Prison Guard when she's lured into his cell by the TV screens. It's really hard to see how that worked, but I imagined he'd actually filmed the sequence earlier and was then enacting it as if he was doing it right there, which would explain how he could sneak round behind her, except for the fact that the screens were right next to the wall and so he couldn't get round that way… So either he scuttled across the ceiling or he walked round the other side while she was mesmerised up close to the screen… I don't know, it never looked quite right and how would he know when it was okay to move, how could he get past her peripheral vision? I know it's supposed to be a fun, entertaining moment and not to be thought about, but it was entirely unnecessary. Okay, not entirely, the guard needed to be taken care of as while they could cordon off a corridor to get JD, Neumann and Cassandra out of the prison, she'd have been in the way, but that was the only slightly flimsy moment.

The Governor's misplaced trust is shown to be a great weakness as he's got to the stage where he's actually confiding in his prisoner, telling him about the takeover and how his job may be on the line. I feel they should have done a little more with both Governor and Guard so that we actually cared what happened to them. As it is, they both look somewhat foolish, even after the Guard expressed suspicions against JD in a previous episode, she's lured in by his trick and ends up getting carried like a sack of potatoes into the Governor's office. We never know what happened to the pair, I expect they were just left there as the villains made their escape, their lives intact, but their careers over. While all this is going on our team are kept busy running around, jury-rigging doors, dodging explosions and just generally having a good time since the pressure's off as Roland's the boss and they don't have any reverence for him. At the same time their lives are still put in danger on a regular basis, whether it be from Cassandra's high-tech gun with its laser sight, 'computer micro-targeting' (whatever that means), and 'in-flight error correction' (those bullets must cost a fortune!), or various explosives. But it was a great weapon Cassandra had, and what really gets the Bureau of Weapons Technology on board for the mission.

It's important to note that despite this being the culmination, or at least a stage towards it, in the villain's plans, it's still a lighthearted story where there are plenty of moments of levity, either intended (Beckett and Ed chuckling over Ros' cover alias), or not (Ed getting really worked up about Cassandra's exploding shells as Beckett tells him to draw her attention!). There's all the usual action, Ed gets to ride in a helicopter again, though this time he's not the pilot as he has to abseil onto the ship's deck where Ros is being held hostage. The best moment may be at the Neumann's building where JD has left Blatty taped to a bomb, while he holds a grenade to Ros' head, then Ed and Beckett charge down there only to realise it's actually a bomb within a bomb, or a diversionary bomb attached to Roland to distract them from the room full of explosives that are about to go off, forcing them to bundle the Bureau Chief out as the place explodes, and only then defuse the one stuck to him at the last moment. It's great stuff and you really feel the force of the blasts as you see the actors running from the flames, especially the shot of the van erupting behind Ed, Ros and Beckett, which looks so close to them! That whole moment was terrific as Ros is chained to the steering wheel, Ed can't reach the grenade and Beckett comes running in wielding a huge angle grinder! It's over the top, but in the way the series did best.

They even have one of the best jokey final scenes, which for once isn't cheesy or silly and demonstrates the strong friendship between the trio as they quiz Beckett on 'Einstein's dog,' a scenario he made up so he didn't look so ignorant after Ed had dropped in the Schrodinger's cat analogy earlier. It's lovely to see them all laughing and happy especially as we then cut to a final final scene, a simple set of images of the desert, the tomb, and finally, JD with his hands on the material he needs for whatever nefarious plot he'd planned. And he really is such a great character, the way he nonchalantly palms the grenade in his pocket when Ros is captive, taking the clothes of the soldier sent to kill him (that's an action figure variant if ever I saw one!), but it's also a sense of superiority to his enemies, either moral or not. For instance, he does diminish a little on the ship, off-balance by his meticulous planning being affected by Maliq's failure to comply with instructions,  but regains his stature by showing he was a soldier, too (don't forget he left the Foreign Legion saying it was too easy). He makes the point that so few of those the Gizmos team cross ever survive, which I feel is Gallagher calling attention to a trope of the series, perhaps poking fun a little, but also using it as a stick to beat our heroes with, because it is true. His attempt to finish each of them off is like a piece of artistry, sending Ed and Beckett to help Roland, but he also has more than one reason for doing so much of what he does - in that instance covering his escape, but he also has a further hold over Ros, that her friends are dead and she helped, perhaps a direct attack for her part in Patrick's death.

I haven't even made reference to what the team were wearing (yellow jacket for Ros, purple shirt for Beckett and Ed's now standard blue jumper), because this is such an atypical episode - for one thing it takes place mainly in daylight, but also we don't see so much of the technological side of the series in terms of the settings, buildings and gadgetry, there simply isn't time as we fly from one part of the story to the next, all the compressed energy and buildup of the season being released in dramatic style. And yet it's not over… There's that sense of coming danger, that this was merely the taster, and that's exciting, too. I went in not really wanting to watch the episode, not because I didn't think it would hold up, but I just wanted to relax and not have to think about anything or write a review, but the mark of a truly great episode is that it doesn't matter how you feel going in, it will win you over, energise you and change your mood entirely, which is exactly what happened and has enthused me to write so much. There wasn't even that much to nitpick: I wished when Ros commented on the brevity of Maliq's lecture that she'd said in 'our day' instead of 'my day,' since she was talking to Roland and they'd been at university together. And Maliq commenting on their 'textbook pursuit,' how his driver was completely unaware of them, suggested to me he should get a new driver: a yellow car on an empty road, and he didn't notice? Maybe he was so used to the backup car dealing with tails he'd become blase about it all? And a barcode on the bonce? Inventive, but not very practical - I assume the actor was wearing a wig, but if so it looked very real!

*****