Episode Report Card M. Giant: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Bizarre Love Triangle
By M. Giant | Season 4 | Episode 7 | Aired on 01.30.2005
Lispy Skip announces to Curtis and Special Agent Breck that he may have cracked the MacGuffin code. He may be able to get in and prevent the power plants from melting down, but the Nuclear Regulatory Commission probably won't let him mess around with the code because of the risk of a chain reaction. So he's not only a computer expert, he knows about nuclear cores too? Renaissance man. Curtis wants Skip to pitch the idea to DaD so they can get past the NRC. It's 1:21:12 as Skip gets out of his chair, hitching up his pants and going all Woody Allen about his low blood sugar. The three of them interrupt Driscoll and DaD in the situation room, and Curtis relays Skip's news. DaD snaps, more forcefully than necessary, that he thought nobody is to mess with what Skip wants to mess with. Skip technobabbles until DaD raises a hand, saying, "I don't understand one thing you're telling me." He just wants to know the downside. Skip says if he screws up, he could accelerate the meltdowns. So what's the upside? Well, he could regain control of the reactors. Driscoll spells it out: "What we need to know is, can you do this without making a mistake?" Skip takes a good six seconds to say he can. "You're not filling me with confidence," DaD bitches. That's because you're already filled with Night Train. "Look," Skip says to the Secretary of Defense of the United States (booze halo notwithstanding), "I'm just a little nervous. If I say I can do it, I can do it." Potato Face would be proud.
In the TerrorMobile, TerrorMom's phone rings. "Helleeew?" Will never get tired of that. TerrorTeen is all stressed about TerrorDad, but TerrorMom tries to talk him out of his tree. "I didn't understand until today what it would feel like, doing these things. They're wrong, Mom. I see it now." And we hear it. Show, don't tell, please. "Maybe I should go to the police and tell them everything I know," TerrorTeen continues. TerrorMom says they can talk about it when she arrives, and hangs up. "You did well," TerrorDad tells her. She doesn't exactly bask in his approval. It's 1:23:55.
1:28:22. Skip wastes computing power on an animated display of the MacGuffin, TerrorMom continues staring at TerrorDad for like the fifth straight minute, TerrorTeen wanders around in the open, and Kiefer and DoDder are still passenging. The TerrorMobile pulls into a parking lot and TerrorDad gets out. As TerrorMom walks around to take the wheel, she spots a couple of swarthy guys getting out of yet another nearly-identical late-model sedan. "Who are they?" she asks. TerrorDad tells her not to worry about it and just "take the second exit at Angeles Crests." "He's going to ask me why I'm stopping," TerrorMom points out. "Let him ask," TerrorDad says. It's not like TerrorTeen is going to have room to swing a shovel in the car, after all. TerrorDad will meet them there, he says. She hops back in the TerrorMobile while TerrorDad joins the swarthy dudes. He's got a lot of faith that she's come around on this so quickly.