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First things first: we find out that the town's population is less than five thousand. One mystery solved! After her close encounter with the dead birds, Emily runs out of gas, boo. But she's picked up by a couple of cops, yay. Who are, of course, actually escaped prisoners, boo. But the cops they're impersonating are still alive, yay. But they're in the trunk of the police car, boo. Emily takes them to casa Richmond, where they have a nice breakfast with Bonnie. Then she sneaks out to place an emergency call via the police radio in the car. While that's going on, it's time for the townsfolk to duck and cover, since a whole lotta fallout is headed their way. Eric helps herd the townsfolk into the old shelters, and we learn that he may be a good son, but he's not scoring so high as a husband; he trades smooches with the bartendrix while his wife tends to patients at the medical center. Hawkins goes to see if he can get any news on the ham radio. And he does, but he doesn't tell anyone about it. Since the shelters are full, Jake helps convert the mine into a makeshift shelter, and then gets the S.O.S. from Emily. Dale makes an extra effort to save the bitchy townie from certain death. Dad goes missing for a while, and then turns out to have had a heart attack, or a fainting spell, or something. Back at casa Richmond, Emily finds herself in a standoff with the fake cops, who hold Bonnie hostage. Jake turns up just in time, and he and Emily kill the fugitives, then take shelter in the Richmond's cellar. At the end, Hawkins visits his wife and kids, and they hunker down while Hawkins reveals to the audience that the message he picked up is a list of other cities that went boom. There's a lot of them. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Previously: Jake hugged people, crashed his car, and drove a bus. Also, stuff blew up.
Emily walks along the highway in the morning light, toting a gas can.
Jake hauls himself up a ladder, groaning with each step. Jake, honestly, the frisbee can wait.
Hawkins stands in front of city hall, being his thoughtful, secretive, nigh-omniscient self. Gary wanders out to join him, and asks if anyone's seen the sheriff. Hawkins hasn't, but he tells Gary that he needs to talk to the mayor. I don't know why he thinks Gary cares. Hawkins looks up at the sky and says, "We got trouble coming. Right here in Jericho. Trouble with a capital 'T, that rhymes with 'G,' and that stands for gamma rays!" He then heads inside. Gary looks up himself, like, "I don't see nothin'." We pull back to reveal flags flapping in the breeze.
Jake finally reaches the top of whatever he's on, and looks out at the mass of dark clouds on the horizon. "Oh my God!" he gasps. "Why didn't I walk half a block instead of climbing up here? God, I'm dumb."
We're spared Jake's twenty-minute climb back down, and cut straight to Jake limping through the clinic. He runs into Mom, asks where April is, and tells her to call Dad on the radio. Poor Pamela Reed. I hope she eventually gets to do something besides pass messages between people.
April turns out to be a redheaded doctor, who's just finished putting a cast on Heather's leg. When April asks how she feels, Heather eyes her cast and says, "I feel like a bad-ass!" Jake bursts in and asks if there's a fallout shelter in the clinic. April says, "Yes...what's going on?" Attention, Citizens of Jericho: Please, try to pay attention. I'm amazed some of these people can remember their own names. Jake just says it's bad, and tells her to come along.
Sheriff's office. Dad says, "Jericho has two underground shelters: one right here, under the town hall, and the other under the medical clinic." Gary asks whether people can hunker down in their storm cellars. Hawkins says, "They're better than nothing," and adds that people will have to seal up their houses with duct tape and plastic sheets. Having spent a depressing few hours reading about fallout, I think I can say that there's really no point in doing that, but whatever. Eric asks how Hawkins knows that, and Hawkins says, "Because I was a cop in St. Louis." And then he goes on about disaster preparedness, but I think that if he turns out to be an expert on the works of Truffaut, he'll say it's because he was a cop in St. Louis. He adds that their big problem is the rain. Some guy asks, "Won't the rain clear the radiation out of the air?" Hawkins says, "Yeah, and bring it straight down on Jericho." A fireman comes in with a map of the town, and Dad proposes splitting up the town -- the south half goes into the town hall's shelter; the north half goes to the clinic. Dad asks Hawkins how long they've got, and Hawkins shrugs and says, "I'm new here." But you were a cop in St. Louis! You should know everything! Hawkins asks how long it usually takes for a storm over Denver to reach them. Gary gulps, "Less than two hours." Everyone starts muttering, and Dad says, "We've got work to do, guys."
Credits. Well, credit. Hey, if you like 24, I encourage you to give Kidnapped a try. It's not groundbreaking or anything, but it knows how to keep moving, and the characters seem halfway intelligent. Plus, James Urbaniak.
The flags are whipping around now. Eric leads Dad and Gary into the city hall's shelter. Dad figures that the shelter will hold about three hundred people. Gary snarls, "You do know that there's almost five thousand people in this town." Dad says that the people with "Reelect Green" signs on their lawns get first dibs. Okay, actually he just tells Eric, "Make sure all the people who have basements use 'em." Eric heads out.
Jericho "A Full Service" Clinic. Jake and April have to clear a path to the shelter door. They finally get the door open and discover that the shelter is crowded with boxes and old equipment. A couple of rats squeak hello, and water drips from a pipe in the ceiling. Jake says there's no air, and foreshadows, "I hope the fan works."
Emily's still walking. A police car turns onto the road and drives past her. She waves and shouts as it zooms past. Then the car stops and, after a long pause, backs up to her. We get plenty of time to see that this isn't any old police car, but one from Jericho. And it's not even any old Jericho police car; it has "SHERIFF" on the side. The countdown to when Emily picks up on this starts...now! In the car are the clean-shaven driver (hereafter, "George"), and a guy with a horseshoe mustache ("Lenny"). Emily says that she ran out of gas, and adds, "There's [sic] dead birds all over the roads." George says that they saw the birds as well, and figure that they flew through the radiation. Emily has no idea what they're talking about, so George explains, "There was a mushroom cloud -- somebody nuked us!" Emily takes a second to stare around. I think her system crashed. George says that they're almost out of gas, too, and asks for directions to a nearby gas station. Emily's brain is still locked up, preventing her from wondering why local cops don't know where the gas stations are. She finally asks whether they think the nuke was an accident. Emily, the phrasing "somebody nuked us" is a clue as to what they think happened. Doesn't mean they're right, but do try to keep up. Lenny snaps that they don't know, and George adds that the nuke was in the direction of Denver. Lenny somehow finds the Ctrl-Alt-Del combination for Emily's brain, and tells them that all the nearby gas stations have been abandoned. She suggests trying Casa Richmond. George tells her to get in. Emily stares around some more. It'd be nice to think she's now realizing that the cops aren't cops, but her expression is one of general befuddlement, not dawning comprehension. Lenny snaps, "It's okay. Get in," and Emily finally remembers how to operate her limbs.
Gracie Leigh's "Super" market. Gracie walks over to Dale, who's camped out in one of the aisles. Do you think she went to her own home for the night and left Dale there, or that she slept in the store, too? Let's assume he insisted on staying there, because I want to like Gracie. She wakes him gently, and Dale sleepily says, "Mom?" Plaintive music is cued up. Gracie rather cheerily reminds him, "Your mom's gone." Then someone hammers on the door and calls, "Gracie?" Gracie and Dale look up as a man shouts, "Gracie, we need to stock the shelters with food!" A fire truck passes by outside, and a man calls, "Attention, attention. There is radioactive fallout coming from the nuclear blast. You have less than ninety minutes to get indoors."
A man tapes plastic sheeting over a window. Another man kisses his dog and prepares to lock it in a bathroom with some food. Johanna frets about the dog. The announcer goes on telling people to get into their basements, and to seal things up with duct tape. A woman throws clothes into a suitcase while her kids jump on their bed. Whee! It's Fallout Day!
At a (or, probably, the) bar, some guys play pool. The Auditor sips her drink and wonders if she'll ever get a name, or a purpose on the show. The curly-haired bartendrix asks, "You're not from around here, are you?" The Auditor says, "I came from D.C. to supervise a little audit on a farm. Is God punishing me?" Yes, but it's punishment for being an egomaniac, not an auditor. God can be paradoxical if He wants, right? The bartendrix tells her that she should got to the shelter, and the Auditor smirks, "Ya think?"
Clinic. Mom doesn't want to go to the town hall shelter. Jake says, "I don't even know if we can fix it, and I can't concentrate while you're here!" Mom looks horribly sad. Poor, poor Pamela Reed. She finally makes Jake promise that he'll join her at the town hall after the clinic shelter is fixed. Then they hug, and she skedaddles.
Bar. The bartendrix tells someone to shut the TV off: "I don't wanna waste my generator on static." Eric enters and identifies the bartendrix as "Mary." He asks why people are still at the bar, and Mary says, "They won't go. I can't leave these clowns in my bar!" They were there all night? And she's still serving. Well, they're very orderly drunks, I must say. Eric tells the crowd that they need to go to town hall if they don't have a basement to hide in. A husky pool player I'll call Lou snickers, "I'm not goin' to town hall." Someone else asks who Eric is, and he proudly announces, "I'm the Deputy Mayor." Everyone cracks up, and someone calls, "What, did your daddy make you a deputy?" Eric is the Rodney Dangerfield of Jericho. Lou says that he'd rather die here: "Playing pool with my buddies." Eric enlightens everyone with his description of radiation poisoning: "Within the first couple of hours, you're gonna be vomiting, and have crippling diarrhea." Johanna says, "Just like every other Saturday night at the bar, then." Eric goes on about how Lou's organs will shut down, and it might help if Eric didn't look quite so smug about that idea. I suspect Eric is a House fan. He winds up with "And then you will die over there, on the floor by the pool table. With your buddies." Everyone looks pensive, and Lou and his friends exit the bar silently.
Mary leads Eric into a back hall, and starts kissing him. Apparently that speech about crippling diarrhea really turned her on. It had a slightly different effect on the Auditor, who steps out of the bathroom and smirks at the kissing couple. She sidles past, saying, "Don't mind me." Oops. Mary follows the Auditor back into the bar. Well, if she tells anyone, I guess they can claim she was drunk.
Casa Richmond. A windmill starts turning slowly in the breeze, much like the gears in Emily's head as she and her new friends arrive. Lenny tells Emily to "sit tight," and he and George get out to look over the medium-sized gas tank. Their borrowed uniforms fit remarkably well. Emily notices a tattoo on the back of George's neck, and she gets a weird tingly sensation as a thought slowly starts to form. Then the car radio crackles to life. Someone asks for the sheriff, and is told that the sheriff's missing, along with two deputies, and that an empty prison bus was found. That should be three deputies, but don't mind me. The chatter ends just as George opens the car door for Emily. As he goes up to the house with her, Emily says it looks like everyone's gone. George says that the gas pump is locked, and raps at the door. In addition to the tattoo, Emily spots a small bloodstain on the back of George's shirt. Meanwhile, Lenny opens the trunk to reveal the two missing cops in the trunk, duct tape over their mouths. Johanna thinks the convicts are actually pretty nice, since they didn't kill those cops when that really would have been a lot less trouble for them. Which is true, even if their niceness is slightly undercut when Lenny tells his hostages, "Make a sound, you die," and closes the trunk again. George starts ringing the doorbell as Emily repeats that nobody seems to be home. Which is when Bonnie comes around the corner with an armload of firewood. D'oh.
Commercials. I am reluctantly dropping my "Hawkins the blackmailer" theory. But I'm sticking with "Jake the ex-con."
April looks over some dated pamphlets and a book titled Fallout? What's That?, hee. She sighs that when this stuff was written, there were under a thousand people in town, so I guess their plans are slightly out of date. They prepare to start moving patients, and Jake says, "I'll get the ventilation system fixed."
Soon enough, Jake's in the dark shelter, working with someone who looks a bit like Uncle Jesse. Duke, not Katsopolis. Heather hobbles in and asks if she can help. Jake skeptically asks, "You know how to strip wires?" Heather smashes his face in with her cast. Well, actually, she just says, "Ever since junior high." Jake stares at her in surprise, because she's a girl and yet she knows about machinery. Craziness. Heather adds, "Yeah, I was that popular." Jake asks her to see if the fan belt is frayed. Heather says they could get another one from "any mid-century American car." She adds, "And check the brushers -- we don't want the motor to seize up." Jake holds up a hand like "Whoa, not so fast!" and hands over his pliers: "You take over. I'll look for a fan belt." As Jake leaves, Heather tells Uncle Jesse, "Excuse me, sir? You're doing that wrong."
On his way to get a fan belt, Jake pauses to chat with April, because hey, there's no rush. April's staring at a woman, who is staring at a baby in an incubator. April explains, "She thinks we shouldn't move the baby." Jake quickly marches over and says, "Ma'am, your baby's protected in this little bubble." Johanna and I crack up. And then it gets better, because he says, "She's got fresh air, and food." Food? Is there a bowl of kibble in there? Wait, we're still not done! He says that the baby is the safest person in Jericho, because I guess the incubator -- oh, excuse me, "bubble" -- is made of some kind of radioactive shielding. I'm really worried that Jake may have lost his mind. He did have a head injury in the car crash before; maybe that's the problem. He tells the mom that she isn't safe, and explains, "We need to make sure [the baby] has a mother to take care of her when this thing is over." He begs the mom to let them move her and the baby into the shelter. She finally nods slightly and says, "Mm-hmm," because why waste your money letting the extras talk? His work done, Jake exits, leaving April in awe of his oratory skills.
Jake hurries on down the hall, but then a woman calls his name. He doesn't recognize her, but she says, "I'm Emily Sullivan's aunt." He stares at her for a second and then hobbles back to greet her politely as "Mrs. Dawson." Mrs. Dawson asks if he's seen Emily. Jake says she might be at the other shelter, but Mrs. Dawson says that nobody there has seen her: "She's not at her house. I heard you were back in town, and I figured the one person who would know--" Jake holds a hand up to silence Mrs. Dawson, and says, "I'm sorry, I have to go." As he backs away, he says that he's sure Emily's fine.
Casa Richmond. As wind chimes are tossed around by the growing wind, George happily tells Bonnie that they just want to use her pump. Not like that, for heaven's sake. Bonnie says, "Stanley has the key." George doesn't understand her, but in his defense, he doesn't know that Bonnie has a brother, much less that his name is Stanley, so recognizing that first word would have been tricky. Of course, a large portion of the audience also wouldn't know Stanley's name, since his name wasn't given in the first episode. Maybe George is kind of a stand-in for the audience. In which case the audience may want to invest in bulletproof vests. Lenny gasps, "She's deaf?" Bonnie helpfully tells him, "Yes," and then adds, "I read lips." Lenny blinks. Emily asks Bonnie, "When do you think Stanley gets [sic] back?" I guess as part of their resistance to the twenty-first century, Kansas outlawed the future tense. Bonnie guesses it'll be another hour, and Lenny demands a translation. He hustles over to George and says, "We can wait an hour, can't we?" They confer quietly, turning their heads away. Bonnie asks Emily if she's okay. Emily smiles brightly and insists that she's fine. She chuckles, "I'm just hungry." Emily, you actually have reasons to look tense and upset what with, you know, the nuclear explosion. She suggests that she and Bonnie make breakfast for George and Lenny. Lenny announces that he'd like eggs. As everyone heads for the kitchen, Emily spots a pair of revolvers in a display case in the living room. Along with some cartridges. Which is convenient.
Town hall shelter. Dad's giving orders, and says he's going to help Eric get supplies from Gracie's. Mom says that she's already sent other people to do that. Dad gripes, "Who is in charge here, you or me?" Mom raises her eyebrows and sniffs, "You do not want to play that game." Someone walks in carrying "every book we have in library about nuclear radiation." Dad picks up the top book in the pile and sighs, "Our Friend, the Atom." "Some friend," Gary huffs. Dad asks if there's anything in the pile that will help them right now. The librarian (I'll assume) says, "Denver was probably hit by a hydrogen bomb, anyway." Gary asks how hydrogen bombs are different. Hawkins stops piling up canned goods long enough to say, "They literally explode the air." A group of enraged physicists grab weapons and storm CBS. Or so I'd like to believe, because that's too stupid even to talk about. Maybe the point is that Hawkins just says whatever nonsense comes to mind, and he sounds so confident that everyone believes him. Mom slowly says, "So, what you're saying is that nobody knows what's really coming." No, I'm saying that Hawkins has caught the brain-slugs or whatever it is that infected the rest of the population. Because if it was a nuke, whether it was a hydrogen bomb or an atomic bomb, there's going to be fallout, so it doesn't really matter. Dad says that they should plan for the worst-case scenario. The librarian says, "I have that," and starts flipping through a book. ["This one?" -- Wing Chun] Hawkins decides to keep going because these idiots bought that "literally explode the air" thing. He says that they'll have to scrub down everything that's left outside, and remove eighteen inches of topsoil before planting, and cover the water wells. He then asks the librarian, "That's about what it says, right?" The librarian nods, awed. Dad tells someone to make sure that everyone's livestock is indoors. Hawkins says he'll go work on the radio, adding, "This may be our last chance to make contact for a while." Or you could move the radio into the shelter, genius. Dad mentions that some people held a vigil in the church all night, and says he'll go make sure they're in a shelter. I love the fact that there's one church in a town of five thousand people. Poor, poor Pamela Reed actually manages to imbue some life into her line when she calls, "Hurry back."
At the clinic shelter, Heather says, "I'm telling you, they need to be replaced." Whoever she's talking to responds, "Listen girlie..." and Heather prepares for some more cast-fu. Oh, I wish. But instead, she calmly says that the engine is revving too high. Jake arrives just in time to see sparks fly as the engine goes kerpow. The "listen girlie" dude backs away and, I guess, slinks off, since he vanishes from the scene. April runs in and announces that everyone's ready to move into the shelter. Jake orders her to keep everyone out. April says that people are getting scared, which wins point for understatement, but Jake says, "Seal them up in here, they'll die." The music swells tensely as sad people in robes stand on the stairs.
Commercials. The door to the shelter leads to the yucky basement hallway we saw before. It doesn't lead straight outside. Why don't they let some people into the shelter, leave the door open for now, and continue to work on fixing the machinery? Even with the door open, the shelter seems like a step up from the storm cellars they've got people using. Not to mention what they end up doing. Plus, then they've got lots of medical supplies right there.
When we return, Jake's herding patients outside as he tries to contact Dad on the radio. Eric calls in from Gracie's and asks what's up, and Jake tells him that their shelter's unusable, so they're bringing the patients to town hall in the school buses that Jake can magically summon. Eric says he's not sure there's room for everyone. April grabs the radio and snaps, "We've got two hundred people here. Some of them need medical attention. Handle it!" Eric says that he'll go to the shelter and let them know how much room is available. April says, "I don't have time. We're coming," and gives the radio back to Jake as they climb aboard a bus.
Gracie's. Eric tells some flunkies that he's headed out. Gracie hands him a case of bottled water and asks how much more he needs. "Enough to feed half the town," Eric sighs. Gracie boggles as men haul boxes of food past her.
Moments later Gracie is packing a cooler with food. The bitchy girls from last week reappear, roaming the aisles of the store. The brunette says, "Skylar, you have to come to the shelter." Skylar, if that is her real name, snaps that she's going home to wait for her parents. As they argue, they pass Gracie, who notices that both girls are carrying sodas. She asks if they're planning to pay. Skylar looks around and says, "What are you talking about? Everybody's just taking stuff." Point. Gracie says that it's still her store, and pointedly asks if the cans of soda are for an emergency. Skylar huffs, puts the soda on a counter, and stomps out. Her friend stays behind and Dale eavesdrops as she explains that Skylar's folks were in New York City. She returns the soda and grumps, "It was just a couple cans of soda," before exiting. Gracie picks the cans up and sniffs, "Yeah, my soda." Wow, the Little Debbie rack is empty. Guess that's the snack food of choice for the apocalypse.
Mm, bacon. Bonnie and Emily are preparing a hearty breakfast. In a corner of the kitchen, George and Lenny are quietly discussing where they're going to go. Lenny loudly asks Emily where she ran into the dead crows. Emily says, "About five miles west from where you picked me up." George says that they'll go north, then. As they confer, Emily taps on a bowl in front of Bonnie to get her attention. She signs, "Not cops." Then there's a sign I don't know, sorry, and then "Escape." Lenny suddenly pops up behind them and wraps his arms around the girls. He turns his head toward Bonnie, who isn't looking at him, and asks, "You wanna help me with the coffee?" He's having trouble with this "deaf" concept. Emily says she'll show him where it is.
Hawkins dumps some parts out onto the radio as Gary hustles in and urges him to get into the shelter. He picks up a couple of boxes and says, "If you get that thing to work, do me a favor and find out who did this to us." Gary's gonna go Rambo on their asses!
Jake leads the school bus convoy across town. He looks up in the mirror and sees Heather batting her eyes at him. And then he plows into a parked car. Well, he should have. They'll be plenty of time to flirt when you're stuck in the shelter for days, Jake.
Eric picks his way through the packed shelter as he's informed that some buses are pulling up outside.
Eric rushes outside and calls, "Whoa, people, please don't get off the bus. We can't take any more people!" Jake starts arguing, and April wheels the incubator & baby over and asks if he's going to turn everyone away. Gary supports Eric, noting that they'll all suffocate if they try to squeeze everyone into the shelter. Eric tells April, "We can take ten. And I saved a spot for you." I wanna see the three square feet of shelter that Eric's cordoned off with a "Reserved" sign. Jake says that the ten most critical cases should go inside, and then asks Greg how many people can fit in the salt mine. Gary says, "About as many as you want." I'm not sure that Gary can count past four. Jake confirms that the mine has a ventilation system and water. Mom hustles past and starts to climb onto the bus, searching for Dad. She explains that Dad said he was heading to the church. Gary says that the vigil-ites got to the shelter twenty minutes ago. Eric tells her that they'll find Dad, and tells Jake to take "[his] people" to the mine. The union guy says he'll go along, adding, "After twenty-seven years, nobody knows that mine the way I do." He tells Eric, "Guess you can fit eleven people now." I almost feel bad for Eric, but on the other hand, these people all know him better than we do, and they seem convinced he's a dink. Gary says that he'll go as well. Jake prepares to move out, but pauses for a second to watch the storm clouds rolling in over the town. Heather soothes, "We're gonna be okay." Heather's plucky, you know.
The convoy zooms down the road, with what I'll just assume is the union guy's SUV leading the way. In his bus, Jake calls, "Hang on," and then plows through a chain-link gate. Props to the eagle-eyed forum posters who wondered where the SUV disappeared to.
Casa Richmond. Emily sets out a nice tray of coffee and mugs. Lenny reaches for the pot, but Emily insists on pouring. Then she looks up at Lenny flirtatiously, and starts pouring coffee onto his hand. She apologizes and tells him to go run cold water over the burn while she cleans up the spill. Lenny stomps off, and we all take a long look at the gun case in the background.
Lenny hurries over to the sink as George asks what happened. Lenny starts to say, "She..." but then, I guess, catches sight of Bonnie and just says that he burned himself. George asks, "You left her alone?" Lenny carefully says, "She's fine." George walks over to the doorway and peers out into the living room. Emily sits on the couch and casually takes a big gulp of coffee. Then she screams in pain as the inside of her mouth is scalded. Or not. She asks if Lenny's okay, and George grins, "He'll live." We go back to Emily, and the camera pans over to reveal that there's only one gun in the case now. A few cartridges are gone, too. Gosh.
Salt mine. Gary shouts that he'll have to take people down in the elevator twelve at a time. Jake finally identifies the union guy as Shep, and says that they'll have to seal the entrance somehow. Shep points out that there aren't doors on the mine. Heh. Jake gibbers, "We can't just let the rain pour down the shaft!" After pondering the problem a moment, Jake asks, "You have dynamite, right?" Over Gary's protests, Jake walks into the mine entrance and points up at the support beams as he says, "We put charges here, here, here..." Bwah ha ha! I love every part of this. I love the plan, I love that Jake's esoteric knowledge is rapidly reaching Hawkins-esque levels, and I love that he's ordering around the people who actually run the mine. Fantastic. Gary isn't as in love with it, and asks, "How do we know we won't bring the whole thing down on top of us?" Jake turns as the camera pushes in for emphasis, and says, "We don't." Just when I thought it couldn't get any more fabulous.
So in my reading, the consensus seemed to be that a few feet of dirt provides decent protection from fallout. I could accept that Jake might not know that, but since he knows all sorts of implausible things, I'm having a hard time going with that. So, honestly, wouldn't it be just as good, not to mention a lot safer, if they blocked up the mouth of the mine as best they could and then, once everyone was inside, filled it in with a yard or two of earth from the inside? Because then they could dig themselves out. I mean, it's a freaking mine; I'm guessing there are shovels and picks in there.
Hawkins plays with the radio as we hear thunder outside. The radio picks up tweedles and hisses and then morse code. Hawkins listens a moment and then grabs a pen and starts writing. I'm guessing that the dashes and dots spell out "B. R. A. I. N. S."
Casa Richmond. Everyone's finally sitting down to breakfast. Emily declares that she's going to "the little girl's room." Well, I guess she is a teacher. But wait, she's a high-school teacher. George asks where the bathroom is, and Emily points up the stairs. George says, "Good to know." He sets his radio down on the table significantly, and Bonnie watches Emily hustle upstairs.
People rush into the mine, and I can't help thinking of lemmings. Jake calls Eric and asks if they've found Dad. Eric says he's looking around town hall now. Jake says, "I'm gonna need you to bring a crew over here and dig us out when this thing's over." Eric asks if Jake's crazy. Jake repeats, "Just dig us out." Because really, does he need to answer that question?
Emily gets a special "She made it to the bathroom!" twangy guitar solo. She loads the revolver and then looks out the window at the police car in front of the house.
Hawkins finishes writing a long list, and finally turns the radio off as Eric and Mom hurry in. Eric asks if Hawkins has seen Dad. He hasn't. Eric sends Mom to check the offices again while he looks in the parking lot. Hawkins asks Mom if he can help, but she says they need him to stay on the radio. Hawkins gets all, "Aw, shucks, how would li'l ol' me know how to operate this here radio doohickey?" Mom tells him to come with her, then. Hawkins shoves his note into his pocket and follows.
Commercials. The Departed. Is it just me, or is Jack Nicholson turning into Ricky Jay? It's just me, right? Sorry.
Dale rides his bike up to an impressive driveway barred with a gigantic gate.
Cut to Dale knocking at the door of a even more gigantic house. Okay, this must be the east side. Skylar walks up, peers through the glass panels in the door at him, and snickers, "You are not in my house." Good observation, Skylar. She tells Dale to get off her property. Dale tells her that she needs to go to town: "Radiation's coming from Denver." Skylar opens the door and says that she's waiting for her parents. Dale asks whether she's spoken to them, and Skylar duhs, "No, freak, the phones are dead." Dale, let her die. Seriously. Dale rolls his eyes and sighs, "Stay inside, tape up the windows, and don't use the water." Skylar goes on being dumb, and Dale hands her a bag of groceries and leaves. Skylar looks in the bag and finds a can of her generic diet soda, which melts her bitchy heart. She instantly calls Dale back. Dale stops and turns, and Skylar pleads, "Stay here! It's not safe out there." I'm starting to think that the people of Jericho are infected with brain-rot because they've been watching too much CBS programming.
Emily climbs out the bathroom window onto the roof and jumps down to the ground.
Jake supervises someone who's putting the charges in place. Because Jake is the expert at this. Heather hobbles over spunkily and asks, "How'd you learn how to do that?" Jake says, "I knew a guy once." In prison.
Emily sneaks into the police car and turns the radio on. It's on channel two, which must be the channel it was on before when she heard the other cops talking. She calls "Hello? Is anyone here?" Or there, as the case may be.
Jake approves of Shep's placement of dynamite as Greg herds the last group of people into the elevator.
Emily says that she's at the Richmond Ranch with Bonnie, and asks for help. After waiting a second, she gives up and switches to channel 3.
In the mine, Jake's radio picks up Emily's message through the static. Everyone listens as she says, "There are men here with guns, I think they might have killed the sheriff." She changes to channel 4 just as Jake makes it to the radio. He calls back to her, but she's gone.
Inside Casa Richmond, everyone's still eating. We get a close-up of George's radio, and see that it's tuned to channel 8.
Outside, Emily moves to channel 5.
Jake demands Shep's car keys. He tells Greg to get everyone down in the mine, and then carries the detonator outside. Greg follows him out and tosses him a gun. Jake takes it and says, "When everybody's down, say 'all clear.'" Greg nods and goes back into the mine. Jake hustles out behind a truck and fastens the wire to the detonator. Over the radio, Gary says that they're almost ready. Jake stares at the radio and shouts, "Come on!" After a long moment, Gary says, "Jake? We're all--" and then Jake sets off the charges. Luckily, Gary does go on to say "clear" instead of "--most ready." And then we see the mine entrance go boom from about six different angles, with varying levels of zoominess.
Mom and Hawkins go roaming through the town hall. Together. Wouldn't it be slightly more efficient to split up? Mom steps into Dad's office and looks around the empty room. Hawkins gets bored and walks back out, and then Dad quietly says, "Gail." Mom rushes forward, finds Dad collapsed behind the desk, and starts screaming for Hawkins.
Still enjoying their breakfast, Lenny suddenly asks George, "Where's the brother?" Good question. George looks upstairs, and asks, "Where the hell's the girl?" Bonnie watches tensely. Honestly, Bonnie, you might be better off with these guys; their brains are still working.
Emily's still on the radio, saying, "I think they might have killed the sheriffs." Both of them? Maybe it wasn't plural, maybe she was about to say, "sheriff's dog." Or maybe Emily's not very bright.
Jake zooms to the rescue, clutching the gun in his right hand as he drives. Guess he's not planning to shift gears.
Emily tries channel 6.
George takes his radio with him for some reason as he heads upstairs, and we get another reminder that it's on channel 8. He finally reaches the bathroom door, but doesn't get a triumphant guitar solo. As Emily gets to channel 7, George knocks politely on the door. Then Emily switches to channel 8 and asks, "Is there anybody on this channel?" George listens to her plea for help, and then bursts into the bathroom. Upon seeing the open window, he turns and rushes downstairs.
Emily hears a thumping sound, and moans,"Oh no, I'm running over dead birds again! Hey, wait a minute, the car isn't moving!" She hurries to the back of the car and lifts up the trunk. I'll assume she hit a release switch first. Or maybe adrenaline has given her super-strength. She pulls the duct tape off of one cop's mouth, and he says, "Run, Emily, run!"
George hurries down the stairs, and Bonnie suddenly decides to bolt. She races for the door, and George and Lenny chase her. George calls, "Hey!" a few times, but, y'know, she's deaf. As they race outside, Emily pulls out the revolver and tells George to stop. She fires once, hitting a post, but then George grabs Bonnie and holds her in front of him. He shouts, "We just want gas!" Emily cocks the gun, and George says, "Supplies, that's all this is about. Just about fuel." Emily shouts, "Let. Her. Go." George pulls his gun out gingerly, as if he's going to drop it in a gesture of goodwill. Meanwhile, Lenny sneaks up from around the side of the house with his gun drawn. George gives up on goodwill and points the gun at Bonnie. Emily pleads, "Please let her go." Lenny takes careful aim at Emily. And is, of course, shot by Jake, who snuck up to the house sometime in the past minute. George suddenly shoves Bonnie away because, gee, what possible use would he have for a hostage in this situation? Oh no, he shouldn't have eaten the eggs! That's how the brain-slugs get you! George starts shooting at Jake, who scampers around like a jackass, firing back as he runs. George turns to keep firing at Jake as he runs, and quickly finds himself facing Emily, who's had plenty of time to take careful aim at a motionless target. She fires. George goes down. In slow motion, yet. This show is amazing.
After the ads, we see that a few stragglers are still running into the town hall. Which is a shame, what with it being full.
Eric and Mom help Dad into the shelter, and Eric calls April over and removes the "Reserved" card he set up on a cot.
Emily's having a little freakout over killing a guy. Assuming she understands that he's dead, which is questionable, because this is Emily, after all. Jake helps the cops out of the trunk, and tells Bonnie to help them to the storm cellar. Then Jake hurries over to Emily, whose brain has crashed again. Jake insists that it'll all be okay. I'm skeptical. The wind whips around them as he begs, "We gotta go in now. Babe? Babe." Emily finally nods, and Jake leads her past the house to the storm cellar. Which is about twenty feet away from the house, for some reason. They get in just as the rain starts.
Hawkins climbs down into a cellar lit with a lantern and candles and at least one lamp that's hanging on the wall. Maybe you should save some of the lights for later, guys. The cellar also contains Hawkins's wife and little boy. He asks the boy how he's doing, and the kid says, "It's like camping." Hawkins says, "You hate camping." "Yep," says the kid. Oh good, the only thing this show was missing was a wise-ass sitcom kid. Hawkins asks his wife where Allison is, and Mrs. Hawkins says, "She's up in her room." Hawkins tells the boy, Samuel, to go get his sister. After Samuel's gone, Mrs. H asks what's going on. She waited until now to ask? Hawkins pulls out some keys and heads for a door as he says, "I don't know." Mrs. H gets the best meta line of the night as she scoffs, "You always know something." Hawkins gets in her face and says, "You are alive, Darcy." He tells her not to ask questions, and then marches into his locked room and slams the door while Mrs. H. looks grumpy. Justifiably.
Dale tapes up the windows at Skylar's house, so they're totally safe now and don't even need to go into the basement or anything. He finds Skylar crouched down in a hallway and says, "I think my mom died yesterday." Skylar nods, and then sniffles, "I think my mom died yesterday, too." I think you're both gonna be with them inside a week.
Casa Richmond's storm cellar. Jake sets up a lantern and sits down by Emily. Emily pointedly looks the other way and grunts, "I thought you were gone." Is this seriously the time, Emily? Jesus. She asks why he's there, and Jake says, "I'm trying to keep you safe." Emily says, "It's never safe around you," and gets up to go sit somewhere else. Where are Bonnie and the other cops? I like to imagine them watching all this. And rolling their eyes.
Hawkins pulls out his notes and looks at a map of the U.S.. He opens a desk drawer, picks out a red pushpin, and pokes it into Denver. There's a lantern in the room. Which Hawkins didn't carry in there. So it's just been there. Burning. For who knows how long. It's powered by fairies! Another pushpin marks Atlanta.
Shelter. The baby squirms about in its magic bubble of protectiveness. Eric holds April's hand as they watch it. In the background, Mary seethes.
Hawkins marks Chicago with pushpin. Ha, now Peoria is the largest city in Illinois! Take that!
Mom and Dad curl up on a cot in the shelter.
A pushpin goes in Philadelphia.
Emily stares at broody Jake.
San Diego is pushpinned. Aw. Then Hawkins pauses to fill his hand with pushpins. I dunno, the Pushpins of Doom aren't as cool as the Whiteboard of Extinction.
Tune in time, when you'll hear Jake say, "More than electricity or food, this town needs information." The rest of the episode will consist of people laughing at him, because no, I'd go with food.