Fade in on the UFO Center, exterior, under the cover of late-night darkness. Suddenly inside, renegade alien Michael Gerrin slides down a long chute in an apparently successful attempt to sneak into said museum. Following this highly charged entrance via an unconventional method (to get back out, will Michael have to use the converse "ladders?"), Michael stands and surveys his surroundings. He comes eye-to-eye with a life-size plastic replica of a camouflaged law-enforcement official enacting vengeance on some plastic-replica-of-an-alien ass. Predictably accessorized in the typical accouterments of any self-respecting New Mexican lawkeeper, even the plastic government agent wears giant, mirrored seventies sunglasses. Michael offers his best bad-ass glare to what is really nothing more than a giant hunk of plastic ("I spit at your law-enforcing ways, Officer Animatronic Porno," Michael’s look seems to say), and moves on. After surveying the space, Michael climbs a nearby flight of metal steps and approaches a door adorned with two signs probably purchased at this museum's own gift shop: "District Headquarters" and "Certified UFOlogists Only." I fixate just a bit too long (okay, fine, three hours) on the latter sign, pronouncing aloud the word "UFOlogists" which has more potential ways to say it than many other words with disputed pronunciations such as "dour" or "Nabokov." I finally sacrifice the "O" and pronounce the "U" and the "F" separately, thus maintaining the integrity of the suffix "ologist." So the official definition of the word on that sign, then, is "one who studies UF." What the hell does THAT mean?
Through the forbidden door with the migraine-inducing signs (whatever happened to a simple "KEEP OUT?"), Michael enters a room containing a lot of books and a computer. Lucky for him, the computer screen conveniently shows the UFO Center’s "Site Search Index," all loaded up and ready for use. Deciding that he can wait just a little while longer before clicking to the witty and insightful description of this scene over at Mighty Big TV ("UFOlogists! How droll!" Michael might chuckle aloud), Michael types the name "James Atherton" into the search field. Oh, for those of you who surfed over to fill the deepening void in your lives since Get Real went on, uh, vacation, you don’t know that James Atherton is the author of an alien conspiracy book that Max (you’ll meet him later. Some believe he is "adorable," though I am wont to disagree) read in last week’s ep. Nice job, Michael, sneaking your paranoid alien self into a museum dedicated to alien paranoia and looking for a whole lotta information about somebody who spent a lot of time thinking about aliens. Interestingly enough, there are other places filled with information about authors and their writing. They’re called public libraries, entry into them is free, legal, and encouraged, and I’ll bet your town probably has one. But I’m not really complaining. On Roswell, any action must be considered good action. So Michael prints out two pages. I know this because the continually accommodating computer informs us in seventy-two-point blinking lights that it is "Printing Two Pages." As Michael retrieves his two pages, however, his eye catches a sleeping Bania the Curator, sound asleep in a nearby chair. Uh. Oh. Michael backpedals in a hurry and is almost out, but at the critical moment, the printer begins to malfunction (the computer shakes its goody-two-shoes head in abject disgust), and Bania is roused. Furious at the intrusion, he chases Michael with a model spaceship which, in defense of his chosen weapon, looks really pointy. Michael backs away, searching for an exit, repeating, "It’s all a mistake. It’s all a big mistake." He makes it to the steps and turns to run, but is stopped suddenly by Porno’s gun-wielding second-in-command, Native American (oh, I’m sorry. Is that name a little offensive? Well, it wouldn’t have to be if someone would get around to giving this character a name already). "You’re right about that," he quips (about it all being a big mistake, I think), and Michael is trapped. Omigod. He got caught. CAUGHT! We are truly on the brink of something different and wonderful here. No more "Lights, Camera, Inaction" this week. No sir. Well, okay, maybe a little.
Opening credits -- the only time they’re not whining is when thirty seconds of theme song are drowning them out.
Y’know, the overall effect of this episode was so positive that I forgot how much I, uh, dislove the part of it when they’re still in school. So here we are in History, featuring every single one of this show’s main characters. Well, except forgotten Alex, whose character is clearly on a retooling hiatus for November Sweeps. We fade up on the uncharacteristically fat-but-not-jolly History teacher Mr. Sommers (Buffy’s dad? Do I smell a WB sweeps crossover?), who offers up a speech ripped from the pages of Liz Parker’s journal: "Everybody has their secrets. There isn’t a person alive today who’s what they appear to be." Yeah, I’ve heard this speech before, and I still get it. But lest I begin to believe that any sentiment out there actually rivals the inanity of Liz’s journal, let me quote the whole of this week’s entry: "Listening to Mr. Sommers, I realized how strange it must be for Max, Isabel, and Michael not to even know their own history. And how scary it would be if anyone discovered it before they did." First of all, Liz, stop beginning sentences with "and." You’re not T.S. Eliot. And second: I don’t understand what you’re talking about, yet again. Please refrain from living on my planet.
Cut to a close-up on Maria, who . . . man, she looks pretty good. Her hair has literally grown four inches since last week, and it’s styled pretty passably as well. My entire perception of her character shifts instantaneously from "annoying sidekick" to "your hair totally doesn’t suck anymore." Cool change. Too bad we’re still in freaking History class. Tonight’s homework assignment, Buffy’s Dad tells them, is a questionnaire that pairs of students will work on together to teach them about each other’s personal history. Other fringe benefits? Well, according to Buffy’s dad, "Who knows? You might just make a new friend." At which point the class dork, practically the only unidentified extra who could snag some desk space what with all these leads clogging up the place, turns and offers Maria that "come hither and let’s make a new friend" look. Maria shoots back an incredulous glare that screams, "Oh, you are SO my old haircut." YOU GO! I love her. Or at least I don’t want to gouge her eyes out with the handle of a blunt wrench, which to my mind constitutes a definite improvement. Buffy’s Dad pairs the students to predictable levels of awkwardness: Liz and Isabel, Max and Kyle, Maria and Michael. Maria argues that she can’t be partnered with Michael because, among other reasons such as his being a total derelict, he is not even present (he cut school to go to the museum. Yeah, right. No, really). Buffy’s Dad snidely suggests that she track him down. Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize we were in Truant Officer Training Class, Mr. Sommers. Hang tight while I confer with my school schedule again. No, it says "History" here. I guess I was right after all.
Hallway, where Maria bitches and bitches and bitches and bitches and bitches about her new predicament, while Kyle sneeringly makes plans to get to know Max a little better. Kyle leaves, and Liz pouts poutingly in a poutlike fashion, but Max assures her that he can manage Kyle and that "everything will be fine." But just then a school secretary approaches and informs Max that there’s a phone call for him in the office. Translation: everything will be very much NOT fine, so pout away there, Poutmeister Liz. Pan back inside of a now studentless classroom, where Buffy’s Dad chats conspiratorially with the omnipresent Renee Zellweger about the questions the students will be asking each other in their carefully crafted pairs. What have we learned from this scene, then? That, driven by the fleeting superstition that there’s an alien in town, West Roswell High School has decided to let the FBI run the school and forgo that little academic tool once known as a "lesson plan."
Max runs into the police station. Inside, he encounters a shaken Bania. Native American brings out a contained Michael and tells Max that Michael "invaded the premises at your behest." Bania says it can’t be so, but Max throws together an impromptu story about giving Michael permission to enter in order to "pick up some research we needed for class." Clearing Michael’s name, Max insures that no charges will be pressed. Michael is free to go. Waiting the requisite four seconds in the absence of authority before speaking as if sequestered in a sound-proof vault, Max tells Michael, "Don’t do me any more favors," and walks away. As he leaves, we pan to Native American giving Porno a copy of the dome-house printouts (two pages worth). Porno looks quizzically at them as if to say, "How come they made Maria’s hair look so much better and I’m still stuck over here in Split Endsville?"
Cut to school bleachers, where Michael is getting positively screwy about Marathon, Texas. Max informs Michael and Isabel -- much to the chagrin of my strained eyes, so tired of rolling back deep in my head at each such similar comment -- that "this is getting serious!" Well, then, Max, why on earth am I so busy cracking up? Oh wait, I’m not. And neither are the Alien Three. See, Michael thinks that this geodesic dome place in Marathon has a door, which can be opened by the key he stole from Valenti’s office a few episodes back. Sorry to be so "last week on Roswell" again; I’m just trying to get all three plot points of the series so far in order. Anyway, Michael wants the Jeep. Max and Isabel want him to stop acting crazy. Max advises following the time-honored Roswell tradition of doing a whole lotta nothing. But Michael has one eye on the dome and the other on the sweeps calendar, and he decides it’s time to get the action shakin’ already. And more power to him. Michael broods, "I’m connected to this thing; it’s not letting me wait. No matter what you guys say." And in a flash Michael jumps up and leaps over the bleacher railing. And speaking of flashing, the jump causes Michael’s shirt to ride up and his pants to slide down, and we come face to face with most of his pale blue underwear which, upon several replays with my VCR’s frame-by-frame feature, I would argue are actually briefs. Briefs! Goodbye, cool guy cachet, hello "Mom stops by Target with the Sunday circular on her way home from work." Uh, Mister Roswell Editor Man? The cutting room floor called -- it wants its undie shot back. Anyway, Max and Isabel stare after him in disbelief, Max unprophetically stating, "He won’t get far without a car." Blue undies. Hee hee hee.
But what’s this? Cut to Maria pulling up in the very vehicle without which Michael cannot get far. She spots him and leaps out, informing him with zero cultural sensitivity of any kind that "we have to do this completely queer history project for tomorrow." Wow. That word hasn’t been around much lately, eh? And I, for one, could not be gayer at the prospect of having it back.
Diversions aside, Maria starts shouting questions at Michael and he advises her to get lost. But then the animated "idea light bulb" goes on over Michael’s head with that resounding "ding" sound effect, and they hammer out a deal by which Maria will "give me a ride and I’ll answer your stupid questions." Hmmm. I’m sure Michael knows what he’s doing, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out the fact that his plan seems, quite frankly, just a little bit queer. See how nicely that word fits?
Inside the Crashdown, Max and Kyle are mid-questionnaire. Nothing very remarkable comes of it, with the possible exception of Max admitting to Kyle that he "doesn’t watch much television." I HATE it when people say that. They think they’re SO much better than everyone else. Plus, they’re all lying. Over at the counter, Liz and Isabel are mid-same-questionnaire. As we cut to them, Is eyes Liz narrowly and asks, "Your favorite flavor is vanilla?" I actually laugh out loud. Which I think means that I now owe everyone I know a thousand dollars and a lap dance -- because I said it would never happen. So Is sees Liz staring at Max and suggests, "Why don’t you just bring them some ketchup or something?" Liz does, and is welcomed snidely by Kyle, who welcomes her arrival as an opportunity to skip down to "Question #8: Have you ever been in love?" The sands of time all but wash back into the ocean before Max gets around to answering: "No." Oh, DISSED. Wow. Sorry, Liz. By the way, don’t you also hate people who spell the word ketchup "catsup"? I hate those people.
Cut to dusty someplace with Michael in tow in the legendary Jetta. I will now write out an entire exchange from this scene to further illustrate how Maria’s new hair makes me hate her so very much less:
Maria: You can’t just make up answers.
Michael: Who said I’m making them up?
Maria: You do not watch The View.
Michael: It keeps me in touch with my feminine side.
Now I realize that my job is to write about the show and not for the show, but I loudly improv Michael’s line regardless: "Man, that Joy Behar needs to be stopped." Then I cackle loudly as if in the process of being passively entertained by some external source. Maria grabs the package she has come to deliver, and as soon as her back is turned, Michael takes to the driver’s seat (taking valuable time to buckle the seat belt, an important directorial "The More You Know" if ever I have seen one ["Not to mention ‘One To Grow On.’" -- Sars]) and begins to peel out of the parking lot. After numerous unproductive shouts of "you’re stealing my car," Maria manages to get in on the passenger side. Michael says he’s only borrowing the car, and Maria screams that where the car goes, so goes she as well. Michael tells her that "you had your chance," and the Jetta goes screeching onto the ol’ 285 South, Marathon-bound.
On the sound of a cell phone ringing, cut to Liz and Is in the Crashdown, Liz picking up her phone. Maria has employed the clever ruse of covertly dialing Liz’s number and then cryptically offering relevant tidbits concerning their location while the phone lies idly in Maria’s bag. It doesn’t work. Michael discovers the offending bit of technology and tosses it out the window. Gee, uh, I know you’re psyched about Texas and all, but it seems to me that simply pressing the "END" button would allow for later use of said phone in a more non-call-Liz-and-have-her-save-me-from-psycho-you kind of way. But Liz is able to discern the following bits of information: they’re in Maria’s car, Michael is driving, and they’re heading south on 285. Liz passes this along to Isabel, who snags Max and they’re off. Kyle (who I think someone slapped on the back once while he was making a really sarcastic face, causing it to freeze in that position) opines, "But things were going so well," and follows the other three outside the Crashdown. Max tells Liz she can’t come on this voyage (traveling is fun, but you are not. Is the conflict clear?), but Kyle taunts her from afar and Max relents. As the Jeep pulls out of its spot, we pan to a nearby car, which contains a poorly concealed agent on his own cell phone: "I’m outside the Crashdown. Parker and the two Evans kids just left. In a hurry." On the other end of the phone, of course, is alien-fightin’ tough gal Renee Zellweger. She receives this bit of information and then turns to send an e-mail on what appears to be a Commodore 64 interface. Black screen, white cursor, send button. That’s pretty much it. She composes her message: "Tension in the ranks. Waiting for them to slip up. Will happen soon." She then encrypts the message in some Zapf Dingbats font that doesn’t look too hard to crack and kicks back with a few rounds of the game "Lemonade Stand" as we slide into a much-needed commercial.
Back on the open road, Liz is lying to her mom on her own cell phone (man, are they giving these things out at high school like condoms these days?), and Isabel totally calls her on it: "The perfect Liz Parker? Lying to her mother?" Liz snipes back, "Yeah, well at least she knows what species I am." Ooooh. Touché, vanilla-lover. Max and Isabel brood about how they’ll get Michael back, and they do their best to keep a curious Liz in the dork, I mean, dark.
Cut back to the Jetta, Maria screaming, among other complaints, "I told you not to go over eighty. The engine won’t take it." And neither will the cops, for before the words are out of her mouth, a police siren blares and they’re being pulled over. Michael dares her to turn him in, and Maria asks for a reason not to: "You have twenty seconds to convince me." So in the time it takes the cop to saunter to the car, Michael brings Maria up to speed with the rest of the viewing audience. The cop comes to the car and is of course decked out in the ensemble of New Mexico peacekeepers, plastic replica or otherwise: uniform, badge, hat, and sunglasses designed for a planet much, much closer to the sun. Like, say, one mile away. But in the interim, Maria has suddenly become sympathetic to Michael’s plight. So in response to the officer’s "where you goin’ in such a hurry" query, Maria steps up: "I really gotta pee." She then launches into a pre-haircut-style diatribe about the many liquid fates which have conspired to make her really have to pee. Oy. Still, the unlikely plan works and they’re off with a ticket but no jail time. Maria: "You owe me big." Blue undies. I’m still on the floor.
Porno household. More father/son bonding between Kyle and dad. I check the current status of my lunch, which solemnly swears that this time it will behave and stay down, but I soon discover this to be as credible a line as "I really gotta pee." Porno walks in on Kyle trying to track Liz down. He has called everyone in town, all the families of the missing folk. Kyle confesses to Porno that "there’s always something weird going on" when Liz is around Max: "They’re not home, they lied to their parents, it’s just weird, y’know?" Oh, believe me, Porno knows. But he’s going to feign disinterest in Kyle and Kyle’s dumb problems because he doesn’t want to let on that he’s after them too. All told it’s a startlingly unrealistic feign, as Porno leaps to his feet and rushes off at the first mention of everyone’s disappearance: "I forgot something at the office." Like, maybe, your ability to lie to your son convincingly? ‘Cause I don’t see that around here anywhere.
Rest stop. Middle of nowhere. Liz tries to make nice with a testy Isabel with a peace offering of hot chocolate. "Isabel?" she asks, and Isabel wheels around, sending the cups and their contents flying all over both of them. Maybe Liz would have fared a bit better with some hot vanilla, eh? Isabel tells her to stop trying to help, waving a hand over her shirt and making the cocoa stains disappear. She does not, incidentally, offer the same service to Liz, who ventures, "Isabel, I’m not trying to take him away from you -- what if you guys found something in Marathon? Would you take him away from me?" Heartstrings sufficiently pulled (hers, not mine), Isabel waves a hand and heals Liz’s shirt. And then, in a genuinely Really Awkward Bit Of Dialogue, Max exits the rest stop to see two men arguing at a pay phone. One says to the guy in the secret-agenty suit, "Hey buddy, I need to make a call here. I told you -- hang up the phone if you ain’t gonna talk." A spy! Alien-hunter-guy alert! Clearly, this man is the worst so-called "secret" agent ever, exiled to the southwest desert to look for aliens for botching the Hoffa job so badly. The Jeep takes off and he runs to his car (y’know, the one with the "Proud Driver for the Witness Protection Program" bumper sticker on it), only to find that someone has popped the tires with his mind. Nice work, Max.
Back in the Jetta, Maria and Mr. Panties are in a spot of trouble themselves. In another scene in which Maria is annoying but does not annoy me per se, she and Michael bicker some more after the car practically explodes and they have to pull off the road. Maria tells Michael to work some mad voodoo alien shit and get them motoring again, but Michael is forced to admit that he’s just "not that good at it." And he’s not. One wave of an inept alien hand, and the battery literally bursts into flames. Michael gets in the back of the car and claims that he’ll be sleeping there, but the kvetching continues and Michael begins to abandon Maria in the flaming wreckage of the former Jetta. Where the hell is he going? "See that motel over there? I’m going to get some sleep." And sure enough, a giant neon palace has risen up out of seeming nowhere, wooing Michael in its general direction.
Cut to a slightly more dour Jeep, Liz and Is expressing concern for Michael and Maria. At the height of tension, Liz’s cell phone (an emerging character with more personality than its owner) rings. It is Kyle, claiming he wants to come see her at Maria’s. She impolitely declines with the old "I’ll see you in school tomorrow" routine and gets off. Cut to Kyle, increasingly the black-cloaked villain in a Spy Vs. Spy cartoon, sneering, "Maybe ever sooner." Pan back to see Kyle’s red chickmobile pulling onto the southbound lane of a certain 285 I might mention here.
Cut to Porno in his office, playing ham radio with 285’s increasingly busy Highway Patrol. Highway has no record of the Evans Jeep, but "I do have a speeding citation on another minor from Roswell. Gerrin, Michael. Car registered to Amy DeLuca. Mean anything to you?" It means something to me: that perhaps when he’s done with this call, Porno will put in a radio red alert to the Continuity Department, who will verify Amy DeLuca as the car’s registrant even though the cop looked only at Michael’s driver’s license. Tsk tsk tsk. There’s nothing more to say. Except "blue undies." Hee hee hee. Anyway, Porno gets the Jetta’s coordinates and traces the path to Marathon on a wall map. Which means we can add his vehicle to the caravan going south on 285, away from plodding ol’ Roswell and towards a bright and promising future. I am such a sucker for the hit-the-road plot, it’s not even funny.
The one-lane road to Marathon has now been officially abandoned by Michael Gerrin and his comedically mismatched sidekick Felix Unger, I mean Ethel Mertz, I mean Rhoda Morgenstern, I mean Maria DeLuca. For when we catch up with them, we are met with the blazing, Vegas-esque neon of a cheap motel on the outskirts of a non-town. Inside, the two discover quite the nookie palace, swathed in red velvet and reeking of cheap, tawdry, two-bit New Mexican-whore perfume. Michael plops himself down on the bed while Maria, still refining her material, dubs the place "like the porno version of Aladdin" and starts whining about being so hungry wah wah wah, and another round of fighting (I expect the Moonlighting theme song to cue at any moment) seems poised to break out. Michael, however, finally takes pity on her and offers to go in search of some food. What’s this? Could it be that these former nemeses are beginning to chip through each other’s gruff exterior to find the creamy nougat center within? Yessir, that’s exactly what’s happening. Too bad we have to wait a whole week before they finally kiss.
Meanwhile, back in the Yawnmobile (the technical definition of a Yawnmobile, by the way, is "any car that contains Liz Parker"), the three hear a radio announcement that there’s been an accident and the highway is closed ahead. Perhaps this has something to do with the fact that 285 wasn’t designed to have Roswell’s entire population pounding its pavement simultaneously and buckled under the strain. Max says they’ll have to keep on, continuing when the road reopens, sleeping in the Jeep if they have to. Liz glances nervously around to an uncaring Max and a brutal Isabel and thinks, "Is it possible that no one here wants me around?" Possible? POSSIBLE? Liz, you’re such a downer. A hatchet-wielding rapist wearing an "Ask Me About My Klan Membership" t-shirt would be preferable to you and your pathos-laden issues right about now. Come on, Liz! It’s the open road, for cryin’ out loud. Loosen up a little! Throw your hair back! Laugh at jokes about rape and the Klan, before I get fired!
Michael, meanwhile, has uncovered a treasure trove of snack food, which he brings back to the nookie den. For several uninterrupted seconds, we are treated to the patience-testing sound of Michael chewing. The mood has changed in the room now, though, and Maria attempts a flirty gesture, following a question about Michael’s loud, smacky eating with, "What, uh, what other human urges do you feel?" But he shoots her down with the calculated skill of someone who remembers what her hair looked like just five short business days ago, and Maria feigns shock that he’d even think she was interested. Needing to cool their ever-burgeoning passions, Maria resorts to that cold bucket of water that is the forgotten "List of Questions." We learn that Michael’s favorite book is Ulysses, which Maria accuses him of never having read. So he quotes like ten words, and Maria oozes with a lust reserved only for when people quote from big books no one really understands. I still don’t believe him; Cliffs Notes have quotes in them too, y’know. Inevitably, they veer off the prepared list of questions and the topic gets around to why Michael is so hell-bent on finding out where he came from. He responds, "Because there’s gotta be something better out there for me than Roswell, New Mexico." And the bonding cycle is officially complete: Maria relates, telling Michael a story from the heart about expecting that one day the father who abandoned her would come in a limo and bring them all to live as royalty. And the impetus behind all this fantasy: "There’s gotta be something better out there for me than Roswell, New Mexico." Alien, human, good hair, bad hair, blue undies, not blue undies -- underneath it all, we’re just the same inside. Forgive me for the electrical short caused by the copious tears striking the numerous electrical cables underneath my computer keyboard.
The Yawnmobile, trapped behind the roadblock. Isabel is outside the Jeep, trying to sweet-talk a cop into defiling a minor, while inside Max and Liz apologize for the external forces conspiring to ruin their lives. The only significant comment, really, is Max’s assertion to Liz that "nothing about you is stupid." Oh, I get it. It is Opposite Day in the Yawnmobile. I’m really good at this game. My turn: "Liz, you are not at all emerging as the dark-horse candidate for weak link of this show. Probably it’s because you never snivel and frown for no real reason, to my great impatience." See, but it’s Opposite Day. So everything is all, like, opposite. Oh, and [end Opposite Day] they come close to kissing. But really, they don’t.
Just as the three think they’ll never get past the roadblock, the Yawnmobile folk discover they don’t even need to try. From the corner of Isabel’s eye, she spies the Jetta marooned in front of the Motel Dirty. As the three storm into the room, a shocked Maria rolls out of the bed and topples onto Michael, asleep on the floor. Michael unnicely guesses that Max is "here to be supportive as usual," and a far more vocal and non-simpering (take notes, Parker) Max shoots back, "No, I’m here to clean up your mess as usual. What were you thinking?" But just as Michael begins his umpteenth "Ode To The Alien Within" speech about how he can’t fake his old life in Roswell anymore, the motel door swings open, and in walks Kyle Valenti. Drama! Tension! Intrigue! And not even in that Opposite Day kind of way. What show is this, suddenly? Kyle struts in and smiles vindictively. Everyone freezes. My phone rings. "Let the machine get it, goddammit," I scream to no one in particular (as opposed to my reaction, reserved for all other viewing moments of this show to now: "Hello? Oh, hi. Me? Absolutely nothing at all. What are YOU up to?"). Michael insists repeatedly that Kyle "get out." Kyle quickly realizes he cannot win a war of words (Question #4: Favorite Book? Archie Comic Digest. Question #11: Who do you most admire? That crazy Jughead fella) and instead resorts to the fists. He and Michael do further physical battle until Max is forced to step in. And with barely a touch, Kyle goes flying across the room into some cobwebby corner covered in dust and rodent droppings. He looks up, amazed. "What the hell are you guys?" he asks, because it’s clear to me that anyone who can fell the great and strong Kyle Valenti is clearly, well, out of this world.
Back from commercial, Liz tosses Kyle out of the Motel Dirty with a little "You Don’t Own Me" swagger (Hey, Liz, you’re still boring. Tell everyone) and then insists that if the five of them are truly going to get away with all of this, they have to shed all of their secrets or there can be no trust. So Max, Michael and Isabel sit on the bed like contestants on The Alien Dating Game (Bachelor #2, if you had the magical alien power to make any part of you bigger, which part would it be?) and spill a " in the last six weeks on Roswell" synopsis of the series so far. It sounds really familiar to me for some strange reason. Oh, yeah. Right.
day, finally at the dome, the Yawnmobile (plus the other four) pulls up for a tighter shot. "I told you it was something," Michael generalizes. Scoping out the desert scenery and the big tin-foil bowl that sits upside-down smack in the middle of it all, they approach it, only to find out that the notorious key does not unlock the front door. I hurl the inevitable "sorry kids, park’s closed" line at the screen and remember how old I am that I find that comment funny. Perhaps if they had gotten lost on the drive, I would have had cause to repeat "look, kids, Big Ben, Parliament" over and over again. I guess we’ll never know for sure. ["Pipe down, Russ." -- Sars]
Anyway, the key doesn’t work, as I’ve mentioned. It’s a good thing Master Locksmith Max Evans is there to take all the fun out of the whole "vision" thing by opening the door with his hand and rationalizing that the key might fit something inside. Hmmm. So they pick over the remains of the forlorn interior, and Michael finally gets another vision holding the key because (to my bewilderment) Maria is standing near him. Huh? Michael becomes aware of a secret lock behind the stone wall that only his key can open. Yay for plot progress. I hail thee. Michael locates the lock and turns the key, and from across the room a door pops open that leads underneath the floor. Cool, just like in The Goonies. The five make their way silently down, but right after Michael proclaims, "Jackpot," they hear sinister footsteps overhead, and we see the femme suede boots of a prying Officer Porno approaching. They look up in horror, fearing discovery, but another figure suddenly materializes behind Porno and knocks him out cold. Cut to Porno’s assailant, none other than an impeccably dressed Renee Zellweger. In the cheesy tin-foil dome. With the lead pipe. The five underground dwellers look up in confusion as the words "to be continued..." appear on the screen, words almost completely unnecessary considering that this is a series, which means things don’t need to be wrapped up in a happy little package at the end of every hour. Damn, I kind of liked this episode. What if I’m being converted? I take one final glance over at my calendar just to make sure -- no, Opposite Day it is not.