Fade up on a clichéd stock footage satellite shot of the planet Earth, an image which, in my pseudo-hippie collegiate experience, was most often hanging as a dog-eared poster on a dorm room wall with a stern eco-warning of the "Reuse, Reduce, Recycle" or "Be Good To Your Mother" variety written just below it. Because the director of this episode is way too enamored of the opening credits sequence of The Thomas Crown Affair, each shot following takes us closer to the surface of the planet, and finally to a skyline of New York City, a turn around the top of the Empire State Building, and inside of an elevator containing King Max "Vulcan of Brunei" Evans and the King's too-faithful blonde bride, Tess "Rodham" Harding. Because New York is the center of the universe (well, that's true) and so is Max Evans (whatever the exact, undebatable antithesis of "true" is). As the floors of the elevator climb through the 50s, Max palpitates that "this is a mistake." Tess reassures him, "You've been looking forward to it all day," but Max clarifies loud enough for the packed soundstage marked "Genuine New York City Elevator" to hear, "I mean this whole thing. Coming here. The City. Rath, Lonnie. It's a mistake." Who? Um, who again? I went a little nickname crazy last week, I'll admit, and I seem to have eliminated the doppelgangers' actual character names from my short-term memory. Hopefully the creators of this show will have realized by now that it's time to metaphorically push the rest of these misfiring "Dupes" in front of a slow-moving truck and be done with this whole silly, campy plot altogether. I'm not kidding, here. If it gets any campier on the Roswell set, I think the only big scary war the aliens all have to be concerned about is "Color War."
Scaredy Max continues his tirade: "What do I know about war and peace and politics?" Max turns to come face-to-face at close range with an elderly African-American man, who nods his head noncommittally and does his best to ignore Max's lingering "I've read about people like you in my history books!" glare. Welcome to New York, Max. Multiculturalism's a bitch, ain't it? But, in fairness, the New York segments of this two-parter have already featured more extras-of-color than the cumulative run of Jack & Jill and Seinfeld combined. Max continues for the benefit of the sullen and disaffected New Yorkers (whatever. It's a tourist attraction. Like one person in that elevator isn't also from New Mexico), "I'm gonna blow it. I'm gonna sit down at this meeting and I'm gonna meet these people and they're gonna look at me and they're gonna see this kid from New Mexico who doesn't have a clue, and…" The elevator begins to slow down and Max freaks out anew, but Tess again reminds him, "We're almost there." The elevator doors open on the eighty-sixth floor, and as a native New Yorker who expresses his love for his city by not taking the time to learn anything about it, I have no idea whether or not if that's the top floor of the Empire State Building, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it's not. I'm also pretty sure that, as befits the observation deck at the top of every tall building I've ever gone to the top of, the elevator does not spill directly out onto the observation deck without the visitor first having to walk through a museum detailing the construction of said building and a hilariously overpriced gift shop where you can pick up a Statue of Liberty foam finger or a ten dollar set of "I Heart New York" shot glasses for your loved ones back in the sticks. Max and Tess walk to the railing that overlooks one of New York's many beautiful blue-screen skylines, and they stand apart as Tess observes, "This is where you belong, Max. Up here with the world at your feet." She pauses a Royal Pause. "Like a king." Max stares silently over the non-city for a moment, then smiles (Drink! Shudder!) and notes, "I'm the King of the World." James Cameron begins the process of filing an intellectual property suit, then stops himself when he remembers the humiliation of putting that dialogue in Leo's mouth, or himself uttering such an inexcusable line at the Oscars to begin with. Which he should feel. And which he should continue to feel. Tess observes, "Yes, you are. Just not of this one." I'll never let go, Max. I'll never let go.
Down on location, Evil Michael "Mr. Tee Hee" Guerin (Rath) and Evil Isabel "Isa-Hell" Evans (Lonnie) enact some mad crazy vengeance, yo, walking past an outdoor café (because al fresco dining is totally all the rage in New York City in the last week of November) and bustin' up some mad crazy shit. Isa-Hell tells Mr. Tee Hee, "When he gets here -- if he gets here -- we're puttin' him in his place. I'm sick of getting attitude from him." Mr. Tee Hee stops by a table and picks up a sandwich containing massive amounts of fishcakes, and he begins wailing at a nearby waiter about putting mayo on pastrami. Gross? Yes. His sandwich? Not so much. Pointless? Do I even need to tell you? Is there not enough fat content in a pastrami and mayo for you, Mr. Staypuft Marshmallow Superman? What would you prefer, a scoop of vanilla ice cream and a Crisco glaze with a side order of ANOTHER FIVE SANDWICHES? Isa-Hell takes the high road, plot-development-wise, interrupting this display of sheer "ACTING" and informing Evil Michael, "He's here." Mr. Tee Hee throws the fishcakes at the waiter and skulks away, and he and Isa-Hell walk away from the eatery. They walk past a street sign correctly reading, "E. 51st Street" and stop at the glass-covered E, F, 6 subway stop in front of the Citicorp Building. Which is extremely near my old apartment. Shout-out? I was so close to commenting on how proud I was of the director of this episode for designing a pretty accurate simulation of midtown New York, had they not walked past a sign for "Edward Street" on their way to the subway stop. Edward Street? Like it would have been that hard for someone to have shelled out the six dollars for a "Streetwise" map, much like the one I am currently holding in my hands to confirm that there is no such "Edward Street" on the entire island of Man-NOT-an. Anyway, standing in front of the stop is the almost-forgotten Gage, doing a poor job of folding a large map he should instead have been sharing with the director and asking, "Do you see an Edward Street anywhere on here? I mean, DO YOU?" Isa-Hell snarks at him for being late, and he responds with a snarling, "God, I hate this town." Well sorry, World's Smallest Independently Traveling Tourist, but if you really want to take in what New York has to offer, you simply have to get out of midtown and away from Edward Street, where there's really nothing to see. And I do mean nothing.
Opening credits: Cat being sucked through a…oh, sorry. Wrong recap.
Commercials: Tonight's episode of Roswell is brought to you by Dude, Where's My Car. Translated, that means that the world is a mere two more horsemen away from the beginning of the apocalypse. Two horsemen called Dawson's Creek and Dungeons and Dragons, I'm willing to bet.
A black-clad duo of hipsters play an upright bass and a saxophone (always -- ALWAYS!) in front of a one-lane Lexington Avenue (oh, my mistake this time -- "Edward Street"), as we join Gage in the process of asking the two apparent alien traitors where Max and Tess have gone to. Isa-Hell responds that "they're doing the tourist thing. Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty." Gage curls his lip (this kid has obviously picked up his copy of Lip Service: The Michael Guerin Guide to Pursing and Curling Your Way to Every Emotion) and acts his usual unctuously coy self: "You let them wander around this open sewer alone?" Okay, we know you hate the city, Gage. But if there were plans to set up this clandestine meeting Max and Tess could know nothing about, why would he be surprised that Mr. Tee Hee and Isa-Hell had shipped them off somewhere for a little while? Isa-Hell tells him not to worry, seeing as "even Max Evans could find his way from the Empire State. It's three blocks." If by "three," you mean "eighteen." And four long blocks over. And if they were also planning a trip to the Statue of Liberty, that would require a ferry ride that would put them a fair distance from Man-NOT-an and suck up several hours of quality peace-on-five-planets time. Gage tells them they'd better be right, seeing as "without Max, no one at the summit is gonna give you two the time of day." Mr. Tee Hee reasserts their position as "two of The Royal Four," and Gage scoffs as Gage is wont to do, "Royal Rejects is more like it." Blah we're the originals blah hothead blah, and Gage notes, "They were carefully hidden away in Roswell and got custody of the granolith. You were dumped in the sewer. Figure that out." I have. They all suck. Mr. Tee Hee snarls and purses, and Isa-Hell reminds Gage that he won't get the granolith without their help, and Gage counters that they won't get home until he gets the granolith. All right. person who says "granolith" with a straight face more than once in a scene has to drive Gage to daycare for the rest of the year. They've been warned. By the way, how is it that Gage is completely fine these days? Shouldn't he be yanking off chunks of face by now?
Mr. Tee Hee spies Max and Tess walking their way, and Gage throws his map in frustration and disappears back down the steps and onto the Edward Street Line screaming something incomprehensible about this "butt-ugly town" (gee, you think he hates…oh, never mind). As Max and Tess approach, practically holding hands (awwww), Isa-Hell adopts a fake-ass smile and muses to Mr. Tee Hee, "Here come the losers." Word. And know thyself, by the way. They meet on that famous landmark corner of Edward Street and One-Lane Lexington, and ask Max and Tess if they've gotten their fill of the sites. Tess indicates, "I could use a rest," and they assent to take a trip to see Mr. Tee Hee and Isa-Hell's "crib." They walk down the streets of Man-NOT-an, Tess gazing at Max in horror when Mr. Tee Hee pinches two bags of nuts and soda from a street vendor we don't even get to see haplessly react. Cut to the four still walking when they reach the Canal Street N from last week's opening scene (hey, that's not a short walk), then the aren't-we-gritty subway shot that would have denoted travel but for some reason doesn't, and then the four walking in a dank underground tunnel with Max calling after them.
They come upon the "crib," which I think is supposed to look horribly ramshackle but looks more like a cross-promotion between the Macintosh product-placement department and an Ikea ad from a few years back where they decorated really unlikely places like a hospital room or a train. Isabel, sitting on a ratty couch, observes, "It ain't quite Mayberry, is it?" Max asks if this is where they were born, and Isabel backstories that they broke out of their pods and "into the brave new world of the sewers." Considering their ability to infiltrate their way into shiny sports cars and a host of Urban Outfitters around the New York City metropolitan area, Tess asks with the appropriate amount of incredulity, "And now you live here?" Michael, brandishing a hockey stick and a checking pink balls (?) all around the place, retorts, "Hey, it beats living in Brooklyn." Oh, not EVEN. You want to stay on the recapper's good side, you step right off of his hallowed borough with its parks and brownstones and Cosby imagery and fun for children and adults of all ages. Pardon me while I enact some killer mad vengeance on your asses, stop by the post office on my way back from the whuppin', and mail your asses right on back to Edward Street. Yo. Oh, and "shout-out."
Tess continues with the inquisition as Evil Michael continues his penalty shooting: "So why did your protector bring your pods to New York? And why put you in the sewers?" Isa-Hell wants to know why so many questions about the shape-shifter, and Tess launches into a pathos-for-viewers-with-reeeeeeally-good-long-term-memories retort about Nasedo, who raised her and with whom she was "very close." They, um, were? Mr. Tee Hee probably implies some kind of subtext I can't quite discern when he sends another pink ball (?) whizzing right by Tess's head and asks, "Yeah, how close was that?" Max blah "watch it!" and turns the topic to "the summit," wanting to know some pertinent details about the when and where. Mr. Tee Hee requests that he "chill," adding, "All in good time." Max: "The time is now." Mr. Tee Hee reels back with the hockey stick and sends a pink ball (?) rocketing toward Max's head, and Max reaches out a hand and picks it out of the air. Hey, cool power. For a lost, infirmed extra in Awakenings, from where that test of reflexes was so non-topically stolen. Mr. Tee Hee advances on Max and asks, "You flexin' on me?" Whatever. Isa-Hell calls from the couch that they should think twice before making her get up, and Mr. Tee Hee laughs in a conciliatory manner before retreating back to the couch with Isa-Hell. Max and Tess sit down on a cushion opposite them, and after Isa-Hell observes that Max is "so Zan," but leaves out the follow-up comment brought to you courtesy of the Roswell forums, "With the exception of that fetchingly fungal facial hair, the Berlitz-English-Language-instructional-tapes-played-in-reverse accent, and, oh yes, a personality of any kind." Word, forums. Word.
Isa-Hell changes the topic: "You two done the deed yet? Made the beast with two backs?" Shakespeare, who had just stopped spinning in his grave from the news that O was to one day become a Hollywood reality, takes another few revolutions at being evoked in this context. She tells them that they are "in for a treat," and Michael smiles big and utters the line that sends me and my rapidly-emerging lunch of Fishcakes 'n' Spite straight for the nearest bathroom: "Alien sex, baby. Accept no imitations." Then he howls, as if a wolf. Then he sticks out his tongue and wiggles it around in the air suggestively (once again, the locus of all of Brendan Fehr's emoting originating in his mouthy region) and points at the couple. Tess throws around an embarrassed I'm-going-to-need-a-few-more-layers-of-padding-if-my-body-wants-to-retain-its-natural-shape-after-a-strenuous-night-of-climbing-Mount-Pecs-if-you-know-what-I-mean-and-I-think-you-do stare, and Max turns the topic back to "the summit." Isa-Hell tells him he needs to meet an emissary and pass a test to determine whether he is the real king, and when he attempts another syllable of follow-up, Isa-Hell shuts him down and promises to "get [him] to the church on time." She puts out a hand to turn up the music on her Sony Mysterious Orb, and Mr. Tee Hee fairly mounts her right there on the couch. Kissy badness. Max and Tess shift uncomfortably across the way. And God help me, I think I'm getting used to those accents. Mad crazy.
Real Michael "Dude, Where's My Comb" Guerin (in comparison to his mohawked NYC self, that hair looks downright acceptable. IN COMPARISON, people) and Real Isabel "O Subplot Where Art Thou" Evans sit in the Crashdown, Isabel grousing, "Two days and not a word." Isabel told her parents that Max has "gone camping again" (again? Has there even been a foray into the desert non-woods since last spring?), and she adds for a measure of timely reality, "They think he doesn't want to spend Thanksgiving with his family." She continues on that "he could have at least said goodbye," and Michael assures her that it has nothing to do with them, adding, "It's probably got something to do with…" He indicates Liz, standing behind the register in uniform telling a customer, "Bye." Yeah, Liz, bye. Yeah, we wish. They get up to leave in a hurry, and a suddenly flat-haired, extension-free Maria "You Can Take Me To Gel And Back" DeLuca calls after them, "Thanks for helping. So sweet of you." Help them? Since Michael only works there when it's convenient for easy plot development, aren't the two of them no more than paying customers right now? Anyway, Maria makes her way over to Liz "Take The Edward Street Line To Central" Parker and indicates that there's a juicy rumor about her all around school. And what rumor is that? Hemming. Hawing. Blah-di-o-la. "The word is that you and Kyle slept together. I know, it's so humiliating. I know. I just can't imagine who made it up." Liz cops to it being true and skulks away from the counter, and Maria follows right behind, telling her, "No, Liz. The rumor is that you and Kyle Valenti slept together, like, sexually." Liz again claims that that's just exactly what happened, and Maria makes it All About Her (Maria's raging sense of entitlement in the lives of everyone around her notwithstanding, if I were her I would probably react the exact same way) and asks why Liz didn't tell her. Liz responds that she was "just upset about Max, and Kyle was there" and one thing led to another. Maria shakes her head in disbelief. Liz skulks further away.
Liz walks along that back alley of the Crashdown, wearing a black hooded sweatshirt over her Crashdown outfit and looking very, very urban indeed. She tosses a large bag of garbage in a conveniently-appearing dumpster, and recoils at a cry of "yo" (natch) coming from a few feet away. Liz walks around to the other side of the receptacle and notices Tess "Tess Arquette" Harding (Ava) sleeping right there in the middle of the gutter. Liz goes all screamy-mimi in spotting her and observing, "Tess? No, I mean, I mean…" She continues on her highly evolved conversational ways, asking, "What are you doing here?" Tess Arquette responds, "Trying to get some sleep." Liz: "In the alley?" Tess says nothing and rolls over to rest her weary head on a pillow of five-cent deposits. Liz begins to open her mouth again, the hooded sweatshirt concealing her entire face. Shut up, Ghost Liz, Way of the Fishcakes. She shuts up. Wow. Those aliens really do have magic powers.
Really cool alien royalty get the coolest alt-rock coronations, don't they? In fact, they do. As matchbox thirty (or whoever) plays a somber tune on the soundtrack, we find ourselves back in Non York, Mr. Tee Hee leading Max through a dark hallway and asking, "You got it together?" He then leads Max into an underground tunnel, near the beginning of which sits a small metal desk and two product-placed Restoration Hardware stainless steel chairs. In one of the chairs sits a very bald man with a goatee wearing a well-pressed greenish suit. Mr. Tee Hee pulls out a chair in which Max sits down, and Mr. Clean slowly stands up from his chair and walks behind Max. He puts his left hand on top of Max's head without touching it, then moves the hand behind his head. After a moment, a light shines behind Max's head and comes shooting through his forehead (make your own "nothing in there, as suspected" joke if you feel you must…mine's in the subhead for this section). Said light illuminates the room in an unspecial effect brought to you by The People Who Invented Lite Brite Technology Inc., and the light travels to the far end of the darkened tunnel and burst in five separate lights that form a "V," the lowest point on the V glowing the most brightly. All the lights fade as the three look on. Mr. Clean returns to his chair and sits, reaching into a matching metal briefcase and pulling out a piece of paper. He pushes it toward Max with a "sign here." Royal Pause II: The Pause Goes On. And then: "You're heinous." What? Cool! Oh, wait. I guess he actually said, "Your Highness." My mistake. But he is.
Max signs a sheet of paper, and Mr. Clean tears off the back sheet and gives it to Max to retain for his own records. Mr. Clean leaves. Mr. Tee Hee comments in non-believable disbelief, "You really are the King!" What part of him didn't know that before, I wonder. Max regards the sheet in his hand: "It's a timecard. The emissary works for a temp agency?" Ha! Best. Shout-out. Ever. Michael explains that the emissary "never left his crib," and that Mr. Clean was just a person being used as a puppet by the emissary so that he himself didn't have to travel to Earth. Mr. Tee Hee: "Doin' the Linda Blair." Oh, leave her out of this. Anyway, certain humans are used as these "vessels," and after they have served their purpose, the humans never know what happened. "They think they've been abducted." Mr. Tee Hee insists that Lonnie will explain more on this matter later. "Now, you should be celebratin'. You passed, man. You are the freakin' King." Which entitles him to "the best slice of pizza in New York. And I'm buying." Oooh, it's good to be the King. Cash and prizes equaling up to $1.75. He didn't even offer to product-place the man a Coke.
And we're back in Roswell. Huz. Zah. A phone rings in the dark of a bedroom to a clock radio reading, "3:12." Maria's hand reaches out and answers the phone with an appropriately confused/exhausted/angry voice people use when they answer the phone in the middle of the night. Cut to Liz's room -- ladies, please stop tying up the Not! Line when there are other people who need it more than you do -- where a "sleep chip no come in handy, Stephanie" Liz sounds more than her share of bizarrely peppy when she tells Maria she needs to see her. Liz whines her into meeting her at "the place by the thing [well, "think"] we went that time with what's-her-name." I'm guessing that line was supposed to signal some kind of unspoken and longstanding bond between the best friends, but did the sheer superfluity of it bother anyone as much as it bothered me? Good. Thought so.
Cut to Liz and a standard poodle dressed in a super-twee plaid wool cap with a pompom on top for its eventual entry in the Best of Breed contest -- oh, sorry. It's Maria. Well, bonjour, Madame French Villager. They're sitting outside on the ledge of a geyser-esque fountain, Liz apologizing and saying, "I know this all sounds really crazy." Maria responds, to the fury of millions, "No. Crazy is sleeping with Kyle Valenti." Oh, sorry, The Once and Never Bride of Sloppy Joe, but when did you start casting aspersions on other people and their sexual non-conquests? Yeah, I thought so. Anyway, Liz does a pretty adequate job of recapping "End of the World" so I don't have to do it -- again -- apologizing, "I know. It's really confusink." More retread. Maria thinks she can fill in the rest of the blanks: "So you slept with Kyle." Nope. "Not really. I arranged it so Max saw Kyle and I in bed together. But nothink really happened." Liz apologizes again for lying, and Maria returns the apology for overreacting, even adding the super-understanding, "I should have known it was an alien thing." Royal Pause III: In 3-D. "Are you still a virgin?" Duh. Yes. She won't be breakink that seal any time soon. They high-five, giving it up for virginity. A different kind of star floats across the sky. The More You Know.
Maria, wearing her Crashdown uniform, still a virgin, knocks on the door to Simon from Go's office inside the UFO Center, all flirtily singing, "Brody [Who? Oh, yeah], you didn't call for your order, so I brought you one anyway. I brought you a Galaxy Sub, hold the mayo, and extra pepper jack." No response. She pushes open the door to his office to find it empty, and we cut from her confused glare right on back to Non York to discover Simon stepping out of a taxicab into the middle of a scene of flaming barrels and blazing police sirens. A cop slams a scantily-clad prostitute up against the trunk of the cab. Sweaty seventies porno music plays. A woman calls from behind, "Hey baby, you wanna dance?" Meanwhile, inside Gracie Mansion, Giuliani issues yet another quality-of-life citation against this show's current perception of New York. Where did Simon ask to be taken to, anyway, "Back in Times Square"?
Mr. Tee Hee uses a stolen loaf of French bread as a pointer as he indicates a drawing of the five planets we saw shoot through Max's head just before. Max asks, "So that's…The Royal Seal?" It, in fact, is. It features the five worlds of their star system, and the bottom of the V is "home," which still doesn't have a name of any kind. Mr. Tee Hee continues, "That's how the emissary knew you were the real deal. You've got The Royal Seal stenciled on your brain." He continues on that each of the other four planets will be sending a possessed emissary to the summit (which, then, is taking place on Earth for what reason, exactly?), and Tess wants to know why they can't come in person. Mr. Tee Hee has just the lip-pursing snark: "You see, little girl, space is what we call very, very big." During which his accent finally finishes its inevitable morphing into a dead-on imitation of a circa-Taxi Tony Danza. Isa-Hell indicates that no other aliens will be venturing to Earth until someone comes to take them home. Everyone says "home" in rather hushed, awed tones, like, five billion times. But they can only go home if, as Mr. Tee Hee tells us, "the man here cuts a deal at the summit." The Man = Max. Even with the visual, that wasn't entirely clear to me, either. What kind of a deal? Well, it turns out that their planet is (we already knew this) at war. "Blood on the streets, baby." Well, then, if the place has been locked in bloody battle warranting The World's Longest, Most Political U2 Song in History, why does everyone want to get back there so badly? Khivar stole the throne from King Max and, as it turns out, he is hated among all people on his planet and will do anything to return it to peace. More hushed iterations of "home." Max tells them that he didn't think this would come to bear so quickly (doesn't feel like it's going that fast to me, friend), and tells them that he won't go anywhere without Michael and Isabel. Isa-Hell says something about "the Royal Four, not the Royal Seven," tacking on another "yo" for good measure. She then claims that it will all work itself out, "unless they bring up the granolith again." Mr. Tee Hee explains the granolith as "this stupid religious thing" and "some useless piece of junk," asking Max if he's ever heard of it. He claims he hasn't. She asks again. He claims he hasn't. Again. That al fresco restaurant can now legitimately set up shop outside the Edward Street subway station. Because sometime during that last scene, it officially became spring.
Screams in the darkness. Back in Roswell, Liz runs down a flight of steps to comfort a screaming Tess Arquette, who is apparently sleeping on the Parker couch now that all of the parents have decided to abdicate to the sovereign nation of Parental Casting Budget Constraint. Liz sits on the couch and takes a weeping Tess Arquette in her arms, askink, "What? What?" In the same inflection. Both times. Both times. Exactly. Exactly. The. The. Same. Same. Echo. Echo. Anyway. Tess Arquette tells Lizbot, "I saw it. I watched it happen again. Zan. The accident." Liz tries to comfort her, explaining that it was "just a dream," but Tess Arquette continues to wail that it's all her fault. Wah. "I could have stopped it." Wah with a twist. Liz wants to know more. Tess Arquette cries and cries. "I can't talk about it." You can't?
Oh, but she can. Cut to the Crashdown by dawn, where Tess Arquette's amazingly swift acclimation to a New Mexico accent continues unabated as the New York disappears almost completely. Thank the holy freakin' heavens. Tess Arquette claims that Zan was "stubborn," and Liz somehow divines from this character analysis, "You must have loved him a lot." She did. "I'm not sure he ever loved me back, though. Just a feeling. Always felt like he was waitin' for someone else to walk into his life." His Liz doppelganger, as it were. Awwww. And it would have been so easy to manufacture another Lizbot with the push of a button and the whirring of some machines and a few union workers to run the assembly line. Tess: but enough about me, says planet-hopping alien renegade. What about you, indistinguishable small-town waitress and future Lifetime movies bit-part player and cast-out-of-Hollywood professional temp? Well, it's like this: "It was right over there. I was workink." Is there ever an episode that doesn't include a healthy recap of the pilot? Nope. "Someone brought in a gun and it kinda went off and I got shot. I was dying. But Max brought me back." That seems significant to Tess Arquette for some reason.
Go to sleep, people. It's dawn. There was an establishing shot of daytime sky before we cut into the Crashdown for the last scene. Which is kind of curious, then, that it's pitch black in New York, considering Eastern Time would have it at, like, eight in the morning. Isabel is on the phone with Max, who is calling from a payphone in New York. The sun is coming up behind Isabel, and she's wearing a gray cardigan sweater, perfectly-coifed hair, and full make-up. AT DAWN. Have I mentioned that it's still dark in New York? Oh. Max asks Isabel how Thanksgiving was, and she guilt-trips, "Mom cried all the way from the cranberry sauce to the peach cobbler." Royal Pause IV: This Time It's Pause-onal. "So did I." Oh, Isabel. You're just overtired. Because it's dawn. Max cuts to the questioning: "Isabel, how would you feel about going home?" She doesn't know what he means, exactly. It seems crazy. Max tells her that it isn't, "and I need an answer from you both." Isabel kicks it guilt-trip style, telling him that she needs some time to think about it, and he rehashes his fight with Isa-Hell in quoting the "self-indulgent little boy" comment, telling her he doesn't want to "rehash the entire thing" and calling her Vilandra. She tells him, "That's not fair." He tells her what wasn't fair was hearing the whole story from Lonnie, and he cuts down an attempted apology with, "You should have said that the first time I confronted you." Isabel, basically, replies, "Confronting with the what now?" I'm paraphrasing. He tells her he'll call her "after the summit" and slams down the receiver. His change goes down in the phone. He, um, used change? He couldn't lay a palm on the phone and make it ring in New Mexico? Wouldn't it be, like, ten dollars a minute? Well I guess the rates are all that much lower when you make the call -- say it with me now, people -- AT DAWN.
Crashdown dining room, at a time still too early to attract the breakfast crowd. Isabel and Michael surround Tess Arquette on either side, Isabel barking, "Why did Lonnie impersonate me?" Tess Arquette pleads ignorance, and Michael needs a time out, it seems, after he loses his temper and reaches out a hand, sending numerous plates smashing to the floor. Liz enters. This blatant destruction of her family's property does not seem to bother her. Nor is it a problem that her parents have inexplicably disappeared for arguably the most important family holiday on the American calendar, and she managed not to have shed a tear between the non-cranberry non-sauce and the non-peach non-cobbler. She pulls Tess Arquette over to a corner of the dining room and tells her that she has to come out with her secret if Max is in danger. Liz starts to cry. "I love him." I have no snarky comment to describe her delivery of that line. It plain ol' sucked. I'm sorry. It did. Cue flashback of The Truck of Non-Speed-Bump Destruction gliding over Zan's body. Tess Arquette whispers, "Lonnie and Rath killed Zan. And they're probably gonna kill Max." Perhaps he shall die a hero's death, at dawn. Thank goodness that, in New York City at least, that happens to still be several hours away.
Blah New York blah fee fi fo dumb, where Max, Tess, Mr. Tee Hee, and Isa-Hell walk down Yet Another Darkened Hallway, Mr. Tee Hee warning Max, "Now you get in trouble, you look to us and we'll help you out." Tess, her stock continuing to rise, actually manages to be the only character on this show who can understate a line without putting the audience on a NyQuil power-bender in the process, in responding, "I think he'll handle it." Mr. Tee Hee doesn't miss a beat, and between his horrific pronunciation and the overall non-believability of this line, I had to rewind the tape several times before I could figure out that he does actually say, "Hey, is someone talking to you, retard?" I'm sorry, but, um, BAH HA HA HA HA! Now that is a damn fine example of snappy writing right there. "Retard." By the way, Mr. Tee Hee, fourth grade called. It wants its hilariously inappropriate and politically incorrect insults back. Because they were deemed too "gay." Hey, see what I did there? Anyway, Max gets all up in Mr. Tee Hee's face with that, all "I was the one who passed the emissary's test" this and "I'm the one in charge here" that. Tess smiles like her intergalactic husband has just swooped down from heaven and announced, "I'll pay the rent," and she smiles all "my hero" as Isa-Hell tells Mr. Tee Hee to take Retard aside so she can have a private chat with Max. She puts her hands on his shoulders and launches in, "I'm proud of you, Max. You're everything I loved about Zan and more. You're the brother I never knew." Hugs. Well, one hug. Isa-Hell walks away and Max follows. "Retard." Tee hee, indeed.
And, really, this right here is where it all starts to go so very, very, very wrong. The Compromised Alien Four walk into a room in this underground tunnel to find a large conference table right in the middle. Four people stand on the other side of the table, one of whom is Simon. Max asks, "Brody?" Who? Oh, yeah. He corrects Max, telling him, "Actually, they've changed my name to some other awful sci-fi cheesefest that even the writers of My Stepmother Is An Alien deemed inauthentic," and I will not dignify the "writers'" decision to cultivate such inanities and force the recap-reading public to learn those names. Simon has the glazed-over look of alien possession in his inquiry, "Are you Zan?" Max responds that he was Zan but now he's Max, and the Kathy Griffin lookalike to Simon's left glazes, "If he doesn't even know who he is, how can he sit in conference with us?" Even though she's inexplicably wearing a nametag that reads, "Hello, my name is Judy." Which is not how she is introduced. Simon states that the emissary certified him, and then introduces the other three alien puppets: Kathy Griffin, an overweight redhead we'll call Mrs. Poole, and an African-American gentleman who is this week's Mr. Status (I guess Mr. Quo couldn't afford the interplanetary airfare). Simon says (hee) that each of them will represent each of their worlds, and that "Max speaks for his." From a mysteriously-appearing back door, Gage barges in all, "Actually, Khivar speaks for his world. And I speak for Khivar." He sits at the conference table and snarks at Tess about being Max's "genocidal girlfriend." Well, it doesn't quite slip off the tongue with the same easy grace as a certain "retard" snipe I might mention here, but I guess it makes more sense to the rapidly-deteriorating plot. Isa-Hell whispers, "You know him?" Look, Isa-Hell. We already know you've got underhanded dealings with L'il Big Alien Man across the way there. There's no need to call attention again to the fact that he and Max have also been acquainted. So return your overdue copy of Traitorous Subterfuge for Dummies to the New York Library of We Get It, because, well, we get it. Max tells Isa-Hell that it's a "long story." It certainly, certainly is.
Back at the Crashdown, Isabel's hair is looking quite lovely, in fact, as she paces nervously and worries about finding a way "to warn Max" as Michael, Liz, and Tess Arquette look on. Liz non-sequiturs her way through Roswell history in referencing "The White Room," fairly screeching, "Remember when it looked like I wasn't going anywhere? I was in every scene then, people!" Again with the paraphrasing. But I digress. And have. And will. What she really says is this: "Hey, Isabel. Can't you dream-walk Max? Y'know, put a warning in his mind. You've done it before. Y'know, when he was in The White Room." Isabel claims that he was drugged and only a few miles away during that rancid episode of stink, but in this rancid episode of stink, he's all the way across the country. Michael notes, "I think we're out of alternatives." I love that Mr. Tee Hee has destigmatized the word "retard" for my recapping convenience. Hey, guys, check this out: Shut up, Liz. For I think you are a retard. Damn, I love this job.
Simon from Go kicks things off by telling the others seated at the conference table (The Alien Other Three stand behind Max), "We're here in the spirit of reconciliation." Blah. Mrs. Poole is really pissed off that she drew the short straw and ended up with the Susan-Hawk-after-the-cellulite-apocalypse-truck-driver body, chewing her way right through the stark non-scenery in her insistence that they all need to stop attacking each other. She claims that "the situation is intolerable." Like your ass don't even know, Poole. Mr. Status agrees, noting, "We have to find a solution." All eyes fall to Max. Royal Pause V: Jason Versus Freddie Versus Pause. But Gage pipes up that Khivar has a solution to all this crazy fighting: Khivar remains in power, Khivar remains in power, and I'm in a coma. Or something. Also, Max tells his followers to lay down their weapons and support Khivar's government. Oh, and they want the granolith back. I jam the spike of that pointy orb directly in my eye, and the vision in my tearful other eye focuses just in time for Max to reply, "I have to think about this." Simon from Go snarks back, "I'd be surprised if you didn't." Hee. Simon knows all. They give him twenty minutes to accept or reject the plan. Max whispers, "You'll have it," and the four depart. The three pointless extras get back on the bread line.
Back on Edward Street, Max and Tess painfully recap the episode thus far, Max kicking it off in high cliché style: "Cut a deal with Nicolas? I don't trust him any farther than I could throw him." Way to set up the punch line, Rowan. Tess replies with the obligatory I'm-the-first-lady-to-the-galaxy's-most-hilarious-king quip, "You can throw him pretty far." Tess asks why Max lied to Mr. Tee Hee and Isa-Hell about the granolith, and Max fixes Tess with his best what-part-of-"sign-up-for-the-mailing-list-to-find-out-when-the-full-recap-goes-live"-don't-you-understand glare (oh, wait, that's me doing the fixing, I guess) when he adds that Liz told Max last week that the granolith would be dangerous "if it fell into the wrong hands." But she wouldn't tell him how she knew that. "The way she said it. She seemed so sure. I just don't know what to do." Tess extols Max's leadership abilities, telling him, "Whatever you do, it will be the right choice. I'm sure of it." Blah "I know it in my bones." Max responds that he doesn't deserve all of the kick-ass support she keeps tossing his way, when all he keeps giving her in return is a big ol' plate of stale and overcooked fishcakes for her troubles. She even has an answer for this: "I think in that other life, you must have been one great husband." Awwwww. Um, waitress? Better make those fishcakes to go. Someone's gettin' randy.
Ew. Speaking of that. And speeyacking of that, as well. Back inside the Omnipresent Granite Underworld, which apparently composes what is always just under my feet while I'm walking the streets of Man-NOT-an (and not so much as one giant alligator in the sewers to complete the cliché), Gage sits alone. He comments -- and not for the first or last time -- "God, I hate this town." Whatever, Copper Summit dude. Go back to Hicksville. He looks down an empty hallway and mutters a curious, "Hello?" He comes into contact with Isa-Hell, who pushes him up against a granite post and leans in with a "yo." She asks if he missed her, and he actually delivers the line, "I can't wait to see more of you." This is so many light years away from acceptable that I can't even believe the sound from this scene has reached Earth yet. Banter. He wants the granolith. She wants to go home. She tells him, "I'm not like the others. I remember our world. I remember Khivar. I remember what it was like to be Vilandra. I want that life and I'll do what I have to to get back." She tilts his head up to hers, and even with her feet shoulder-width apart and all hunched toward him like The Hunchback of Slutra Dame, she's still about three feet taller than he is. Which is good, considering that she's about two inches away from breaking any number of federally-enforced statutes guarding against this canoodling with a minor. She tells him that Max will go for the deal because "millions of lives hang in the balance." Gage continues that "Khivar wants him dead," and Isa-Hell retorts, "I'd have to be a special kind of stupid not to figure that out." She's also willing to renounce Mr. Tee Hee. Ooooh, big sacrifice. Like giving up lupus for lent. She walks away. Gage leans back against the post and whispers, "What a woman." No comment. Oh, wait, comment. "Retards."
Crashdown. Night again. Isabel slams a hand down on the table and yells, "Dammit!" She reports that "it's not working" (Liz: "What?" Djb: "Workink." Liz: "Oooooh."), and Liz asks, "What's Plan B?" Isabel responds that "there isn't one." Oh, fine, you guys. Why don't you just HAND me that "there is no step three" joke of the week I was trying so hard to go without? There is no Plan B. There is no Plan B. Chuckle. You people happy now? Oh, but there is a Plan B. Tess Arquette skulks up from where she had been standing by a table near the back of the shot and announces, "Liz can do it." Um, eh? "Max brought you back from the dead. You've been changed." Um, eh redux? "Look, there ain't enough time to explain." Translated: this moment makes ghoulishly little sense, so we'll just skip over that whole "prescribing logic" thing that characterizes linear plot development on so many other shows. Tess Arquette: "If Max brought you back, you're different now." Liz sits down in a nearby chair, all central to the action again. Damn. She's ba-ack. You Liz lovers are all getting booted.
Back in the dank underground tunnels of Granitopia, Isa-Hell spots Tess and Max walking arm in arm (awwww) toward her, and she asks The Alien Formerly Known as Retard for a private moment. Tess goes. Isa-Hell sulks, "You lied to me. I don't like it. But there it is." She circles him. She circles him again. She again makes with the "millions of people will die" speech and preaches the gospel of "the greater good," calling the two of them "nothing in the scheme of things" and even "WE GET IT," except she leaves out the last one. He says nothing. Isa-Hell's accent is almost entirely gone. She lets Max walk ahead, telling him, "After you. You're heinous." Er, "Your Highness."
Real Isabel insists that Liz take her hand, and Liz frets, "I'm really scared to do this. If you can't contact him, what makes you think I can?" Isabel responds, "I know my brother, and I know if there's one voice he will hear, no matter what he's doing, no matter where he is, it's yours." Dude, it's true. All hail Liz and The Whine Heard Round the World. She takes Isabel's hand.
Granitopia conference room. Simon asks if Max has made his decision, and Max tells them that the granolith was entrusted to him, and that he will not give it up to anyone. Gage stands and speeches about how "you're all witnesses. Khivar tried to be reasonable, tried to extend a hand of peace, had it slapped away." The conference is over, and the interplanetary puppets stand up and take their leave. On her walk by, Kathy Griffin observes that Max "made a lot of enemies here today." Gage tells him that his predecessor was killed because "he made. Bad. Decisions." Gage leaves. Simon still hasn't gotten up, and when he finally does and walks over to Max, we discover that the other actors in the room have stage-directed themselves out accordingly, leaving just Simon, Max, and Tess. Wow. Even Simon gets an Emmy clip. For your consideration: "You don't remember any of this, I'm sure. But our families used to be very close. You and I practically grew up together. I was there at your father's funeral" blah blee I remember when you were THIS BIG blee blah-di, and then, "It was so painful to watch you fall." Simon purses his lips (damn, that thing is contagious) and bemoans the fact that "it's all ancient history now. What a shame it is to see history repeat itself." Simon leaves, and Max and Tess stand alone. He puts his arm around her shoulder (awwww) and I really, really, really thought the episode was over and that the shot was poised to fade to black and for a product-placed advertisement for music heard on tonight's episode by, like, Destiny's Cousin Ernie or something. I need to start using the counter feature on my VCR. Because it's not even over.
And now, the longest denouement in the history of the moving image. Or is this still angling toward the climax? It's that easy to know for sure. Out on Edward Street, Mr. Tee Hee bellows at Max that he may well have ruined the only real chance they have of ever getting home. "You think you're the man? Is that it?" Yeah, yeah, you pity the fool who don't return the granolith. We already knew that. And perhaps it's to the acting credit of Jason Behr that he's able to deadpan this line, as he looks Mr. Tee Hee right in the eye and slow-burns, "That's right. I am the man." God. They continue walking. Isa-Hell notes that they'll "find another way home." Mr. Tee Hee proposes getting "a slice," and Isa-Hell responds that she's "sick of pizza" and proposes "Chinatown." Oy. Polanski wept.
Liz and Isabel mind meld for a brief moment, and we cut back to New York to find the aliens rounding a slo-mo corner as Liz appears across the street from them in a smoky haze. Mr. Tee Hee reaches out and grabs Tess, putting his hand over her mouth and pulling her to one side. Isa-Hell watches as Max walks under a large metal, like, thing that window washers stand on, attached to the side of a building above. Max. Liz. Eye contact. Max cocks his head like a polite puppy and takes a step toward Liz, just as the window-washing thingy comes a-plunging down right in the spot in which he had just been standing, like the plummeting chandelier that follows immediately after Martin Mull's "I just can't stand any more surprises" line at the end of Clue. Max looks up to find he is alone, and takes off in a big hurry to locate Tess. He runs back down the steps of the Canal Street N and finds her sitting in the lotus position in the middle of an empty Granitopia hallway. She tells him, "They tried to get inside my head. Find out where the granolith is." But she wouldn't let them. He stands her up and asks about forty more times if she's all right. She tiredly replies, "I'm ready to go home now. Home to Roswell." Don't forget to write. Minus the "forget to" part.
And just like that, we're back in the kitchen of Chez Evans, matchbox forty playing some dulcet tones as Max tells Isabel that he was all poised and ready to take the deal and get them home, "but in the end, I realized that any deal that meant leaving you and Michael behind was something I couldn't do." He advances on her in a creepy we're-not-really-brother-and-sister kind of way and continues, "You're my sister, Isabel. Isabel, Vilandra, whatever your name is, it doesn't matter to me. You're my sister and I love you." They hug in a way that I have never, ever, ever hugged my own sister. And make no mistake, I really like my sister.
Liz bids Tess Arquette goodbye with a hug and a pronouncement of "that's so cornball" from Tess Arquette. And, over at the Crashdown, Maria sits at a table in her uniform and listens to Simon ask her, "Why would they take me again?" "Well…" Maria begins. Royal Pause VI: Royal With Cheese. "Maybe you're special." They both smile, almost as embarrassed as the small but intrepid group of viewers who have hung on until this point. She goes to get him a Galaxy Sub. Because Pepper Jack Humor is definitely an enduring area for endless comedic development. So it's a good thing they brought THAT up again.
Max stands behind Liz in her bedroom, and she stares into the mirror and states, "I keep looking for some kind of change." Max offers her the visual of holding two fingers over her head in a way that's supposed to connote alien antennae, I guess, but was more often the international symbol in my formative days for "you have this many girlfriends." You know what I mean? Liz turns to face him, and he tells her, "I want to thank you. For saving my life." She calls them "even." He wants to "start again. Our friendship, that is." They miss each other. Awwww, Part The Fifty-Trillionth. He begins to make for the window (leave through the door like a proper gentleman, dude. It's not like her parents are home to see you go), stopping just before he leaves and turning to face her: "There's one thing I have to ask. And I promise I'll never ask it again." We already know what it is you're about to ask. Please speak faster. "Did you…sleep with Kyle?" Liz is silent. Max smiles ever so slightly (ever-so-slight shudder) and takes his leave. Liz tries to act her way to a "curses, foiled again" emoting thing. Hey, Liz? Way to save the world. Retard.