Episode Report Card Daniel: C+ | 27 USERS: D+ YOU GRADE IT Angie, You Can't Say I Never Tried
By Daniel | Season 1 | Episode 3 | Aired on 07.08.2013
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.“This is a small town,” characters are told repeatedly in the third episode of Under the Dome, generally in the revelation that someone knows someone else's secret. Everybody in Chester's Mill has them, with some of them darker than others, and the darker ones, by and large, haven't bubbled up to the surface yet.
The town deals with the aftermath of the accidental shooting of Policeman Freddy, and the lynch mob that surrounds the town jail is the most excitable the residents have been since the dome came down. It's Big Jim who calms them down and urges them to let the law do its job. Not too well, presumably, given the headaches that would likely cause for him. And the residents get back to normal, which is being largely unconcerned about being trapped inside an invisible dome.
Paul seems to be remorseful about accidentally shooting Fred, but then tricks Linda by faking some sort of asthma attack or panic attack, and when she enters his cell to help, he jumps her and locks her in before stealing a rifle and fleeing, leading to the "Manhunt" title. Big Jim enlists some of the menfolk, urging them to take a break from being homophobic towards Carolyn so they can smoke Paul out of the woods. Barbie comes along too, although Big Jim and Julia are becoming increasingly suspicious of him; Junior has told both of them that Barbie beat him up for no reason, but Junior always kinda looks like he serves a punch in the face, so neither Big Jim nor Julia ask Barbie about it. Julia, becoming increasingly convinced that Barbie was in Chester's Mill for a reason, snoops in his stuff before finding a map of the area with a location on it. Big Jim, meanwhile, is becoming more concerned with being in charge, and — more important — being seen to be in charge. He's boring Barbie to death with football stories from his school when Randolph manages to get the drop on him, only to be felled by Linda, that hardest working cop under the dome or outside it. Randolph may have been helped by the fact that somehow Phil Bushey is narrating the manhunt over the radio in real-time somehow, despite phones not working under the dome. Good job giving away where the search party was over the radio, Phil!
Meanwhile, Norrie has snuck out to Joe's house, because she heard he has a generator, and she's hoping to avail herself of it, because without her tunes she's apparently not the ray of sunshine we've already come to know and love. She neglects to tell her moms where she's going, though, which seems pretty shitty of her. But Carolyn does arrive in time to see Norrie and Joe engage in some synchronized seizuring.
Elsewhere, Angie plays up to Junior and encourages him to check the cement factory where they used to have sex for a way out. Julia — puffing herself up mightily as the one, as a journalist, with the responsibility of finding answers about the dome — follows him, and then they get lost on their way out, giving Julia the chance to explain why she, clearly an awesome journalist, is in a backwater like Chester's Mill. The reason does not make her more sympathetic — in her zeal to take down a politician, she published damning documents that were fake, which she suspected they were. And she doesn't appear to have learned enough as a reporter to use a notebook or some kind of recorder when interviewing someone. Oh, and her news reports on the radio include such great muck-raking dirt as, "Presumably, [the authorities] will keep at it until they get some answers." Nothing makes for good journalism like making assumptions and placing unmitigated faith in authorities! Or maybe she was talking about the audience?
Daniel is a writer in Newfoundland with a wife and a daughter. It's not that hard to portray journalists accurately on television. Not that Aaron Sorkin has figured it out either. Follow him on Twitter (@DanMacEachern) or email him at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Barbie and Julia are strolling down the street, asking and evading each other’s questions: Julia wants to know what the odds are that Barbie would just happen to be in town when this earth-shattering account happened, and I hate to tell her that unless there’s a reason why it’s weird for him specifically to be there, it’s not especially long odds for someone to be in town. It’s not an especially invasive question, so Barbie just seems more suspicious when he complains she asks more questions than anyone he’s ever met. She points out he’s pretty good at evading them, and self-importantly says asking questions is her job, like if I were to run around grilling my friends about everything all the time SHOOT ME if I get all “asking questions IS MY JOB” about it, and he says she asks questions to avoid answering her own, and wants to know how someone as “ambitious as you” (I’m not clear on what he’s basing that on, so I assume he just means he thinks she’s hot) wound up in this shitwater town, and she says her husband grew up here, and then vaguely says “circumstances shifted” and it made sense to come here and start over.
After that conversational dead-end, Julia spouts Phil Bushey, who is outside the radio station, and she asks if Barbie wants to meet him. Barbie demurs, saying he’s going over to the diner for a bite to it. I don’t see anything to suggest there’s some weird reason Barbie doesn’t want to meet Phil specifically; given Barbie pulls a face every time Julia mentions her husband, it’s fair to say this show isn’t big on subtlety.
Big Jim discovers Linda locked in the cell and lets her out, following it up by starting to lecture her on how he’d hoped she was ready for the responsibility of running the department. That seems a little much, considering she’s what, the only cop left now? She’s in no mood for lectures and tells him so, because she’s heading out to track Paul down. Big Jim says he’s going to organize a search party. Knock yourself out, Linda tells him, but she ain’t waiting — especially when she discovers Paul took a rifle. “Jim, I know you like to control things, but you don’t control me,” she says and leaves, with the look on Big Jim’s face letting us all know just how he feels about that.
Over at the Sweetbriar Rose, we learn why no one in Chester’s Mill is particularly worried, if the two old-timers at the counter are any indication. Ollie figures they’ve got government scientists working their ass off on the problem. Roger, meanwhile, just wants them to figure out how to get more bacon inside. Honestly, I’m a little tired of small-town America’s complete faith in and reverence for the federal government and science in general, not to mention government scientists specifically.
Meanwhile Carolyn is fretting about Norrie being missing, worried she’s had a seizure somewhere, and she asks the old-timers if they’ve seen her. Ollie is one of those pro-government anti-gays characters, though, and asks, “Your daughter? How’s that work?” after looking at the family picture on Carolyn’s phone. Carolyn schools Ollie a little on how the 21st century works, and explains they were taking her to a nearby private school, and Ollie is all, oh, the reformatory! “Think they can pray the gay out of her?” Rose steps in to keep things from getting uglier. Barbie takes it all in.