The next great sci-fi show? I Have Found It!
From the moment six months ago when I saw a preview of “Eureka," I knew I would love it. Something else I love: when I’m right.
Hilarious, delightful and smart, “Eureka” is an old-fashioned whodunit set in a newfangled town that’s even weirder than Jessica Fletcher’s bizarrely murderous Cabot Cove. That's because Eureka is a top-secret village of geniuses sequestered by the U.S. government so they can concentrate on making the world a safer place. You know, like Los Alamos did.
And there you will find Jack Carter (played by the versatile Colin Ferguson), a U.S. marshal transporting a fugitive — as it turns out, his rebellious teen daughter Zoe (Jordan Hinson) — back to her mom, from whom he is separated. But they are sidetracked in Eureka, where it soon becomes clear that everyone in town has the Einstein gene, even though they hold mundane jobs.
Henry (Joe Morton), a happy-go-lucky tinkerer, drives a tow truck when he’s not rebuilding the wormhole machine from “Contact.” The dogcatcher (played by Max Headroom himself, Matt Frewer, seen here in photo) seems to be busy on some mad gadget in his spare time, though currently all it does is wreak havoc on cows.
While waiting for his car to get fixed at Henry’s shop, Carter gets roped into a missing-person case. He solves it quickly, gaining the attention of key superbrains in town, notably the alluring Allison (Salli Richardson-Whitfield), who identifies herself as a Defense Department official. Defense? Well, yes, for as Carter soon learns, there’s a laboratory just outside town that’s so high security, you need to pass through a force field to get there.
At first he tries to shrug it off: “I’m from L.A.,” he tells Allison. “Nothing shocks me.” That’s before she drives him through the force field.
“I think I’ve gone blind!” he cries afterward.
“Relax,” Allison says. “That almost never happens.”
Meanwhile, Zoe, whom Jack has locked up at the local pokey, becomes best buds with her jailer, Lupo (Erica Cerra), an ex-Special Forces soldier.
Before you slap the “quirky” label on this show, know that most of the relationships are normal and real and are conveyed with an economy of words. Like when Jack is trying to explain why he and Zoe’s mom have split.
“Some people just don’t work,” he says.
Zoe’s reply, “Dad, all you do is work,” suggests that at least she has the symbolic-analytic skills for this brainy little burg.
There’s a touch of conspiracy and more than a hint of sensuality here. And some of both come wafting from the general direction of Debrah Farentino. The siren from “NYPD Blue,” “Hooperman” and “EZ Streets” (where she bared her breast on CBS when the FCC wasn't looking), Farentino plays Barlowe, a sexy shrink who also runs a bed-and-breakfast and knows secrets that you can’t learn even with military clearance.
At a press event last January, someone rudely asked (that’s what we do) Farentino if playing a really smart person was a stretch. Very sweetly, she began her reply, “These characters are brilliant, but I finished my last series five years ago and went back to school to get my degree in molecular biology …”
Wha-wha-what?
“Well, The last series I worked on was ‘Get Real,’ ” she explained, “and I found myself reading Scientific American and other scientific magazines (on the set) and thinking, ‘I know there’s something out there for me (that’s) different.’ ”
An episode that airs next month shows that “Eureka” may have the gumption to become the best sci-fi show since the late lamented “Farscape.” It’s a story about a weapon that can create short-term memory loss and, by extension, long-term regrets. It’s a throwback to the old days, when science fiction was less about gizmos and more about the human propensity for madness. In other words, documentary in disguise.
“Eureka” premieres at 8 p.m. CT Tuesday on the Sci Fi Channel.
