Warning, contains spoilers. Click the “continue reading” button to continue.
EDIT: My bad, it was an 18 wheeler truck.
Maaaaaan! Holy cow! Take back everything I said about Jeremy in the last episode because this episode was SO FREAKING BRILLIANT.
BRILLIANT!
NATHAN!!
OK so let’s get into why this episode was so brilliant. So- Eugene can’t get the spillway for the dam open, no matter how hard he tries. They find out he has to go down there and get something out of the opening. Something big.
Meanwhile, Wooton and Whit go back to Connie and Penny’s house, Connie drives through the door of her garage. That was predictable, I was thinking about it after I reviewed the first episode. What would I do? Drive through the door. I guess I shouldn’t say predictable, since whatever I personally think they should do is not what happens. But this time was different. This is why Nathan is my favorite writer. He does things that I like.
OK, so Eugene gets Wooton and Bryson to go down into the water with him. Fascinatingly enough, I thought this would be the climax of the episode, they get the car out at the last minute, yay happy ending. Another reason Nathan is my favorite writer, because he then takes that scene, makes it the road TO the climax, and DANG YOU’VE ALL BEEN FOOLED HAHAHAHA.
Let me explain what I mean. They can’t get the car out of the spillway gate. But, they get up to the surface, and the mayor congratulates them for a job well done. They are all like, “what the heck man, we didn’t do anything”, but the mayor says that the water level is going down anyway.
I was personally getting worried at this juncture, because knowing Odyssey, I was waiting for another bit about miracles, but knowing Nathan, I was waiting for the bit about the dam exploding. Which is what Eugene asks about, (the dam exploding), but no that wasn’t it either! There’s a mine shaft on the other side of Trickle Lake that’s taking in water, and it’s got an entryway near Odyssey, which is where Eugene says the water is going to come out. There’s nothing else they can do.
So this was where I was getting the goofy grin on my face. I was like, “dang, Nathan! You’re actually going to do it, aren’t you?” And then the sounds of the floodwaters coming out and breaking things, and I got an even goofier grin on my face going “dang, Nathan! You’re actually doing it!”
And then we switch back to Ted Humphries reporting that the floodwaters came out of the mine shaft in Odenton, and I was like, “DANG, NATHAN! That’s brilliant!!!!!!”
Holy cow, man!! You fooled me! And you brought back Odenton and destroyed it!! All in one fell swoop! MAN I love Odyssey when it does brilliant stuff like this! BRILLIANT!
So then we bring back Jeremy & co. Looking at their house that has been destroyed in Odenton, holy cow man I didn’t see this one coming either! We got the climax in the beginning of the first part of the first episode and didn’t even realize it!! I can forgive you for throwing Jeremy at me in the first episode then. It didn’t make sense, NOW IT DOES.
OK, real quick. Whit shows up a little bit before we see Jeremy&CO., driving a sixteen-wheeler semi truck. Whit, Whit, Whit. The old Whit we know and love who could do anything and show up at the right time is back. It seemed a little cheesy, but no cheesier than the original Whit knowing everyone, everywhere, at whatever time is convenient. I love you, Whit! He’s back with his amazing-ness again!
OK so then Whit, Eugene, Connie, Penny, and Wooton all hop in the semi truck and take a ride over to Odenton. Then we get Jeremy & Company I think. So just real quick, Jeremy and company are really bad actors. I think I said this last time. But it sounded like maybe they were contest winners or something. Jeremy’s voice suddenly gets really nasal when he says that a lot of the homes were damaged, his kids sound like me when I try to act, and his wife sounds like someone on staff at Focus. Oh, well. I can forgive them because if I got on to Odyssey I would sound worse than they do. Don’t mock it until you’ve tried it, right?
And then here’s my other AW NATHAN AND OTHER WRITERS WHO HELPED YOU’RE SO BRILLIANT moment. Whit & Co get out of the truck, Eugene disappears for a minute and everyone else says hi and offers to help Jeremy & Co. I have to wonder where Eugene disappeared to, because a couple scenes before this one he was blaming himself for what happened to Odenton. OK, so then he shows up again. Really morose all of a sudden. I was like, wow. Haven’t seen that too often. And then he reveals…. Jeremy & Co is actually the Pittman family!! DUN DUN DUN!!! BRILLIANT! Too brilliant! Agh! I didn’t even mention it in the first review because it seemed so trivial! In the first part of Swept Away, before Spencer taps on the car window, Eugene is talking to Katrina. She is saying that her visit with… get ready… the Pittman family didn’t go well, because she asked them to go to church and they were pretty rude about it. And I didn’t even think about it! How brilliant of you writers, mainly Nathan! Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant! So then Mr. and Mrs. Pittman apologize to Eugene for being so rude, and Eugene asks if he can pray for them. This whole scene was FANTASTIC. Just great. Though I got the impression through the whole thing that Eugene still feels really bad.
Sound design was again brilliant. Jonathan Crowe has yet again done a good job, I preferred Part 1’s sound design better. Notwithstanding, the flooding part sounded good and NOT cheesy. That’s the very important part to get right, and he did it well.
OK, now to the complaints section. Not a lot. Nothing wrong with the plot. Really. However, the scene underwater where Eugene, Bryson, and Wooton are inspecting the car sounded incredibly unnatural. If it was intended to be that way, then excellent. In fact, it probably was, because somebody says something, you wait for everyone else to hear it over the radio, then someone else says something, waits for everyone else to hear it over the radio. However, it was maddening. I was wishing that we had the point-of-view from Bryson, or Wooton, or Eugene instead of the zoomed-out view where we are listening to all three of them crackle over the radio, or even the point-of-view of Spencer listening in or something. But it was maddening to be floating out in the middle of the lake. I wanted to hyperventilate just as much as Eugene did. Again- I get it, logistics and all that (my interview with Nathan was very eye-opening), but I was glad to be back out of the water.
OK… again, Jeremy and company can’t act. Like really. That kind of detracted from the episode a little bit. But if I went on Odyssey… I would probably review the episode I was in saying I can’t act worth heck. So… again. Don’t mock it until you’ve tried it. I mean, if I were on Odyssey, people would say I can’t act… but the important thing is being there. I mean seriously. If Jeremy & CO were guests or something to the Focus on the Family headquarters, or wherever they recorded, I congratulate them on being in Odyssey. It’s neat.
And I heard Bob! As the fire chief or police chief or whatever. I had been looking for his cameo and was pleased to immediately recognize him.
All right, to sum it up.
Positives:
Emotional scene with Eugene
Clever and unpredictable nature of the episode and tie-ins
Cool Whit is back
Didn’t have a stereotypical happy ending
Negatives:
Diving underwater scene
Jeremy and company’s lack of convincing acting
Here’s the ratings, again, using the IGN point system and a point average.
Acting: 8.5, J-CO was unconvincing, everyone else was great.
Plot: 9.5, Fascinating, driving, ties everything up in a neat knot and throws the package of climax at my head.
Sound Design: 8.9, Wasn’t as neat as the last episode but was still nicely done.
Music: 8.4, Noticed the underwater music and liked it a lot. Fitting and in the background.
Overall rating: (defying math again) A solid 9.5. If I were to make a quote that was going to go on a movie case, here it is:
“Brilliant”
Any opinions, questions, etc? Drop them in the comments below, or email us at odysseynerds@mail.com! This is Kungfunaomi reminding you to come in and nerd out at Odysseynerds!
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