Exploring Old Frontiers

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

The minor issues that plague “Eureka”could easily overshadow the larger problem, which is its very existence.

This is not to say that this hybrid concept couldn’t appeal to someone — a fan of “Northern Exposure,” perhaps, who loved the rural Alaskan setting of that quirky 1980s CBS series and its obsession with eccentric small-town charms. Other potential viewers might include those who devoted entire months of their lives to the fate of Laura Palmer on David Lynch’s 1990 dissection of American small-town life, “Twin Peaks.”Then there might be those who lived for the utter incomprehensibility of “The X Files,” Fox’s excursion into paranormality in (yet again) the villages and hamlets of the American countryside.

In its effort to attract a loyal weekly viewership to a Sci Fi Channel series, “Eureka” has pandered to those who buy the same breakfast cereal every week at the grocery store, and read their favorite Stephen King novels again and again. Nothing in the two-hour movie that launches “Eureka” tonight at 9 p.m. suggests anything new or fresh or provocative. It’s amusing without being fun, oddball without being weird, strange without being different. If it finds an audience, it will only be among those who want to repeat old thrills instead of seeking new ones.

“Eureka” creates the world of a small town that serves as home for a secret government project designed to protect our nation’s most intelligent minds. It’s a haven for the super-smart that functions at a level of secrecy so high that the show’s central character, a U.S. Marshal who stumbles on it, doesn’t get to find out what it is until almost an hour into the pilot. The Marshal — given the bland moniker of “Jack Carter” by the highly undynamic duo of writers (Jaime Paglia and Andrew Cosby) behind “Eureka” — had been transporting his teenage daughter cross-country when he entered the supposedly mysterious universe of Eureka; he stays for the inevitable romantic entanglements that pop up almost immediately.

The underwhelming developments that stir the plot pot here scarcely deserve repeating — suffice it to say that there’s a quirky dogcatcher (played by quirky Matt Frewer) and an eccentric car repairman (as interpreted by the you-know-what Joe Morton) and they say and do bizarre, spooky things. We’re meant to pay attention and wonder why they’re so damned unpredictable and odd, so that when we finally get the gist of the town’s true purpose — disclosed after a beautiful representative of the Department of Defense gets Carter to sign a nondisclosure agreement, but not without some reckless attempts at romantic banter by the writers — we’re off in the kitchen making sandwiches. Had this been a two-hour movie, the sped up revelations might have saved this idea from itself, but its existence as an ongoing series demanded delay after delay of the show’s the most obvious revelations.

Don’t count on the casting to keep you awake. Canadian actor Colin Ferguson plays Jack Carter with the kind of panache we once expected of a young Barry Bostwick. Joe Morton is cast as Joe Morton in the Joe Morton role, and Matt Frewer’s appeal is limited to those who can comprehend his convoluted accent. If you’re bored of looking at the passing parade of beautiful prosecutors on “Law & Order,” you might find some eye candy among the women of “Eureka” — Salli Richardson-Whitfield as harried Defense Department official Allison Blake, or Debrah Farentino (the girl from “Hooperman,” if that means anything) as the town’s psychotherapist.

There’s every possibility, of course, that “Eureka” will find an audience among those who keep their sets tuned to the Sci Fi Channel for breaking news. Now that “The Closer” has given TNT a breakout cable hit, everyone north of Channel 13 wants an equally big piece of the action. But while “Eureka” may well find Nielsen numbers among those who devour things-aren’t-what-they-seem stories, most will quickly bore of the jumbo-sized serving of Kraft American cheese singles that “Eureka” provides.

***

It was reported last week that one of the most original shows to ever air on network television, “The Wonder Years,” may never come out on DVD the way the shows originally aired. It seems that the high cost of what is called “music clearances” — the permissions necessary from songwriters to allow their music to be heard in public — will likely never be gotten for the rock ‘n’ roll soundtrack that helped place “The Wonder Years” in its late-1970s moment. From Billy Preston’s searing opening-credits rendition of the Beatles tune “A Little Help From My Friends” to Smokey Robinson’s “Tears of a Clown,” the music that accompanied Kevin Arnold on his journey to manhood can’t be left out. Anyone who remembers (or wants to experience) the deeply satisfying rhythms of ABC’s Emmy winning series that aired between 1988 and 1993, will share my outrage at whatever officials at Fox are failing to drum up the clout and/or money to make this happen as soon as possible. Meanwhile, you may amuse yourself with this week’s release of “Punky Brewster: Season Three,” wherever pointless television show DVDs are sold.

dblum@nysun.com


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