Stoned:
Written by: Eric Wallace
Directed by: Joe Morton
Original airdate: August 20, 2010
Synopsis:
Fargo alerts Jo and Grant that the DoD has been looking into him and so they bribe Zane to find out what exactly is going on. He ends up discovering that it seems to be the IRS that is doing the digging due to Larry mistakenly filling out his tax forms as having 11 dependents instead of 1. With that out of the way, he can relax, until he receives a gift basket from his “friends in accounting” with a note to meet. When he goes to meet them, he is met by someone who says that Grant knew her father back in 1947, and mentions that “they” have been waiting to meet him for a very long time. She introduces herself as Beverly Barlowe.
Elsewhere, Henry takes Grace out for a first date which just ends up being an exact recreation of the same date that Grace’s Henry took her on years earlier. He seeks Jack’s advice and later comes up with an entirely un-Henry like date in which he serenades her in the middle of GD with the song She Blinded Me With Science, complete with eerie dancing and a light show courtesy of Fargo.
Meanwhile, Zoe has returned to Eureka for a visit and it’s revealed that her and Lucas are not really a thing anymore and she’s been interested in someone else, to which Jo tells her to go for it because life is short. She jumps at the chance to see a fossilized pinky that her former teacher, Derek Thurgood, found at the site of Jo’s new house, which in turn stopped the construction, much to Jo’s exasperation, wanting to have her own place again. Unfortunately, Derek has his hand trapped in Flashcrete, a fast acting concrete mix due to the construction site contractor pulling a joke on him. They use a special solvent and he is quickly released.
Later, Jack gets ready for dinner with Alison, having asked her earlier about wanting to talk with her, and dresses to the nines. Zoe however left her phone back at the construction site and Jack runs her over there where they discover Derek, seemingly encased completely in FlashCrete. Alison reveals that his body is actually turning into full FlashCrete and while he’s still alive, once his body solidifies, he won’t be. She comments on Jack’s clothes and he realizes that she didn’t think he was actually asking her out on a date. He changes clothes either way because he has to start an investigation into what happened with Derek. He questions the contractor and she denies having done anything but he jails her on probable cause for the moment.
Dr. Vicelli from the Shangri-La Spa brings in her FlashCrete solvent which is their most popular treatment at the spa, but it doesn’t do anything to dissolve the FlashCrete off of Derek.
Jack investigates the contractor’s warehouse and discovers multiple workers who have also been turned into FlashCrete statues, leaving GD to bring them into the lab for testing and hopefully saving them. Jack theorizes that the FlashCrete formula was changed to cause the people to turn into statues but that’s a dead end. Later Jack discovers that the contractor has been turned into a FlashCrete statue as well.
After talking with Zoe, Jack is shocked that she has her sights set on Zane as she tells him he’s actually very nice. Zoe reveals that the pinky that Derek found does not appear to actually be an ancient fossil and they go to his lab to find out more. They end up finding his PERM solution, a permineralization formula which turns things into stone inside and out, witnessing it turn a rat into a statue. Zoe is crushed to discover that Derek was just trying to fake a historical find… for reasons. Jack asks Alison why she didn’t think he was asking her out on a date and she says it’s because he’s been quiet about their kiss for so long now but Jack is happy to know she has thought about the kiss.
Now knowing that the PERM solution is the cause, Allison begins working on a cure while Jack tells Zoe to go to the spa so the episode can happen, and while there ends up getting a special treatment that exposes her to a treatment that uses limonene, the same ingredient used in the FlashCrete solvent which activates the PERM solution that Zoe was exposed to and she begins getting stoned like everyone else at the construction site was.
Eventually, Alison is able to create a cure with the limonene but can’t get it absorbed into the body because their skin has turned into stone. Jack reveals that Vicelli’s steam treatments can get into the pores at a microscopic level so by combining the cure with the stream, they manage to deliver it past the stone outside and everyone is saved.
Zane stops by to see Zoe, following up on their earlier conversation that Jack interrupted and Jo walks in to see them from afar, surprised and hurt that she basically told Zoe to go after him.
Jack talks with Alison and asks her if Zoe is right when she said that maybe friends should stay friends. Alison says that they do have a good friendship and that it might be too risky to do anything that might affect that. Jack agrees and turns away but then quickly comes back and kisses her. They both smile and embrace and continue kissing.
Advanced Research:
Dr. Viccelli was played by Keegan Connor Tracy. She is mostly a character actor showing up in numerous projects just below the fold. She has had some starring roles such as in Night of the Reaper (college student Dina visits home and is roped into babysitting while the local sheriff is mailed a piece of evidence and is led on a scavenger hunt to reveal the killer of another babysitter), Bodycam (two officers attempt to cover up an accidental shooting during a domestic dispute, only to realize that their body cameras weren’t the only things watching them), Z (a child’s imaginary friend terrorizes the family), Dead Rising: Endgame and Dead Rising: Watchtower (zombies), A Daughter’s Conviction (a woman’s daughter is the only one who believes that she is innocent and works to clear her mother’s name), Final Destination 2, and My Life As A Dead Girl (a teenager takes on her murdered friend’s identity and takes shelter with that murdered girl’s estranged family, but her vengeful pimp threatens her new life). She’s done some series such as Providence Falls (romance about star crossed lovers throughout time), Jake 2.0 (NSA computer technician Jake is transformed into a secret agent after he is infected accidentally with nanobots, and now has superhuman powers), a few episodes of The Magicians (students recruited to a secret magic academy where they discover magic is real and dangerous), The Descendants movies (playing Belle), Once Upon A Time (mother superior/blue fairy), an episode of Creepshow (to grandmother’s house we go), Garage Sale Mystery, Bates Motel (Miss Blair Watson), Beggars and Choosers (staff of a tv network), one episode of The New Addams Family, and a few episodes of Battlestar Galactica.
The Contractor, Dr. Zimmer, was played by Stephanie Belding. Most of her movie roles are well below the fold or right at the fold, though she is a little higher in the classic Dr. Dolittle: Tail to the Chief, as well as some Hallmark style movies like The Town Christmas Forgot, The Christmas Chalet (Erica Durance), and Growing The Big One (Shannen Doherty). She has been in a few series, like some guest appearances on the Murdoch Mysteries, 8 out of 10 episodes of Incorporated (SyFy, Man attempts to thwart a giant corporation with seemingly unlimited power) and Remedy (guy drops out of medical school and gets a job as an orderly at the hospital where his father is the chief of staff and his sisters are a nurse and a surgeon, also has a reoccurring guest star of Niall (Zane) Matter).
Derek Thurgood was played by John Reardon. He stars in Hudson & Rex (Turner and Hooch or K9 type storyline) and Arctic Air (a series set in Yellowknife portrays renegade bush pilots at work and play in northern Canada, 35 episodes). He had a few episodes of Continuum, Painkiller Jane, Edgemont (The kids of Edgemont are faced with issues that happen in their lives, whether the issues are racism, homosexuality, or discrimination), and lower down the cast list for Scary Movie 4. He’s also done some Hallmark style movies and tv miniseries.
Piltdown Man was a famous scientific hoax consisting of a cobbled-together medieval human cranium and an orangutan jawbone presented as an early human ancestor. Between 1910 and 1912, amateur archaeologist Charles Dawson claimed to find the fragments in a gravel pit at Piltdown, near Lewes in Sussex, England. Dawson and British Museum paleontologist Arthur Smith Woodward announced it as a new species, Eoanthropus dawsoni ("Dawson's Dawn Man"), claiming it bridged the evolutionary gap between apes and humans. In 1953, refined fluorine testing and microscopic analysis proved the bones were a deliberate fraud.
The song Henry sings to Grace is She Blinded Me With Science by Thomas Dolby.
Gayle Laverne Grinds was fused to her couch in 2004. Just under 5 ft tall, 480 pounds, sat on the couch for 6 years, husband could not get her up, she broke her leg, it healed, but for fear of it breaking again, stayed seated.
The Ex-Files:
Written by: Amy Berg
Directed by: Chris Fisher
Original airdate: August 27, 2010
Synopsis:
Beverly talks with Grant, reminding him of the group that he and her father Adam Barlow started that has grown now into thousands of followers dedicated to keeping watch over scientific developments in order to control their progress and avoid another repeat of the creation of nuclear weapons. She tells him that their latest concern is a directed EMP device or DED that is due to be tested at GD.
Meanwhile Jack, Allison, Jo and Zoe are having a barbecue at Henry and Grace’s house when Grant finally arrives. Henry and Grace show off her PTSD therapy devices, adapted now for the two of them, allowing them to share their memories through them. Suddenly a power surge causes the radio to turn off with a spark but otherwise everything seems fine.
At GD, Fargo and Zane test the DED with Mansfield watching and it successfully works but afterwards there is a transient anomaly from one of the couplings that goes off and knocks Fargo for a loop. Mansfield tells them to fix it and be ready for the next test in a week.
Jack flirts with Allison but is called away by Deputy Andy. Allison watches him leave when suddenly Tess appears from behind and admonishes her angrily for dating Jack.
Jo sits at Cafe Diem and is confronted by Zane who comes on to her and tells her he is calling off his flirtation with Zoe before leaving suddenly.
At the DaVinci Bridge, Andy tells Jack he’s been hearing something odd when the bridge starts to suddenly collapse under their feet. They manage to escape and Jack takes Andy back to the sheriff’s office so he can repair himself. When they arrive, Jack is surprised to see Nathan Stark sitting at his desk. Nathan tells Jack that he was floating around in space-time after dematerializing until a GD experiment went wrong and managed to pull him back in. He manages to convince Jack he’s actually there by hitting him and then heads off to find Allison as Jack, confused, tries to help Andy, who had collapsed.
Fargo meets with Jo who is giving a tour to a group of gifted students when Mansfield comes over and speaks over Fargo in a show of manhood and control. One of the students asks Fargo how he can allow him to speak to him like that.
Grant goes to Allison and asks about the DED, pointing out that it is a weapon even if they aren’t calling it that. She tells him that they have to do some work for the military, in order to be able to also work on scientific projects that can help mankind.
Jack confides in Henry that Stark has returned, but Henry is disbelieving, laughing about it. As they talk about how Nathan could actually have been pulled back, Allison calls and tells him that she needs to talk. When he arrives at Café Diem, Jack sees Allison sitting with Nathan. Jack wants to leave but Allison convinces him to stay so they can clear the air and Allison watches as he takes a seat next to Tess. Vincent comes over and asks what he can get for the two of them. His question makes them realize that Nathan and Tess are not actually there, but are hallucinations. Suddenly a loud noise outside draws their attention and they see Jack’s jeep, crushed.
Zoe prepares to go hang out with Zane. He shows up and Jo tells him to please go easy on her but he’s confused and just leaves with her.
Back at GD, Grant finds anomalous readings in the DEDs energy and suggests they dismantle the whole project, seeing that it is already shut down and still showing signs of problems. Mansfield refuses and tells Grant to leave, since he doesn’t really belong there being a historian. Fargo sees one of the students from the tour still hanging out and goes to confront her, taking her to see Jo who says she’s in the middle of something with Zane but he points out that he can’t see Zane and she realizes she can’t see the young girl, Jessica Lansky, Fargo’s fifth grade bully.
MRI scans show that they are all fine except their brains do show signs of increased gamma activity. They realize that they were all together at Henry’s barbecue, and reasons that the power surge they experienced could have amplified his and Grace’s neural implants, causing the others’ minds to create a link with someone from their memories, resulting in the hallucinations. They reason that in order to get rid of them, they need to deal with their fears and issues with those people. Before they can act however, the garage begins shaking and the roof caves in much the same manner that the bridge and jeep did. They head off to try and find an acoustic oscillator that could be responsible for the occurrences.
Grant goes to meet Beverly again and sees his old friend, Adam Barlowe, Beverly’s father. She convinces Grant that the machine needs to be shut down and gives him a security code.
Henry and Zane can find no trace of the oscillator so they decide to try a dampening field to control the DED’s energy buildup which is nearing critical and will fry all electronics in Eureka. Jack investigates the bridge again and is confused why the bridge was affected first instead of GD. Together, he and hallucination Stark work out that the original event must have been at the barbecue and every event since then has been moving towards GD.
The DED dampening field doesn’t work as Zane and Fargo work on a different section of the computer to fix it, leaving Grant alone with his hallucination of Adam who prompts him to enter Beverly’s security code in order to turn the dampening field off. When he does he is hit by an electrical surge from another resonance event and heads off to the infirmary. Mansfield shows up and orders them to prepare the DED for removal, not wanting to risk destroying every project at GD. Fargo and Henry argue that it doesn’t matter where they take it, because whatever is targeting the machine can hit it from anywhere but Mansfield is adamant. Jo gives Fargo a pep talk about deserving the job he’s in and to ignore the little girl’s insults.
Jack brings Allison a frequency detector from Henry to try and find the oscillator and eventually they track it down in the woods. Jack goes to shoot it, but it suddenly shuts down. Jack realizes that maybe the device was just a distraction. Alison calls Jo and they realize that the DED was ambushed while being transported, and stolen.
Back at GD, the group discusses things and they realize that there must be a mole inside of the company helping whoever stole the machine. As Fargo looks at the computer data, they find traces of Zane’s handiwork.
Mansfield shows up to reprimand Fargo, but Fargo fights back, telling Mansfield that he gave him his recommendation and it was ignored. He adds that he has already filed a report with the Department of Defense. Mansfield leaves, knowing that he’s been outplayed. With that move, Fargo’s hallucination disappears
Zane goes to Jo wanting to talk about something but she interrupts him and tells him that she’s done romanticizing their relationship, and if he wants to be with Zoe then he should go do that. She hands him back the ring that he proposed to her with in the original timeline, and he is shocked that she has it, asking why she has his grandmother’s ring. Jack comes in to take Zane away for questioning and Jo, shaken, realizes that the Zane she just talked to was not the hallucination, but this timeline’s actual Zane.
Back at home, Jack defends Zane to Allison, reasoning that this isn’t the type of thing that Zane normally gets involved in, despite his shady past. They both decide to sit and talk about their issues. Allison tells Jack that she’s afraid of how the relationship they are starting could end given her past relationships. Jack understands and asks her if she is too scared to miss out on them. Jack tells her that he has been head over heels in love with her since the day they met and the two kiss, ready to move forward together as their hallucinations disappear.
Grant confronts Beverly and realizes he was used by her to get the machine. She tells him they didn’t steal the weapon to use it as a weapon, but for its power source. She shows him a new bridge device they created in order to send Grant back to his time and really change the world.
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