Journeyman: "Pilot" (Episode 101)

Welcome to Journeyman, NBC's attempt to capitalize on their only successful show, Heroes. Unfortunately, I think this might be problematic for Journeyman. Clearly the poor addled minds of the NBC programming executives thought that the geekiness of Chuck, the comic book action of Heroes and the time-traveling “sci-fi” of Journeyman would be a perfect match for each other, Journeyman is in fact the lightest style of sci-fi that you can possibly give to middle America. Even the snore-fest that is Bionic Woman is harder sci-fi than this show. Hell, the original Bionic Woman was harder sci-fi that this show. Unfortunately, I think that means that the geek crowd isn't going to embrace Journeyman and that puts the show on dangerous ground. But all that being said, I like this show. I think it's a great way to relax after a long Monday... at least until I continue recapping my favorite comedy 24.

It's significant to note that the title doesn't just have a clever single meaning – being about a guy who “journeys” through time, but Webster's defines journeyman as “a person who has served an apprenticeship at a trade or handicraft and is certified to work at it assisting or under another person.” That's obviously significant by the end of this episode and hints at a larger story arc that might just save this series. Anyways, on with the premiere.

Meet Dan Vasser. He's what you would get if you mixed up Lucius Vorenus, Sam Beckett from Quantum Leap and whatever the hell the name of the guy was on Early Edition. And the show is a bit of a mash-up of those series as well – minus HBO's Rome of course. Dan is somewhat not American, the way Mark Addy was on Still Standing before him and how whats-her-face will be on Bionic Woman after him. Well, two days after him (I still bet Bionic Woman goes down first). Dan has a shiny, shiny life with a wife and a kid I'm pretty sure didn't exist in the pilot. Dan works at a newspaper, which I'm sure will give Lucius Danus lots of access to historical records that he needs for his time-quests. Dan's planning for his anniversary and has to go pick up a ring, but his head is killing him. Advil won't cure his time-shifting migraine and soon he finds himself wandering into a pub (sorry, in America we call it a bar) where everyone is watching American football (I mean football. Just plain football). Except it's football from eight years ago. Dan catches sight of a woman he knows just as she gets into a cab and drives away. When he tries to pursue, he finds himself waking up in the back of a cab, much to the surprise of the driver. Dan goes to find his current wife and tries to explain how he was having dreams of the past woman in his life. Nice.

Dan returns home to tuck his son in and now I think the kid was in the pilot, it was just the shiny, shiny scene that's new. Dan gives his fairly hot wife a temporary ring while he upgrades her wedding bling. The audience waits for the other shoe to drop and for Dan's life to go to hell. Seven in the morning and wifey wakes to find Dan missing. Dan wakes to find himself in the woods, napping with homeless people in Golden Gate Park. After stealing some pants from a bum, Dan returns home to find that his house is not his own. He's stunned, but not so much that he can't steal some more clothes and not quite as much as the bat-wielding man who currently lives in his house. Dan reveals to us that he's convinced that he's dreaming. The bat man nails him, but Dan fails to wake up. He now knows this is really happening.

Cue crazy backwards credits.

Commercials: Bionic Woman doth protest too much. But Beowulf? Whoa.

Mrs. Dan runs down to the station to tell Vic Mackey's first murder victim that Dan's missing. Terry Crowley lets us in on the fact that Livia, Dan's mystery woman, has been dead for nine years (wasn't the bar scene supposed to be eight years ago? Whoops.) Det. Brother is annoyed, but promises to get the word out. Meanwhile, Dan is dealing with ghetto blasters and shoulder pads. He is struck by an odd looking black man standing in the middle of the street. Only Dan is paying attention as the man attempts to kill himself by way of cable car. Dan dives in and saves him and the man seems jolted out of his stupor. He says his name is Neal Gaines and I know that we'll see him again.

Without warning, there's another flash and Dan watches a Prius pass by. Wifey is upset when Dan walks in looking like the time-traveling homeless man that he is. In quiet disappointment she simply tells him to say goodnight to their son. She wants to know where he's been, but he still thinks that he might have been dreaming. She tries to understand, but Dan can't understand it himself. Dan swears that he's not on drugs, but is stunned when wifey informs him that he's been gone for two days. Work is mad at him as well and demands his important local news story by noon. But of course he wastes time googling Neal Gaines. And lo and behold, he finds him. Dan heads down the street in his Mustang, bluetoothing away and drinking bottled water and doing anything else 21^st century that he can think of. With a flash we cut away to wife and son at home, where sonny boy recognizes Dan demolished car on the television. The car is totaled, but Dan's missing. Wifey and boss think that it must be drugs.

Commercial: Feist needs to get out of my head.

Dan wakes up on the cable car tracks. Thanks Time Gods for trying to kill me in the most regionally specific way possible, but Neal Gaines already tried that. Dan checks his iPhone to discover that cell service hasn't been invented yet. Except the passerby with cell brick against his head can still make a call while killing his brain cells, but of course he gives Dan's bluetooth the weird look. Or maybe he just thinks people that wear bluetooth while not using them are retarded. Dan spots Neal Gaines again and follows him, oddly enough to the same damn restaurant. It must be a time vortex. Neal is frustrated with a woman, but as Dan moves to intervene, he runs into the future love of his life. He has a nice moment with Livia, who doesn't look the slightest bit dated. Nice how that works, huh? Dan doesn't catch up with Neal, but he does meet Neal's baby mama. He manages to convince her to have the baby in about two sentences. Back in the present, sonny boy is playing piano and Daddy returns just in time. Wifey of course doesn't believe his time-traveling stories and is convinced that something much more horrible is going. Dan goes and get his upgraded wedding ring as a last ditch effort to save his marriage (bling fixes anything – ask Kobe). But alas, the moment is ruined by an intervention. Nobody gets it and Dan get more and more angry. Only his brother isn't buying into this... but it's because he's there to arrest him. But it's just a pretext to question his brother. Apparently the brothers fought over the same woman and Dan got to marry her. Even though he's still wrapped up in a woman who's dead and gone.

Leaving the station, Dan continues to be a 21^st century digital boy finding gaines on his not iPhone on not Google. He finds that Neal's wife and son (who was born) died in 1997. While looking at the iPhone, he skips back in time again, but doesn't think to patent the Jesusphone that he's holding. But he does still have his wife's wedding ring? He misses Neal and instead takes a tool box to his future home and does... something. Immediately afterwards, he goes to find his old apartment that he shares with the old love of his life and the adult contemporary CDs of the 90s. Dan comes face to face with Livia and he's so clearly in love with her that I feel bad for wifey. Livia on the other hand is so self-absorbed, that she only registers Dan being a decade older as looking a little tired. They're about to do the horizontal tango when Dan sees his wedding ring and doesn't quite know what the time-traveling manual says about fidelity. He runs out of the apartment only to run into a different Livia. A... time-traveling Livia. Turns out her body was never found. She vanished just like Dan. And she's apparently been doing this awhile. She hints at a larger purpose and tells him to go with his instincts and to follow his guy. And like that, she's gone. A future Dan and a future Livia crossing paths in 1997, and she's been leaping for a decade at least. Interesting.

Dan calls Det. Bro for help, but Bro sees the 1997 Dan and calls him a prankster hanging up. People were dumb in the late nineties. Dan steals yet again, this time a bike and heads off to the time vortex restaurant. Oasis plays to remind us of the year and he spies on the past fun he had. Dan with Livia. His future wifey with his brother. Before time-traveling screwed up everything for all of them. Dan 1997 gets called away, so Dan 2007 sneaks in in his place. But it's just to get information on Neal Gaines from Livia 1997. She gets him an address and he's off on his quest.

Commercial: Apparently there's an interactive timeline to help you keep track of all this nonsense.

Dan meets up with Neal Gaines after following him onto a bus. Dan poses as an old high school buddy and Neal tells him that his wife is leaving him and ominously promises not to let her go. Wow, this Neal guy is a seriously unstable individual. In a tense moment, Neal calls out to his wife in rage, and Dan distracts him for just a moment and Neal is demolished by a bus in like the seventh sudden death by bus I've seen on television in recent seasons. Mission accomplished? Dan makes like Sliders and badly CGIs back to the present to find a full voicemail box. Dan was thinking that Neal's son would do something amazing in a medical field and that's why he had to save him, but instead (as he shows his brother on his not iPhone, showing off the video of the real iPhone) Neal's son saved a bunch of school children from a school bus accident. Dan marches into his home to put up a fight to win his wife back. Wifey is ready for a divorce, but not after what Dan has in store. Grabbing a sledgehammer and shovel, he heads out to the backyard . Like a magic trick, wifey confirms that the patio in the backyard was put in seven years ago. Dan smashes it open with the sledgehammer, digs into the dirt and pulls out... a tool box. Inside is a makeshift time capsule, with a 1997 paper and ... wifey's wedding ring. Dan promises that he'll always come home and as wifey goes to sleep, Dan finds himself again leaping through time, to put things right that once went wrong. Oh boy.

UPCOMING WEEKS: Smoking on planes! Delivering babies! Earthquakes!