Lower Decks

This was a much better episode than last week’s installment (“Insane in the P-Brane”). Even the subplot involving Lexi and Duncan worked well enough, meshing with the main storyline. Fargo and his competition with a bowling team from Area 51 was hilarious, especially the bit about Eureka continually insulting the Area 51 team by joking about little green men.

Big Ed, or more specifically his “pet” radiation-eating bacteria, made for an interesting villain. True, Big Ed was yet another in a long line of scientists in Eureka who take their experiments just a step too far (he was stealing that special energy source, after all). But the poor guy was eaten by his own creation. That’s comeuppance and then some. Carter has to track down the green glob and tries to freeze it with a freeze ray, making the requisite The Blob reference.

There were some nice scenes involving Carter and Tess (played by Jaime Ray Newman) in which Tess kept laughing at Carter’s questions and attempts to understand the science behind the dangerous blob. I don’t think Jo was in this episode at all; Zoe and Vincent had only a few brief scenes at Cafe Diem, although Zoe was involved in the Lexi-Duncan relationship drama. When poor Fargo was forced to run out of the shower naked and found himself in front of a room full of people, his reaction was wonderful.

“It’s Not Easy Being Green” also managed to move forward the new alien signal storyline. Allison has been charged with developing a defense plan in case the signal leads to danger. Tess isn’t thrilled with the idea, worried that any defensive measures will be misinterpreted or worse. I can’t wait to see where this goes.