Bionic Recap: Detailed Events of Episode Two “Paradise Lost”
Bionic Woman came into the fall season as the show with the most buzz, and it proved it mettle by
So what happened in episode two?
Previously On: Becca telling Jaime that “Dad didn’t try to control me,” while Jaime responds “Dad dropped you off on my doorstep. Jaime telling Will she is pregnant, him responded “Marry me.” Then they are in the car, with Will proposing the hipster name Coltraine if it is a boy, etc. and the impact of the eighteen wheeler. Will telling Jaime what has been replaced, Jaime screaming, a “combat ready” quote combined with Jaime leaping from building to building. A bloody Sarah Corvus telling Jae she is not in control and leaping forward, him shooting, someone saying “Sarah Corvus is still alive” while they transition to Will telling Jaime she is filled with military technology. She says “You made me into a soldier,” Will gets shot, Michelle asks Sarah who she is and Sarah tearfully replies she is the first bionic woman. Then we see parts of the famous rooftop rainy fight scene, and the episode begins.
It’s a funeral under trees. A pastor-like voice says “We are here today to honor the memory of William Anthros.” What? Hooray!! Have my prayers been answered??
Back to the graveside funeral: Jaime is looking teary and angry, Becca is looking concerned. The voice continues, with “a surgeon, teacher, son, and loving friend.” Lucy takes Jaime’s hand. Jaime looking across the grave at Jonas. A tombstone fade takes us to Jaime and Lucy walking away from the graveside service. Lucy asks Jaime if she will be okay, Jaime says “I will be.” Jonas calls to Jaime and says they need to talk, her reply is “No we don’t … listen, I am going to go back to my job, and my life, and pretend that none of this ever happened So don’t call me.”
She walks away, back to Becca. When Becca asks “Who was that?,” Jaime replies “Nobody.”
At Will’s Apartment
Next we see Jaime going to Will’s apartment, indicated by her getting off an elevator and walking up to a blonde wood door with a pewter door knocker reading “Anthros.” Jaime tearfully picks up a picture of the two of them together, smells an article of clothing that is (hopefully) a shirt. She steps on a creaky blonde wood board and leads down, lifting the board and pulling out a thick bound folder that reads “Berkut Group: Classified Material.”
Jaime sits down, opens the folder, and reads “SESI I.Q. Test: SOMMERS, Jaime.” It gets very interesting, and very creepy, when she looks over to see the tabs on the side. The first one says December but I am having trouble reading the year, but it looks like 2005? The second tab clearly says June 2004. Jaime turns the page to see pictures of herself, and looks up with an expression of confusion and comprehension. So has Will be viewing her as a test subject all of this time? Or did he steal her information to keep her shielded from the Berkut Group hierarchy?
At the Bar
The scene cuts to a bar that looks nothing like Jaime’s, it appears to be a restaurant bar by the lighting. A news story plays in the background and says “Breaking news from Paradise Idaho today, where authorities have … cordoned off this small town,” etc. The broadcast explains there is no official reason for the quarantine as we hear pool balls clacking in the background and see a close up of some shots that look a lot like tequila being poured. The television commentary switches to the forecast (cloudy) as we see both shots are being carried to Jaime, who seems like she has had a few already today.
“Here’s the thing,” she says. “You never really know anybody. You think you know them. You think you want to marry them and spend the rest of your life with them, and then they turn out to be a creep with a weird dossier on you.” The bartender, who has been nonchalantly polishing glasses in the foreground during her ramblings, flips his head around at the words “dossier on you.” “What?” he says. “Nothing,” she replies. The way things are going, that may become Jaime’s new favorite word.
“The point is,” Jaime says, as she taps a shot glass on the bar, “there is no such thing as Mr. Right. From here on in it is Mr. Right Now.” That brings the shot around to the cute if slightly smarmy, and waaaay young, looking fellow sitting near her who of course says “Hey,” with a smirk. Instead of brushing him off, Jaime replies with “hi…” and then we see her slamming him up against what is presumably a bathroom stall as they kiss violently. Lots of happy above the waist grabbing and kissing follows until Jaime REALLY pushes him against that wall and the audience hears some cracking noises. The guy looks winded, and wounded, as Jaime asks him if he is okay. He says he may have a broken rib and needs to go to the ER, much to her disappointment.
At this point, Jonas walks in and effectively kills any hope of more bionic sex. Jaime protests by asking if he is following her now, Jonas ignores her by asking who the guy is. Jaime, slightly drunkenly, asks him his name as the guy looks at her like she is crazy and says “Steve.” Clearly, guy seems to be under the delusion that Jaime remembers his name, one she tries (very badly) to continue by saying “Obviously, this is Steve,” while wavering in a faux drunken television manner.
Jonas tells Steve to go home, Steve looks at Jaime in pain and says “Thank You” … to Jonas. Ungrateful jerk.
Back to Jaime, who tells Jonas to go away. Jonas says he would love to, but her parts cost him $50 million. Jaime proposes a $20 a month payment plan, which will not buy you out of most debts much less that one. Jonas says he wants her to come work for him, and crudely reminds her that her protest that she “already has a job” does not mean much when she works in a bar, never went to college, and has sex with strangers in a public restroom (in all fairness to Jaime, what happened in that bathroom only counts as sex with junior high guys, but whatever). Jaime yells back that she was accepted to Harvard, but she is not at Harvard because she is raising her little sister. Unfortunately her speech is ruined by her announcement that she thinks she might have to throw up now, which ruins all fantasies of anthracites curing hangovers. Jonas then tells Jaime to stop making excuses, she tells him to stop being a douche.
Jaime asks Jonas why Will had a file on her in his apartment that started two years before she met him. When he does not answer, she gives him the opening for a cop out answer by asking “What are you people?” to which he replies, quite creatively, “We are a private clandestine organization dedication to stopping rogue organizations from ending civilization as we know it.” So the Super Friends? “I could use your help … are you in or are you out?” She says she is definitely out, and goes off to throw up.
We have our theme song. It is short and fairly unremarkable, but like all things with Bionic Woman you just have to have faith it will get better as the season progresses. It’s at this point that I realize how much real time has past, but I am only ten minutes into the show.
At Becca’s School
Jaime’s cell phone is ringing and she gropes for it, starting awake as the voice on the other end apparently summons her to Becca’s school. Someone (a principal?) tells Jaime that she is sympathetic about all Becca has been through but smoking pot on campus is unacceptable. Becca will not be expelled, but she will be prevented from participating in the talent show on Friday … which elicits a protest from Becca and surprise from the viewers, who have yet to see any of Becca’s talents. It is at this point the credits reveal that Lucy Hale is now “Lucy Kate Hale” and there is a “special guest star” of Bionic Woman. Jaime talks the principal out of taking away the talent show appearance, but as they leave the school that is not enough to keep the sisters from bickering over whose sins are worse between Becca’s pot smoking (”It’s not really a drug! It’s from the Earth!”) and Jaime’s hungover state (”Shut up, okay! Just shut up!”). Jaime accuses Becca of being selfish, Becca says maybe she should move in with their father, and Jaime says “Maybe you should, because apparently I am doing a terrible job.” As she walks off, Becca looks upset and disappointed. In the meantime, no one is explaining how Jaime’s anthracites can cure her broken arm, and prevent Sarah Corvus’ lung cancer, but they can’t stop tequila from making Jaime hungover. Is tequila the Bionic Woman’s kryptonite?
Back at the Berkut Group, Jonas and Ruth are looking at video footage from an unnamed town. We see dead dogs and dead humans, and Ruth tells him the casualties are at least fourteen but “there is every indication there is more.” Jonas asks where she got the footage, and Ruth is vague but apparently it came from a source “before the FBI confiscated” the footage. No one from the military has contacted Jonas, and Ruth says it seems like a cover up of a biological weapon attack. Ruth wants to “get in there,” but Jonas wants “more intel” because “the last thing we need is a pissing match with the Army.” Ruth is not happy.
Back to Jaime, depressed and stirring her coffee half-heartedly as she says “I was such a bitch, I don’t know what is wrong with me.” A friend takes her side, saying she just lost Will and Becca is a twerp. I guess Jaime’s the only character who gets to curse on this show. Another friend shows up and gets teased for being late as Jaime’s bionic ear starts shrieking. Then more shrieking, as the late friend announces she just got into Columbia’s law school. Jaime leaves the celebration, saying she has an appointment, and removes herself from the plans to visit in New York.
Next we see her in a book store, and dammit if this scene does not go and crush all my hopes about Will Anthros being dead by becoming the scene where Isaiah Washington’s character meets Jaime. To see Antonio’s attempt to meet cute and Michelle Ryan bond with a Jack Russell Terrier, click that link.
At the Diner
We then see Jaime reading What Color is Your Parachute in a diner, as the television on the wall talks about the crisis in Paradise. “We now at Day Two in Paradise as the mystery deepens, as a small town in northwestern Idaho population 201 has been quarantined. Still no word as to the reason for the quarantine but police have blocked off all access roads and evacuated neighboring towns as a precautionary measure.”
As Jaime leaves the diner, the ringing in her ear comes back and is accompanied by a gasping for breath and sounds of agony. She starts to move faster, and sees a woman standing on the edge of a building about to jump. She runs bionic fast, at a blur, to the roof and catches the woman just as she jumps (back side first?) over the edge and pulls her back up. “How did you do that?” the woman asks. “Pilates?” Jaime says. And … scene.
Training at the Compound
Then we see Jaime walking into Jonas’ high security office, while he is on the phone, and telling someone “the answer is still no and it is non-negotiable.” Jaime asks if he is breaking up a terrorist cell, he replies “It’s my daughter, sixteen is too young to be on the pill don’t you think?” She replies if she is sexually active it is better to be safe than sorry and he says it is too young, Jaime drops it by asking “Don’t you want to know why I am here?” He impatiently tells her he knows why she is here, she saved “that woman’s life” and now she thinks she can make a difference. Jaime says she won’t adhere to his request to say tell him he was right, but “this saving the world thing? I’d like to give that a try.”
But she has some rules. She has to be home by seven every night to have dinner with her sister, she does not work weekends, and they have to get Becca on their health plan. Do covert groups have health plans? One would think the premiums would be craaaazy. Anyway.
Jaime says this Friday night she has to be at Becca’s school talent show to see Becca do a number from Annie Get Your Gun, and her bionic hearing has a ringing in it. Jonas says they are working on it and he is about to introduce her to “Pope,” her supervisor. It is of course the guy with the Jack Russell from the bookstore, and Jaime is not pleased.
Next we see Jaime with a twitchy tech kinda guy who says “You did NOT try to put a Q-Tip in my ear” to which she replies “your ear?” He asks her to describe the ringing, which is not going away, and then tells her (reassuringly) that it is “probably something loose somewhere … or a brain aneurysm.” Nice. Then he slaps her upside the head like an appliance … and it works, no ringing. She basically tells him to screw his request for food, booze, and hugs.
Then comes Pope, ignoring Jaime and asking “Nathan” the tech guy if “she is ready for training.” As they walk down the hall together she calls him on his bookstore performance, getting him to admit that he does not have a Jack Russell Terrier, he just borrowed the dog from a pet store up the street. She asks why he wanted to talk to her, he said “I needed to figure out if you were compromised, if you were with another agency.” Jaime, and the audience, is surprised to hear there are Berkut Group competitors out there. She asks what he found out about her, and Pope replies that Jaime is “smart, that your honest, that you don’t quite know you are yet, that you are sad right now.” She turns and walks off, asking what she has to do in this training. Pope’s reply is that is up to Jae, as we cut to a scene of Jae screaming and attacking Jaime.
The two fight, with some flashbacks to Jaime’s rooftop fight scene with Sarah Corvus. Jae has a lot of the same moves, and during a break he asks her if she is feeling any deja vu. Jae reveals it was on purpose, his moves and Sarah’s, as they were both “calibrating” Jaime and her muscle memory. “The machine is nothing without the woman, Jaime.” We then have a training collage, set to music, with Jaime doing one armed pull ups, running, etc.
Of course, she gets better as the collage progresses. At the end, we see Jae telling her she can run 60 MPH (”maybe faster”), she has enough power in her arm to shatter brick and she can bend steel with her grip. She can see from 2000 feet what other people can see from 20, and her ear can hear a conversation from two miles away, so if she hones her skills then she could become “one of the most powerful weapons ever developed.” But if she fails … she will go insane.
Jaime asks if this is what happened to Sarah Corvus, if this is why Sarah killed Will. Jae is clearly not comfortable with this question. Jaime asks if he was in love with her, Jae asks where she heard that and Jaime says “I’m a bartender, we hear things.” When Jaime asks if Jae is still in love with her, Jae says he doesn’t know … she killed fourteen agents and Jae shot her in the head. “I can see how that experience might stay with a person,” Jaime says. There is some odd saxophone music in the background implying that Jaime and Jae may be attracted, which is very creepy. Jae, however, says his loyalty is not to his emotions but to the agency. Jaime, smart girl that she is, seems skeptical.
Heading to Paradise
Jaime wants to fight some real bad guys, Jae says she is not ready. Meanwhile Ruth is pressuring Jonas to go to Idaho, but Jonas says they need to leave it to the government. Ruth is worried “Paradise is just a test run” and they argue about how there is no one to go with her. Jaime barges in and says she could go, but Ruth is against the idea.
“She will only slow me down,” says Ruth.
“I am a lot faster than you are,” retorts Jaime.
“Only at running,” Ruth says dismissively and turns back to Jonas as he gets a call. He tosses over his shoulder that a test may not be a bad idea, and to please have his office soundproofed.
Next we see the two women in a cool car (emphasized by the dialogue “Cool car,” and “I know.”) in a rural area. Ruth asks Jaime why she came, she says she wanted to do something else besides think about Will. Ruth understands, and when Jaime asks if they were close Ruth says they teach you to never get too close to anyone. I am quite disappointed, because Ruth was very much Jaime’s advocate in the first episode and she seems to do a 180 in episode two.
They get to the edge of the town, where some worried people are milling around and a guard in a hazmat suit asks for Ruth’s ID. After she says she is expected and shows him, he asks about Jaime and Ruth says she is “my muscle.” The two ladies enter a tunnel facility as Ruth calls for Marty, explaining to Jaime (and us) that Marty works for the CDC and thinks Ruth works for the Department of Agriculture. Marty shows them a dead body, and says if they don’t like this one there are 200 more. Ruth asks where they are holding the survivors, Marty says there are none … everyone in the town is dead.
Jaime wants to know how more people don’t know about what happened, Ruth said they don’t want to know. Jonas calls, Ruth tells him the massacre was caused by an airborne synthetic called DC-30, which the Burket Group developed. It is only toxic for 12 hours so she is going to find a distribution center, but she thinks this is only the first strike. When Jonas says he will ready a team, she asks how because “I thought we don’t have anybody.” His reply is “I’ll call Halliburton.”
Couples Counseling
Back at the compound, Jae goes back to his office and finds a note that reads “Couples counseling? You know where to find me. - Sarah.”
Back in Idaho
Ruth and Jaime are exploring the two when Jaime thinks she hears something. The scene contains a subtle shout out to the famous bionic woman “noise” from the original series. Although as the women get closer, it sounds more and more like teeth being brushed. They head down the stairs, into a basement, and Jaime points to a door which Ruth pushes open and tells the girl inside to put her hands on her head. Jaime busts in, tells Ruth to calm down, and when the girl asks for her grandma Jaime says they need to talk.
Back home, we see Jae walking up to a nice hotel called the Yellow Rose. The doorman tells him it has been a while and his wife is waiting. Jae goes upstairs and enters the room with a gun, only to find Sarah on the floor, sexy and sassy as always.
Back in Paradise, Jaime, Ruth and the girl walk outside the house as the girl questions what happened and why she is still alive. Ruth asks her if she remembers anything, the girl says there was a weird truck driving around last night, like a gas truck. Ruth leaves with instructions for the other two to stay out of trouble. We then she the girls walking through another part of town, as the girl tells Jaime she feels like a freak and Jaime tells her she can relate. “Looking one way and being another is something I know something about.” Jaime’s bionic hearing and bionic eye kick in as some soldiers come around the corner, and she realizes they are there to target them not help them. The girls run, the soldiers shoot. Jaime and the girl are hiding, the girl is freaking out, Jaime says be quiet as her phone rings.
Jaime picks up and says “I can’t talk now,” as Becca ignores her asking where the hell a t-shirt is. Jaime repeats it is not a good time and Becca says “that’s just fine, I just wanted to let you know Dad said it is okay for me to move in with him, so you don’t have to worry about me anymore, just go ahead and live your awesome life.” Jaime tells her not to do anything until she gets home, Becca says she wants the t-shirt and hangs up. Sweet girl.
A soldier enters the hiding place, Jaime stands up to fight up and he is kicking her ass. Finally she punches him with her bionic arm and he hits the wall before falling to the ground unconscious. The soldier gets up, Jaime takes him down again and then Ruth shows up and says they have to get out of there because they have … something … and they are coming right this way. Did anyone hear what they have?
Ruth leaves them a booby trap which explodes, but it is not enough. It looks bad, but a masked man shows up and saves the girls who turns out to be Antonio Pope. When the girl, whose name is Vivian, asks “Who are you people?” then Ruth replies “We’re with the Department of Agriculture.”
Back at the hotel, Jae and Sarah talk after sex. Jae asks why she killed everyone, Sarah says she told him she was not in control … she thinks someone “hacked her.” Jae says he watched her die, and starts to apologize, but Sarah stops him saying she knows he did not have a choice.
Back with Jaime, in a coffee shop/diner somewhere, she and Vivian seem to be bonding. Pope tells Jaime that Vivian has an immunity to the gas as Vivian hugs a woman who is there to pick her up, and tells her he will find out if there is more gas out there.
Then we see a man dressed as a soldier, older, with a black eye, handcuffed to a chair. Pope comes in, and asks him once where the DMC-30 is and where his accomplices are. He says he will only ask him once before he gets some pliers and “shows him a little something that someone once showed me.” The guy swallows, and then we see Jonas’ phone ringing. When he answers, Pope tells him Ruth was right and Paradise was just a test run. “They” are sending out twenty trucks at midnight that night, and Jonas replies he is on his way.
Next we see guys with guns heading down an alley in an area that looks like a camp, which they rapidly take over. Jonas comes in, with Ruth and Jaime, and Jaime sees the map on the wall. Targets included Spokane, Washington, Portland, Oregon, Springfield, Illinois, and Jackson, Mississippi among others. Jaime is concerned.
As guys are loaded into trucks, Jonas comes over and says “You are either thinking we just saved tens of thousands of people, isn’t that a great feeling, or you knew the world was a scary place but you did not know it was this scary, and you just want to run off somewhere and hide. Which is it?” Jaime says “both.” Jonas says he owes her an apology because “I should not have sent you there, it was too soon.” Jaime stands up and says, “No it wasn’t … I’m in,” a reference to their earlier conversation in the bar bathroom. His reply is “It’s good to have you with us, Jaime Sommers.”
Next we see Jaime coming in late to the talent show, carrying flowers, as music takes over the scene. She and Becca grin at one another as Becca sings in a cowboy hat, afterwards the sisters meet up and hug while Jaime tells her “You’re a star!” Then Jaime tells her she lives with her, that’s the way it is, and Becca is never going to live with their dad. Becca asks if Jaime is sure, she feels like she holds her back sometimes. Jaime says Becca is the only thing in her life that makes any sense right now and she does not want to lose anyone else. Becca tells her not to cry and embarrass her, and the girls laugh and head off to eat pizza.
Bionic Woman, eighteen wheeler, Jaime Sommers, Becca Sommers, Will Anthros, EW, Entertainment Weekly, tequila, kryptonite, Jack Russell, Isaiah Washington, Antonio
October 5th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
Man, this is a great show. I like the storylines about her ex having known about her long before she knew him. I think that’s gonna play out in an interesting way.
October 9th, 2007 at 6:11 am
[...] The second episode of Bionic Woman got mixed reviews. If you missed it you can catch up with a detailed recap here. [...]
October 10th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
[...] Margie did an excellent job recapping episode 1.02 “Paradise Lost” so I’ll pick out points of interest from the episode. Episode two revealed Jaime to be a tough, caring, sex-driven heroine. After attending the funeral of her deceased fiance, Will Anthros, and discovering that he had a dossier on her from two years prior to them meeting, Jaime saddles up to a bar and proceeds to drink herself into an inebriated state. From which she winds up in the bathroom very close to having sex with the guy she met minutes ago. Unfortunately, bionics and alcohol induced passion don’t mix and she breaks a couple of the guy’s ribs pushing him against the wall. Things get worse when Jonas Bledsoe shows up and all but calls her drunken whore. [...]