Charlie Jade Verse

Interview with Charlie Jade Headwriter Alex Epstein

It’s no mystery that I’m a huge Charlie Jade fan. I don’t write those insanely long and detailed recaps on a show relegated to the 2am time slot for fame and fortune, that’s for sure. What is a little surprising is how I came to know and love the show.

Like many others, I’m an aspiring screenwriter. In some ways it’s harder to break in today because there are more competitors for the few available slots; however, we have resources that weren’t available even five or ten years ago. There are dozens of accomplished writers blogging about their experiences as staff writers, writers’ assistants, and show runners. Some write from decades of experience and some give us play-by-play as they learn on the job. One of the longest-blogging writers out there is Alex Epstein, who keeps an ongoing conversation with fans, newbie writers, and others at Complications Ensue. I’ve been reading Alex’s blog for at least two years now and also own his book “Crafty TV Writing”. If you want to write for television, I highly recommend it.

Once I started reading Alex on craft, I realized this was a guy who not only could teach me a lot, but who had similar sensibilities to mine. Odds were high that stuff he did, I’d like. And having seen a decent-sized chunk of his work now, I can tell you my instinct was right. Alex frequently discusses Charlie Jade, even using it to demonstrate how to break and beat a story in “Crafty TV Writing”. I’ve got to tell you, when I read about Charlie hopping dimensions, I knew this was a show for me.

If you’ve been watching and following my recaps, you know that the first eight episodes took a while to get up to speed. There was an awful lot of world building going on, particularly in episodes three and four, and a lot of it felt like the writers were spinning their wheels just a little bit. Some conflicts between the show’s creator, Robert Wertheimer, and the writing staff led to a separation. Starting with episode nine, “Betrayal”, which will air next Tuesday morning at 2am on Sci Fi, a brand new writing staff took the reins, led by Alex.

Alex was nice enough to answer a few questions for us about the switchover and the show. There are a few spoilers in here for upcoming episodes; I’ll do my best to indicate them for those who want to remain pure.

Also, Alex is going to be doing a couple of the episode Podcasts coming up, so if any of you have any questions you’d like to ask in general or about specific episodes, you can contact Alex through his blog, or write them up in comments here and I’ll pass them along. If you want to check out the episode Podcasts, you can find those over at Charlie Jade Verse.

Richard Porter: So how did it happen that you got this job? Did you get a call from Robert Wertheimer one day and end up on a plane the next, or was there more to it?

Alex Epstein: I’d chatted with Bob maybe a year before Charlie Jade started shooting, but he was still developing the series conceptually. After that I was working on the comic drama I created, Naked Josh. I’d pretty much forgotten about CJ when I got a call from the late Robin Spry. He had optioned a fantasy series of mine, and I’d developed a robot series for him.

“How would you like to go to work in Cape Town for four months?” asked Robin.
“Sounds interesting, Robin. When?”
“How about Tuesday?”
“I can’t do Tuesday, Robin, I have a meeting. How about Wednesday?”

Apparently there had been a bit of a falling out between the writing staff on the one hand, and Bob Wertheimer and Diane Boehme on the other, and the staff had been sent on their merry way, or quit, or a bit of both. So we parachuted in during the production with no time to prep.

The show was in a bad situation - behind schedule, over budget, with the storyline wandering, and no real template. Ironically, that meant that we couldn’t screw it up. All we could do is help Bob bring the show back on track. If we succeeded, we’d be heroes. If we didn’t, it wouldn’t be our fault. I think I probably had more fun than anyone else on that show. Bob had to figure out how to juggle the budget and the financing. I just had to sit in a swell conference room above one of the best restaurants in Cape Town drinking coffee shakes with Denis and Sean, and talking science fiction stories.

RP: Did you put the team together back in Canada and fly it out as a group - I know Denis McGrath joined at the same time as you - or did you fill it out with local South African writers? How big was the writing team and what was its breakdown of Canadian to SA writers?

AE: The writing staff was Denis McGrath, Sean Carley and I. We had independently “auditioned” for Bob and Diane, our exec for CHUM, and given our “take” on the show. I met Sean on the plane; I met Denis the next day.

We were originally working with an assortment of South African free lancers, but we weren’t at all happy with the results. Still we had a co-production requirement that roughly half of the scripts had to be South African. So we auditioned some new freelancers and brought on the best of them. That was Dennis Venter.

RP: How did the composition of your team compare to the original team? More Canadians, or was it about the same?

AE: We replaced three Canadians.

The following question has spoilers about next week’s episode

RP: You and your writing team took over the show at episode #9, “Betrayal”, where a lot happens to move character and story forward:

• Karl’s betrayal of Charlie
• Meeting 01’s family and discovering he’s sane in Gamma
• Learning that Alpha either doesn’t have the Greek myths or they are not widely known
• Reena losing her first and only friend in Beta
• Charlie going underground

How many of those beats were in place from the prior writing staff? Was there an existing outline, or did you guys come in with nothing but the notes and thoughts of Wertheimer?

AE: There was an existing script, but no one was happy with it. In fact originally the plan was we were going to start on episode 12. But episode 9 was so worrisome that we told Bob we wanted to rewrite it in the 24 hours we had before we needed to start prepping it, and that’s what we did. We broke a completely new outline in the morning, and then divided up the acts.

The previous writing team hadn’t left any document for how they intended to go forward. I have the impression they and Bob fundamentally disagreed about that, which had led to their hopping a plane back to Canada. It’s probably just as well. It was probably simpler and cleaner to just look at the episodes and try to figure out ab initio what the show was, and where it wanted to go. That meant bringing certain things into the foreground that had lapsed into background.

For example, an earlier episode (was it 3?) had shown that the Link was going to blow up our universe. We felt that had to be the center threat of the whole show. Yet episodes 6-8 had very little to do with that. We also felt Charlie had to take on Vexcor, and that meant he had to go underground. It was all a massive “retcon,” where we tried to make sense of what had gone before.

Then we had to explain to Bob what we were trying to do. It was his universe and his tone and his characters - which he had worked out with Bob Sawyer and Chris Roland and Diane Boehme and the original writing team. He was pretty pleased about most of what we came up with. We never did convince him about Reena’s “programmed personality” or the secret of the Men in Grey Suits.

RP: Following on that theme, was there much of a bible in place, or did you need to build one up yourself? I ask, because obviously some things changed significantly when your team came on, most notably the presence of the blue stones…

AE: People don’t really write bibles once production starts. The room is the bible.

There was a bible, but it was full of backstory that hadn’t manifested in the series - which meant we could take it or leave it - and not so full of plans for a way forward with the story. Too many details about the world, not enough story elements to play with. The story elements were really in the episodes.

RP: I remember reading elsewhere that you dropped the blue stones because you didn’t know what the original writers had intended with them. Have you found out since? Did they even know?

AE: I figured they were like the radioactive glass you find at atomic blast sites.

What we dropped was the “special water.” (That third pipe in the shower.) That just seemed precious. And it would have required a lot of plot mechanics for O1 and Charlie to get it. Simpler to say: you need water to go between the worlds. But you also have to have the ability to go between the worlds.

(Emphasis mine. Because, uh, watching on my computer I never noticed the third pipe before Alex mentioned it.)

RP: It’s pretty clear early in the run that 01’s behavior is closely tied to the verse he finds himself in. Your team obviously carried that forward, as well as showing some growth to his character even in Beta and Alpha. Why does no one else seem effected by the different verses? Did you know, or was Wertheimer keeping that close to the vest?

AE: I don’t think we meant that he was magically affected by the world he was in. Gamma’s just a much saner world; and much further from Brion, his father. I think he was saner because he was happy there.

RP: Did Reena’s arc play out the way it was always intended, or did you just make the best of a bad situation? Slowly rewatching the show now for the third time, I’m struck by the abuse the writers heaped on Reena from the beginning through episode eight, “Devotion”. Even then her brief peace is shattered when she has to kill her one friend in Beta. Did you and your team specifically try to make things easier on Patricia McKenzie, or was the timing coincidental?

Alex’s answer contains spoilers

AE: We were wondering where to go from “Raping Reena.” We wanted all that abuse to mean something - to give her something positive. So we decided that it was intended to create the “programmed personality.” That way she could go from being a victim to a death-dealing agent, while still keeping her conscience.

Bob never really liked the “programmed personality.” He felt strongly, for example, that Reena would never be able to destroy Alpha just to save her own world. We thought she would. (”I am become Death, Destroyer of Worlds.”) It’s Bob’s show, of course, and Reena is his character, so it’s his right to decide what she would and wouldn’t do!

RP: So, what makes Paula/Jasmine so special? Why were there never any doppelgangers? Or was her presence in both verses merely a dramatic conceit as an obstacle for Charlie?

AE: We didn’t see what connection there might be between Paula and Jasmine. I remember early on in the writing room, writing “Paula is Ross’s Monkey” on the whiteboard. In the first season of Friends, Ross has a monkey. It probably seemed like a good idea in the formulation of the show, but it turned out not to be necessary, or all that intriguing. Marie-Julie hadn’t been playing the two characters much differently. So we got rid of Paula.

There actually was another doppelganger. In episode 16, when Charlie learns how to see, and then walk, from world to world, he sees other Charlies. In one world, he’s a gangster. In another, he’s a happy family man. In the last one, he’s a fascist rebel who’s destroyed the Vexcor of his world at the price of massacring everyone Cape City. The finale had a huge dramatic confrontation between Charlie of Alpha and Charlie of Epsilon, all about sin and redemption and fate and pain.

You may have noticed that’s missing from episode 16. Acts 3 and 4 have no A plot. The story had a number of things going against it. The director hated having to shoot multiple Charlies. In fact he claimed it wasn’t possible to do on budget, notwithstanding that every science fiction show does the Two Kirks episode sooner or later. Second, I don’t think Jeff Pierce really dug the idea of playing multiple Charlies, many of them evil. But much more importantly, Bob was really trying to avoid Big Sci Fi. I think his vision of Charlie Jade was much more of a drama. It was about What Is It Like to Be Charlie. He wanted the show to be Sopranos, not Battlestar Galactica. Episode 16 was very far from that vision. We knew that early on, and had offered to chuck it and write a new completely new episode, but the decision was made to move forward in order to avoid hanging up the whole script pipeline. In our defense, we broke down episodes 12-16 in more or less our first week on the show. Episode 17 is the first episode we wrote where we were really able to deliver what I think Bob was hoping for. In every show you have some episodes that come out better than others. I’m really pleased with how 17 came out.

Of course, Bob was kind enough to let me put the fourth act of my ep. 16 script into the back of my book “Crafty TV Writing”, so if you want to check it out, you can read it there.

This question and answer contain mild spoilers

RP: About the Norns: should we conclude that 01 is Loki? I’m kidding, of course. Unless he is, in which case I’m being incredibly insightful.

• More seriously, are they truly symbolic, or just a nod to mythology nerds and Walt Simonson fans?
• Were there nine verses, of which we generally see just the three, and do the those map to Norse myth? Alpha to Nilfhelm, Beta to Midgard, Gamma to Asgard, perhaps? Or is such a literal reading a mistake?

AE: It started as a nod to mythology nerds like myself. I mean, there are three of them, right? And they hold the fate of the universe in their hands.

But they might have wound up attaining Norn-like powers in a second season. You throw things like that out there and then decide later whether to pick them up.

I do miss the scene we had where the Three are using a sort of Link scanner to tape record science fiction movies from other universes. You know, the stuff that didn’t get greenlit in their world. I would totally abuse the equipment to do that. It had no bearing on the story so we had to cut it. Oh well.

RP: Has Wertheimer ever mentioned to you any ideas about continuing the story in a different medium? Novels, comics, or an Internet-based series, perhaps? Would you be interested in trying your hand at one of those, or are you too busy right now?

AE: I’m developing my own pay cable series about a fallen angel in Montreal. And in my free time, I blog. And fight crime. Yep, I’m too busy.

Also, none of us is a novelist. (Okay, technically I have a novel about the childhood of Morgan le Fay in the works at Tradewinds — look for “The Circle Cast” in 2010). And none of us can afford to write comics.

I’m sure Bob will do another show that incorporates some of the themes of Charlie Jade. It’s more likely you’ll see avatars of 01 and Charlie in a new Bob series than you’ll see the originals in another medium.

RP: Anything you can tell us about your new series? Any likelihood of seeing it down here in the States? I hear SciFi has an opening Wednesday mornings at 2:30. Maybe they could make space for another Epstein Joint. Kidding again, obviously. They need that time slot for midget wrestling.

AE: God forbid.

I’m still developing the show for The Movie Network and Movie Central. We aren’t even looking for American or foreign partners yet. So I can’t tell you much about it yet. But you can follow my development efforts in my blog, Complications Ensue. I don’t talk about the story details because those are a secret. But I talk about the process whenever interesting things happen.

CJ was a fun show to write. I’m truly grateful to Bob and Diane and Robin Spry for bringing Denis and Sean and me on board. We had a blast. I hope you have even a tenth as much fun watching it.

I have mixed feelings about this episode. It’s the best of the season so far, I think. A compelling case can be made for “And Not a Drop to Drink”, as it opens the kimono on inter-dimensional travel, 01’s unique abilities, and the importance of water to the scheme of things. But tonight…it’s something else.

Then again, this is also the last episode under Writing Regime #1 (WR#1). Things you’re starting to understand? Things that you’re figuring out? Some of that’s just going to change next week and beyond. And trust me when I say it will get a hundred times better and cooler. It takes a few episodes until the second team - Alex Epstein, Denis McGrath, and Sean Carley - really takes off, but even in next week’s episode, “Betrayal”, you can see marked improvement. That slowness that was evident early in the season goes away fast as things ramp up quickly.

But that ramping starts tonight, even if it still looks like Charlie Jade is spinning his wheels.

Missing Persons

Charlie heads to the Glass Door to confront 01 Boxer about another missing girl. If you want me to point at the one thing obviously wrong in these first eight episodes, it is this: this is the first time these incredibly charismatic actors have shared a scene. Jeffrey Pierce and Michael Filipowich command the screen in subtly different ways.

Pierce burns slow, with the taciturn stoicism of heroes of times gone by. John Wayne and Gary Cooper made careers out of these traits. Clint Eastwood honed them to a fine edge, where a squint spoke volumes. Pierce is at his best when he plays to that same strength. In stark contrast, Filipowich is a short fuse, a real-life Daffy Duck. His silences are more frequently broken by unexpected mania than a wry smile while his tightly coiled muscles bear the threat of sudden violence or passion. The closest comparable actor I can think of is Joe Pesci, though Katee Sackhoff shares similar traits of unpredictability.

Sadly, this is just a short scene, but we can expect more to come.

As Charlie’s been investigating 01, he’s found another in a string of missing persons. Karl convinces him to push forward, even when Charlie’s convinced this particular girl’s disappearance has nothing to do with 01. A quick money drop by pops leads to the boyfriend of daughter Aliah. Using the classic “enhanced coercive interrogation technique” of tossing a ball against the doofus’ head gets him to confess that Aliah ran away on her own and has taken up with a motivational guru.

“You are what you choose to be”

Mancuso Keyes is a guru to the rich and fabulous, helping them take control of their lives. Helping them be what they choose to be. This catchphrase echoes Charlie’s military training and we see a series of flashbacks throughout the episode filling in more about that period in his life. It wasn’t the army and it wasn’t the police. Charlie Jade, enemy of all things Vex-Cor, used to be a Vex-Cor security officer.

In his first flashback, Charlie recalls an innocent training exercise. A squad, closing on a blockhouse, establishes position and flushes out the occupants with tear gas. As the occupants come out, weapons hot, the security personnel mow them down. When the exercise is done, the dead disappear, as though in some sort of training simulator. A behavioral specialist welcomes them as the sons and daughters of the Vex-Cor family.

In his second flashback, the setting is the same but Charlie now leads the squad. However the end result is quite different. These aren’t simulated people who exit the blockhouse. These are real people, armed but unable to defend themselves. How and why they were there is not explained, but knowing the rules of Alphaverse and the ways of Vex-Cor, we can surmise they were enemies of the company, given weapons in order to justify their summary executions.

When Karl tells Charlie that Keyes worked as a behavioral specialist for Vex-Cor security, he recalls the same, stirring speech as it was delivered after the fatal training exercise. The words have less meaning this time, unable to raise the proper devotion to mother company. Angry over the memory of his manipulation at Vex-Cor’s hands, he ups his pressure on Keyes.

Seeing that Keyes has advanced tech that can knock out a Vex-Cor bug, Charlie tries one last time to talk with Aliah. But she’s not listening. Keyes and Charlie talk alone and Keyes has one final insight for Charlie:

I’m a teacher. You know? It’s like horses. Before you can train them you have to break them. Yes. Like you were broken and reborn.

Charlie’s final flashback, on these words, is a gruesome scene of torture gone awry. No cute ball-on-the-head questioning occurred here. This was blood, and pain, and death. As is usually the case, Charlie himself was not the perpetrator of the violence. Here, he observed only the aftermath, but the impact of the scene is written in the lines of his face.

Brion Boxer: Vampire?

What? I mean, WHAT?

Essa tells 01 that Brion needs to see him; 01 tells her to make him come to the office. When he arrives, the two of them are hooked to some kind of machine. Brion, at death’s door is barely conscious for the procedure. Something is sucked out of 01 and injected into Brion. I’ll assume, in the absence of any other theories, that it’s just blood. There must be something special about 01’s blood, some life-giving properties. Whether these are general, or specific to Brion in his condition, I could not begin to guess.

When the procedure is complete, Brion is a new man - youthful, vigorous, energized. 01 is wearied, but appears to be alright. The price Brion pays is a small box containing possessions of 01’s mother. Theirs is a classic battle between father and son for the love of the boy’s mother. The hatred and contempt each holds for the other is palpable. The bounds that hold them together are now more patently visible. 01 can’t leave. He needs for his father to retain nothing of his mother’s.

Back in Beta, some of 01’s odd behavior now makes a little more sense. Broken and damaged, he holds onto his mother in the only way this child has figured out. He puts on her lipstick, dallies with her mirror, and tries in small ways to become his mother.

That’s only some of the time, of course. Mostly, he gets stoned and screws women in Beta. That’s what our world is for, I guess.

Not that any of that lasts for long, as Julius makes the call. He gets 01 to stay at the club for another 15 minutes, just long enough to die. Fortunately for 01, the assassin is incompetent. He kills 01’s companion and manages to hit 01 in the shoulder, but fails to kill his target before 01 hits the shower and the third tap on his way to Gamma.

While I imagine this security agent is not long for the world, things can’t be much sunnier for Ren and Julius, can they? With 01 alive, their lives are in his hands.

Reena’s Friend

My favorite thing that happens when WR#2 takes over? Reena gets to suffer a bit less. Hey! I should be happy tonight. She’s recovering from her fall against Rosalie’s car, but no one’s trying to rape her, brainwash her, program her, or cut off her nose with giant, rusty scissors. In a nice place by the beach, she can finally let her guard down a little and try to rest in…what? Rosalie’s dying? Jesus!

With an infection rate of somewhere around 20%, South Africa is one of the most affected nations in the world. Calling it an epidemic there is no exaggeration, so it’s little wonder the creators of Charlie Jade would make it a plot point at some time. Sadly, it comes when Reena has her brief respite. Her time in the sun passes, as she must help her new friend shuffle off this mortal coil.

Even when she’s doing good, Reena can’t help but hurt people.

Those familiar with comics, and feminist commentary on comics, will be aware of the term “Women in Refrigerators”. When watching the first half of Charlie Jade, I frequently feel as though Reena’s suffering serves no real purpose and falls in that category. So for me, it’s nice to see Patricia McKenzie get something more to do this week than get smacked around. She does a nice job with the quiet scenes at Rosalie’s house. Imagine what she might do with actual plot developments.

Final Thoughts

Um, things are rough for Jasmine? Does anyone care right now? They gave her what, 45 seconds? Skip her, or give her something to do.

Things are heating up between Paula and Charlie. I think those kids are in for a…no. Not really. That’s another weird sidetrack.

In the end, I think this is the best or second best episode of the first eight. If you’ve made it to here, I can only conclude you’ve decided to ride the show all the way to the end and I salute you. you’ve made an excellent choice that will be rewarded in the weeks ahead.

What did everyone else think?

Featuring commentary by Robert Wertheimer on Episode 108, “Devotion”.

Originally aired Space on 5/28/2005 in Canada, aired on SciFi Channel on 07/29/2008 in the USA.

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 108 Commentary: Devotion [47:32m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (357)

Promo recap of Episode 107, “Diamonds”, aired prior to Episode 108, “Devotion”

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 107 Recap Trailer [0:46m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (166)

For those of you long-time Charlie Jade fans, this will come as welcome news.

The efforts to reclaim charliejade.com from the netherworlds of Internet limbo failed, but from the ashes a new site has risen.

Robert asked, and razorbraille delivered. They rebuilt the site they had originally created in 2005-2006, at a new location: http://www.charliejade.info

Update your bookmarks!

Surprise…Charlie Jade is not a force of nature. Neither is he a man with no name. He’s flesh and blood, and filled with contradictions. Like anyone, Charlie has a past that informs who and why he is and this week we get a peek into it.

Diamonds are Forever

Remember that gangster’s pinkie ring Charlie wears? The one he pawned to pay for his sweet ride? Charlie hits the shop, looking to retrieve it. Instead he finds the owner dead and the ring missing.

A flashback to five years earlier shows us Charlie as a soldier of some sort, on a sweep with his partner. Charlie lags behind as she bursts through a door and opens fire, killing a man and his wife. She scans his implant, then cuts that recognizable ring from the man’s hand, passing it over to Charlie with a smile on her face. Charlie hears steps at his back and spins, weapon at the ready. He finds a small child in his sights and recoils. Happy partner takes the kid out with one quick shot.

Over the course of several more flashbacks throughout the episode, the story gets filled out more. Charlie and his partner were acting on orders to clear out terrorists and locate an arms cache. But there was no cache, and the C-3s they executed were no terrorists.

Because of this history, we understand why Charlie goes to such lengths to recover the ring. Tracking down a low-level criminal plugged into the crime scene in the neighborhood surrounding the pawn shop, Charlie roughs him up until he gets a name: Jasel Eckman. Charlie wastes no time in finding Eckman and telling him he wants his ring back. Even if Eckman doesn’t have the ring, he’ll know where to find it, but Eckman wants to know what Charlie would be willing to pay. That evening, we find out.

Charlie, with the help of his tricorder slash sonic screwdriver slash magic wand, breaks into Eckman’s cutting works and steals a synthetic diamond from its incubating chamber. A big fat diamond, being grown with Vex-Cor tech.

Karl’s slow on the uptake. He first assumes Vex-Cor wants to replace real diamonds with counterfeits. Then Charlie shows Karl the scar on his wrist. The chips Vex-Cor uses to classify and track everyone in Alpha are diamond chips. If Vex-Cor is growing synthetics here in Beta, it must mean they intend to institute large-scale tracking. Tracking with the same type of chip Charlie cut from Andrea Bridger’s wrist back in “And Not a Drop to Drink”.

Charlie and Eckman engage in an intricate dance. Eckman wants his diamond back. Charlie wants his ring. Eckman’s goon tells Charlie to be careful for Karl, and any other friends he might have.

Friends like Paula.

Charlie returns Eckman’s diamond and Eckman lets Charlie know he’ll get back his ring. Charlie then suggests Eckman pay more attention to whom he’s working for and tells him what the diamonds are for.

When Ren Porter brings Eckman the next set of seeds to be grown, he asks what they’re for. He’s heard Charlie’s words, but backs off quickly when Porter challenges him. A Rand is a Rand and Eckman is a businessman.

Finally, Eckman’s goon returns Charlie’s ring and as he puts it on we flashback one last time to see Charlie, disillusioned, as he walks away from his service, keeping only the ring and the clothes on his back.

Karl: So when are you going to tell me what this is really all about.
Charlie: Blood.
Karl: What are you talking about?
Charlie: It’s a reminder. Reminds me of what I was. So I can hold on to who I am.

Meet the New Board

In Alpha, Essa informs 01 Boxer that the new board members for Beta have been approved, though she thinks they’re unusual choices. Intimating that she knows 01 is manipulating the messages he’s transporting between the verses, she reminds him the link will be reestablished soon and “then the situation will be clear.”

Poor Julius. The guy’s the head of a multi-versal corporation bent on complete and total domination, and yet I feel bad for what 01’s putting him through. Staring longingly at a bottle of booze, Julius can’t get a drop to drink because here comes new board member #1, Cool Slide. Cool is a rap impresario in the P. Diddy mold and is happy to be getting his hands on a company with Vex-Cor’s resources. Cool will be creating a new division and running it: Vex-Rap.

Julius isn’t done with the board, unfortunately. Next up: Myeeko Stiles. This fashion maven will be running a new division called F-Vex. Just what a corporation seeking total control needs: a fashion house. Julius once again looks longingly to his one true friend in Beta, his bottle. Oh, in case you didn’t catch it, Stiles needs to see Vex-Cor’s books. Looks like 01 has some exciting accounting plans up his sleeve.

Ahhh. Alone at last. Julius pours himself a stiff one. But there’s a dead fly in his glass. Or…oops. That’s not a real fly, it’s a bug: “Eat me, 01.”

At the Glass Door, Julius and 01 have a little dance of their own, as fraught with threat of violence as Charlie’s was with Eckman. 01 still has all the power; only he can travel to Alpha. Even though Julius senses, just as Essa has, that 01 is manipulating the slates, there’s nothing he can do about it. He knows if he’s wrong and goes against home office’s wishes, he’s doomed. All he can do, like Essa, is issue toothless warnings to 01.

Reena: Locked and Loaded

Reena’s rape and reprogramming finally get a target. Her suave benefactor gives her her first - and only - mission. Julius is a bit too regular. On the same day each week, he stops on the way home and spends 15 minutes with his daughter at the playground. Reena’s mission is to strap on a bomb, walk up to Julius, and kill him.

However, it seems Reena’s programming was incomplete, or her Gamma-born sense of right and wrong is too strong. She kills the terrorist who was guarding her and runs. Jumping a fence, she lands on the windshield of a moving car. The driver helps Reena, taking her away from the scene and away from her captors.

Jasmine? Really?

I don’t even know where to stick this, Jasmine gets such short shrift lately. At this point in the show, she’d become an afterthought to the writers and they just didn’t seem to know what to do with her. But here she is, in her one scene in the episode, having her chip status upgraded to C-2 by a hacker. Frankly, other than the fact that it effects the diamond chip in her arm I have no idea why this scene is in the episode at all.

The writers were really starting to spin a bit by this point. Reena’s story had been careering out of control for weeks and Jasmine ended up with disconnected scenes like this. More importantly, while 01 was moving forward with his schemes and plans, Charlie was merely reacting. Fortunately for us, only one episode remains under the original writing team. After that, things pick up.

We’ll get into that in much more detail when we present an interview with Alex Epstein, Executive Story Editor and writer from episode #9 through the end of the series. Look for that interview coming next week.

Featuring commentary by Robert Wertheimer on Episode 107, “Diamonds”.

Originally aired Space on 5/21/2005 in Canada, aired on SciFi Channel on 07/22/2008 in the USA.

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 107 Commentary: Diamonds [46:42m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (357)

Promo recap of Episode 106, “Dirty Laundry”, aired prior to Episode 107, “Diamonds”

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 106 Recap Trailer [0:46m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (182)

In case anyone’s forgotten, Charlie works for Karl. He gets a couch and a hundred Rand a day to investigate Vex-Cor. But there’s a price to pay for being in Karl’s employ. This week, the price is getting his butt kicked by some white supremacists while following the trail of missing organizer and activist Themba Makandi.

Charlie Jade doesn’t take place in a vacuum. The geography of Cape Town - the ocean, Table Mountain, Robben Island - frequently come into play. The history of the city and South Africa also inform much of the show’s writing. The disappearance of Makandi is certainly more resonant in the South Africa of Beta than it would be in the North America of co-creators Chris Roland and Robert Wertheimer. The wounds of Apartheid are fresh and a source of much current pain.

So when the white guy, one step removed from a Lethal Weapon villain, says they must protect the Volkstadt and then has Charlie busted up, he seems the most likely culprit. But things are never so simple in a world with Vex-Cor.

Dumped on an empty street, Charlie gets a vision of Alpha. A truck bears down on him and barrels right through him to no effect. Because we now know water matters, I’ll point out that it’s raining in Alpha, but not in Beta. I love the way Jeffrey Pierce plays this whole scene. He’s not suicidal, but defiant in demanding the universe try its best to kill him. It seems as though he wants the truck to kill him in order to prove he’s actually alive.

Is this Vex-Cor, or Enron?

Vex-Cor’s been siphoning off power; we saw the first evidence of that back in the opening when the light flickered during Charlie’s interrogation. Charlie’s been trying to hack and track, but he can’t figure out where the power’s going.

01 Boxer knows why the power’s going, but not yet where. He shows up at a power facility in a sweet old Bentley to deliver a slate to Julius. Of course 01’s motives are never as unsubtle as they at first appear. He’s not just trying to vex the Vex-Cor chair by showing up with a couple of bimbos in tow; neither is he merely challenging Julius to act. Palming a small camera, he hands it off to a Vex-Cor employee mere feet from Julius. 01 plans rationally, but acts with the bravado and rashness of an adolescent.

Back in Alpha, Essa watches the report from Beta on the progress of the link and the overall state of that branch’s business. Bryon Boxer calls and she makes a veiled threat regarding 01, but the old man needs to see him soon. At death’s door, he needs to see his son. Essa demonstrates the power of Vex-Cor in Alpha by having her secretary send the President on his way after waiting for two hours so she can go see Bryon.

The Making of a Hero

Charlie’s been a reluctant hero at best, but it’s not hard to understand why. Coming from a world where everyone has given up and given over to Vex-Cor and the other four companies that rule, he’s inured to caring. If nothing you do matters in the grand scheme, eventually you don’t do. It falls to Karl and the humanity Tyrone Benskin brings to his portrayal to teach Charlie how to care. It falls to Karl to teach Charlie to be a man.

Charlie speaks to Makandi’s wife who convinces Charlie with her strength and love for her husband to continue the search.

But Charlie makes a little detour to follow 01 first. Riding a skateboard - yet another sign of 01’s maturity level - he heads for a playground to meet with Trevor Sykes, the stooge with the camera. Charlie trails and listens in with his phone slash tricorder slash dessert topping. Sykes hands 01 a photo of the temporary link and learns it’s, “an insane, crazy ride that’s gonna blow your mind, that’s gonna set you free, that’s gonna set everybody free. And I’m gonna blow it up.”

Karl calls Charlie, interrupting his quiet stalking time, and 01 disappears.

Charlie returns to the Makandi investigation, where the trail grows cold at Regrow Industries. The trail is truly cold - chilled down to 77K by the tanks of liquid nitrogen in use at Regrow.

To combat his recurring and worsening headaches, Charlie will try almost anything. So he seeks out some muti medicine. Except, of course, he doesn’t. He’s following another lead in the Matandi case, trying to see if Matandi was targeted for outing a charlatan.

Brought before a sangoma, the old man asks for something from Charlie’s pocket to determine the type of headache he has. Charlie hands over a blue stone which seems to excite the old witchdoctor. Through his translator, the sangoma tells Charlie he has “the most difficult type of headache to control.” Charlie then becomes belligerent, first asking for the “rubber hand”, then asking if the sangoma had anything to do with Matandi’s disappearance.

Looking around the morgue, an attendant asks what he’s hoping to find. Several bodies have been cut open, and organs removed, so Charlie tells him missing body parts. He asks if it could be muti healers, but the attendant points out the witch doctors are no surgeons.

Charlie’s given up. He stares out Karl’s window and argues with him about Makandi.

Makandi’s dead. You get it? People who disappear, they don’t just come back, Karl.
Maybe where you come from. Maybe in your world it doesn’t matter how or why, but in this world it’s important to know what happened. It’s important to know the truth. I want to know the truth!
It’s your world Karl, it’s not mine. I just want to get back to mine.

Then Charlie spots a Regrow truck driving by outside. A truck filled with LN₂. It all comes together: the chop shop from the pilot, the tanks, the missing body parts in the morgue. He rushes to Regrow and finds it abandoned, a bloody scene of dismemberment and organ harvesting. The only evidence left, Makandi’s distinctive glasses.

The Making of a Killer

In direct contrast to Charlie’s development as man and hero, Reena is being turned into something far uglier. Her captors show not the humanity of Karl Lubinsky but monstrosity. Reena’s been beaten and bloodied, and now wears bandages on her eyes. Whether from her injuries or something more heinous, she’s temporarily blind. As she sits in dark solitude, she relives the horror of being raped by one of her captors. In the flashback but unseen by her, we watch as the suave, smooth leader coolly follows the proceedings. Finally, he “jumps” to action and pulls the attacker off her before showing false compassion.

Just another mind game in the endless series to break Reena down and rebuild her as a weapon.

When her mentor later cuts off her bandages, he speaks gently to Reena, telling her “I saved you. Now you’re one of us.”

He gives her the opportunity to prove her fealty a short time later. She hears her rapist speak and reacts. Her captor hands her a pistol and encourages her to kill the bastard, watching on proudly. Whether the gun was actually loaded I leave for the rest of you to guess.

Jasmine’s Journey

Honestly, even I’m not as interested in Jasmine this week as usual. She’s on the street, suffering and alone, but other than the shock and disgust of encountering her mother, there isn’t much going on with her. Then again, as Reena’s journey is counterpoint to Charlie’s, Jasmine’s is counterpoint to Paula’s.

Jasmine has lost the love of her life, her sun and moon. Paula is finding hers in Charlie.

This week sees the return of Paula’s father, last seen wielding a cricket bat back in “Sand”. He warns Charlie not to hurt Paula, but seems warmer to the notion of the two of them together. At least he’s not grabbing any sporting equipment at the moment.

Question: what should we make of the fact that Jasmine’s mother lives (and we’ve no sign of her father) and that Paula’s father lives but her mother does not? Anything?

Walking to dinner, Paula wonders when Charlie’s going to open up to her and say something real. He’s not ready yet. But a siren startles them as an ambulance rushes by and Charlie takes the opportunity to end that line of questioning and continue on to dinner.

Meanwhile, the ambulance continues to the scene of a hit and run. Trevor Sykes wasn’t very good on a skateboard, I guess.

The Link to Charlie’s Headaches

On each brownout, Charlie’s headaches are worsening. He realizes there’s a connection between the links, the power drains, and his headaches. He also knows 01 wants to blow up the link.

While Charlie investigates Regrow, Karl calls a contact. He gets the address of a dry cleaner where his contact assures him the power has been diverted. Grabbing his camera, Karl stakes it out.

01 modifies a bug, turning it into a bomb.

Julius grows impatient, sure his nemesis is going to attack the link before it’s ready, but his security chief, Ren Porter, tells him all will be fine. The link will be up in 20 minutes. We’ll be seeing more of Ren, played by Langley Kirkwood, in the weeks ahead. Interesting story how he got his job as head of security…the last guy got killed in a bathroom.

Ren leaves, 01 drives up, and Karl calls Charlie. But it’s too late. 01 released his bug on its suicide mission. The link is destroyed and Charlie’s way home is gone.

Aftershocks

With the link destroyed, 01 remains in his position of power. Essa can’t remove him and she certainly can’t kill him. Until another link can be constructed he can continue his machinations. To what end remains to be seen.

Charlie and Karl go to Thembi Makandi’s funeral and we see that Charlie is beginning to understand the importance of truth. He’s still a product of Alphaverse, but thanks to Karl’s efforts is learning to appreciate the value of human life and human struggling. Who knows. He may become a hero yet.

Sadly, Reena’s learned a different set of lessons. What ugliness her future holds is unclear, but what is clear is that her path has been dictated by others.

Thoughts? Questions?

Here’s an article on Charlie Jade from Genre Commentary, from November 2006:

The Best SF Series You’ve Never Seen: CHARLIE JADE
Submitted by Arwen Spicer on Tue, 2006-11-07 06:59. CHARLIE JADE | Introduction to the wonders of the TV series

Have you heard of Charlie Jade? Unless you live in Canada or South Africa, the answer is probably “no.” If it is, you’re missing out on an extraordinary show: original, intelligently conceived, and populated by refreshingly fallible heroes and ambiguous villains. Filmed gorgeously in and around Cape Town, this Canadian-South African co-production (2005, 20 episodes, plus one “recap” episode) centers on the adventures of the eponymous Charlie (Jeffrey Pierce), a private detective who, in the course of investigating a mysterious girl’s murder, gets catapulted into an alternative universe. Our universe. There he must unravel the machinations of the nefarious megacorporation, Vexcor, before… well, to say any more would spoil the surprise.

Charlie Jade breathes new life into the standard SF trope of the parallel universe. The show moves among three “present-day” universes: the Alphaverse, Betaverse, and Gammaverse. You won’t find Spock-with-a-Beard here; in fact, very few characters have alter egos. This—to invoke Spock again—is logical: given different life circumstances, most people’s parents wouldn’t have gotten together. Charlie comes from the Alphaverse, a Blade Runner-esque dystopia where Vexcor rules a totalitarian state of near-universal surveillance and corporate corruption. But Vexcor has a problem: the Alphaverse is running out of natural resources. Luckily for Vexcor, it has developed a universe-hopping technology that will allow the company to plunder the Gammaverse, a seeming utopian idyll of ecologically sustainable living. To reach the Gammaverse, however, Vexcor’s machine must punch a line through the Betaverse, our universe. And when Gammaverse terrorists blow up the Vexcor’s Gammaverse base, Charlie finds himself caught in the shock wave and stuck in Beta.

He’s not alone: one of the Gammaverse terrorists, Reena (Patricia McKenzie), has also been thrown into the Betaverse. A wanted criminal, she’s on the run, combating Vexcor, her “hellish” new world, and her own conscience. Charlie, meanwhile, has it somewhat easier. Befriended by conspiracy theorist Karl Lubinsky (Tyrone Benskin), he quickly finds his footing in the Betaverse and uses his Alphaverse detective skills to get the dirt on Vexcor.

(more…)

Featuring commentary by Robert Wertheimer on Episode 106, “Dirty Laundry”.

Originally aired Space on 5/14/2005 in Canada, aired on SciFi Channel on 07/15/2008 in the USA.

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 106 Commentary: Dirty Laundry [47:31m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (375)

Promo recap of Episode 105, “And Not A Drop to Drink”, aired prior to Episode 106, “Dirty Laundry”

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 105 Recap Trailer [0:46m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (177)

That wasn’t a slow one at all, was it?

This is usually the point where those of us who are fans of this fantastic show can stop promising it’ll all be worth it if you just hang on a little longer. This is the point where the newbies become converts and start proselytizing right alongside us. This is also where we see the real crime of SciFi’s quick hook.

Had the network stood by this show until this week’s episode, and had they been smart enough to then promote next week’s episode with a marathon of the first five episodes, they could have picked up a lot of new viewers. Because all of you remaining, those who’ve been patient through a month of slower, mysterious episodes, would have been telling all your friends to give Charlie Jade a second look. Oh well.

Instead, it’s just us: the ones who already knew, and the small band who trusted us this far. Good for us! Let’s dive in, shall we? Trust me. The water is fine.

01 Gets Off…

…of Betaverse!

Finally acting like an actual PI, Charlie’s on a stakeout outside the Glass Door. He spots a mysterious man in a gray flannel suit and gives chase but the man seems to vanish into the ether. Charlie’s reminded of Jody’s Invisible People from back in episode 2, “Sand”. After losing the mysterious stranger, Charlie turns a corner and spies 01 having a little party in the alley behind the club. Because he’s a PI (and not because he’s a perv, or anything) he peeps.

As 01 gets close to climax, he pulls out a bottle of water and pours it over his head. At first he starts to fade out, then he finally disappears! Now, *that’s* an orgasm. N.B. this is one of many, Many, MANY scenes throughout the course of this series that make it clear why it should never have been broadcast at 8pm. Either the SciFi execs never watched, or they never intended it to remain on Fridays.

Charlie spots the dry footprints on the pavement and finally makes some sense of the footprints he’d seen back in the pilot.

Besides making things clearer for Charlie, this should start answering some of our questions:

• How does 01 travel?
• How did 01 appear out of the bathroom at the Glass Door back in “Sand”?
• How did 01 get into Elliot Krogg’s hotel room in “You Are Here”?

Of course, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We don’t know everything.

The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit

Charlie pawns his ring to buy a car, picking up a sweet Audi which can’t be too cheap. The pawnbroker must be right when he says, “this is a very unusual ring.” Charlie again spots the man in the gray flannel suit.

Charlie will espy the mysterious stranger twice more in the episode, finally taking his wallet at knife point. He doesn’t strike me as cut in the Vex-Cor mold, neither is he like Reena’s captors. Who he is, and who he works for will remain a mystery for now.

The Three Faces of 01 Boxer

In Gamma, the local Vex-Cor chairman walks along the beach leading a delegation of what appear to be political representatives. They come upon 01 Boxer, who stands serenely in the surf as the waves caress his feet. Pointing to an island just off-shore, the chairman talks of the need for a “permanent home for fanatics, militants, revolutionaries.” 01 pictures the cells of Robben Island while the chairman speaks.

This 01 Boxer is not the petulant child of Alpha, nor the psychotic malcontent of Beta. His persona, in fact his entire physical bearing, changes from verse to verse. Michael Filipowich does a great job capturing the subtle and not-so-subtle changes 01 undergoes as he travels, but why does 01 change at all? Charlie certainly seems the same in Beta as in Alpha, so what makes the 01 who casually killed a man in Beta the same man who contemplates the horrors of Robben Island and says “it must never come to this” while in Gamma?

This man of contradictions is the only thing keeping the tenuous connection between the verses in place. As Essa’s courier, he keeps the lines of communication between the home office and the Beta and Gamma branches up. Using encrypted slates, the messages between the worlds are kept secure from prying eyes. Except obviously, 01 can hack the slates.

Watching Julius’s most recent message to Essa, 01 learns a temporary link will be reestablished in three weeks. He immediately heads for the shower and another verse.

Reena’s Torment

Okay, I don’t know about the rest of you but of the tortures Reena endures throughout this episode, it is the music that hurts me the most. Maybe the electrodes to the skull hurt her more, I don’t know, but the music would make me lose it. Of course, that’s the point. This isn’t interrogation: it’s brainwashing. I don’t know who this group that captured Reena last week is - Vex-Cor, random terrorists, or something else entirely - but I can tell you what they’re doing. Breaking her down for some higher purpose.

On a side note, because I’m not going to talk much about Reena this week, on Saturday I finished “Y: The Last Man”. I’m not going to say much, other than I cried a couple of times which is pretty damn impressive for a comic. However, it struck me that for the film adaptation of Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra’s masterpiece, producers could do a hell of a lot worse than casting Patricia McKenzie as Agent 355. I’m just sayin’.

Jody and the Invisible People

At his favorite restaurant, Charlie tells Karl about 01’s disappearing act and flirts with Paula. Quick tangent: do you guys think he goes for the service, or the ceviche? Regardless, things are looking good for those kids, I tell ya. Which of course makes the cut to Alpha to see Jasmine and her plight that much more poignant. Charlie’s possessions are being taken by the state. Jasmine is a possession. Jasmine is of no use to the state.

Charlie heads back to the desert to get some answers. Jody’s mom is still a wacko with a gun, but the reasons start to make more sense. Jody recognizes a picture of 01 Boxer and her mother becomes more defensive. Charlie tells her it all has to do with water. Then she tells him about the water.

Before Jody was born, her parents lived in a town near the reactor where the groundwater became contaminated. People got sick, there were birth defects, it was bad. Charlie visits the town, now buried by the shifting sands of the desert, and finds another blue stone. He also finds a conveniently located faucet dripping water.

On investigating the town’s history, he learns a pharmacist, Aaron Bridger, was charged with dumping “outdated cough syrup down the toilet” and served 11 years. Obviously the contamination was from the Vex-Cor facility, but he was set up. Charlie has an address, so he and Karl go to investigate.

Bridger died three months earlier, but his wife Andrea agrees to talk to Charlie. She lost everything because of Vex-Cor - her child, her husband, her home - and came to Cape Town where she set herself up as a psychic. She can’t read people’s minds, but she does see a grim future of “poverty and filth, armed soldiers, violent confrontation everywhere.” But Charlie recognizes the world she sees is not the future. It is his home.

The reluctant hero does something finally and truly heroic. He buys Andrea Bridger passage to Patagonia and cuts the chip from her arm. Patagonia, because it has no value to Vex-Cor and he believes Andrea will be free of her visions at last.

This chip is almost certainly the same as the ID chips Vex-Cor uses in Alpha. Now we know they have the tracking ability in Beta, so expect to see more about the chips themselves in the weeks ahead. Andrea gets in a cab immediately and Charlie waits behind. Knowing Vex-Cor will be signaled once the chip is removed, he lies in wait. What we get is one of the best close quarter fights you’re likely to see this year.

I’ve heard great things about the bathroom fight in Eastern Promises, and Burn Notice has some of the best hand-to-hand on the air right now, helped greatly by star Jeffrey Donovan’s black belt. Still the claustrophobia in this fight, the mix of grappling with striking, and the way water plays such a crucial element make it very intense. A couple of the punches are a bit roundhouse for my taste, but there are a lot of elbow strikes reminiscent of Krav Maga and other more practical styles. There’s never a doubt that Charlie will survive, but when his head was underwater, there was a moment I actually believed he might do so by shifting out of the verse.

Instead, he kills the Vex-Cor security agent.

Beaten, bloody, and limping. Charlie heads back to the desert. He fills his bottle from the leaking tap and pours it over his head. No screaming, no crying, just a silent drop to his knees when he doesn’t dematerialize. Nicely, quietly played by Jeffrey Pierce.

What did everyone else think?

Featuring commentary by Robert Wertheimer on Episode 105, “And Not a Drop to Drink”.

Originally aired Space on 5/7/2005 in Canada, aired on SciFi Channel on 07/08/2008 in the USA.

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 105 Commentary: And Not a Drop to Drink [46:00m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (383)

Promo recap of Episode 104, “The Power of Suggestion”, aired prior to Episode 105, “And Not A Drop To Drink”

 

 Charlie Jade Episode 104 Recap Trailer: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (173)

Things are still moving a little slowly this week, and we have to make do with no narrator this week, but by episode’s end quite a lot will have happened. Watch closely.

Four Funerals and a Riot

Simultaneous funerals in Alpha, Beta, and Gamma verses for the victims of the three explosions. Julius out in the windswept desert, Essa shedding glycerine tears in her office, and of course a shot of paradise. Elliot Krogg gets his day in the sun as well, but it ends not in tears but screams as rioters arrive and disturb the proceedings, overturning his coffin and desecrating his corpse. Charlie and Karl watch from a distance as Karen (Elliot’s girlfriend) is taken away by 01 and Vex-Cor agents.

01 bugs a meeting in Julius’ office in which Elliot’s potential involvement in the attack is debated. Julius sticks with the party line, right up to calling Elliot’s death a suicide, but the others lay the blame on 01. As we’ve seen what 01 is capable of, all I can say is that these people are gonna get it.

Bottle + Head = Oweee!

Things are tough for Reena. Capetown is nearly in lockdown in search of the terrorist with the R5 million bounty on her head. As nothing else ever happens in town and there are no South African TV shows (these poor folks in Betaverse don’t even get Charlie Jade) her picture is on every TV 24-7. On those rare moments it’s not taking up the full screen, it’s being shown behind Julius Galt and another of his carefully stage managed press conferences.

A kid recognizes her and chases her into an alley. Peeking back around a corner, Reena takes a bottle square on the noggin. Then she levels the kid with one punch and tosses him in a dumpster. Even dizzy, she’s a badass.

Spotting a drug dealing ambulance driver, she jumps in his van and surprises him with a knife to his throat. This is NOT going to go well.

The next morning, the ambulance driver is stoned out of his mind and Reena is still reeling. He wants to PARTAY, but passes out. Reena takes his money, finds his gun, and tries to sleep in an empty tub.

When Reena’s new roomie finally wakes, he sees Reena’s face on the television. He thinks he’s going to have a massive payday, but Reena hogties him with tape and rolls him on the floor. She’s still weak, still dizzy, and still needs sleep. Unfortunately, she did not secure him well.

He makes a call, looking for the reward, and the security forces head out. A second group intercepts the call and beats them there, killing the ambulance driver and taking off in a van with Reena. Okay, what? Who the hell are these guys in masks who don’t hesitate for one second before killing the poor sap who lives here?

Is it Safe?

Karen has been secured in a safehouse where she is interrogated by feds. Flashing back to 01’s brainwashing of her from last week, she starts naming names. All the people who were meeting with Julius earlier. 01’s plans are starting to make some more sense now, though who these people are and why he wants them out of the way are still a mystery.

Charlie shows up, thanks to a tip from one of Karl’s informants, and the agents take off with Karen. One lone agent remains behind and tries to stand down Charlie, but she’s clearly scared and tentative. Charlie calmly informs her, “you want to take a bullet for a paycheck, I’m more than happy to give you one.” She hands over her gun and he knocks her out. See? More of that winning charm that the ladies likeee so much.

Karl’s upset by Charlie’s approach, but comes around a little when Charlie tells him Karen had been given a drug that doesn’t even exist in Beta. The same drug 01 used on mystery girl Katie Grail in the pilot. Realizing 01 is going to kill Karen when he gets what he wants, we start to see the first signs that he might actually be a hero, if a reluctant one. Lost, confused, angry, he wanders the streets of Capetown.

Having his first really long vision of Alpha, he spots Jobbo who we’ll meet later. Broken out of his vision by a soldier, he’s taken away in a truck. Civil rights certainly are in short supply in Capetown since Reena’s been outed as a terrorist. Of course, sloppy Beta security forces can’t hold Charlie for long; he escapes and quickly steals a car.

Unable to get home and looking for a scrap of comfort he heads to Paula. Since he’s a badboy, she invites him back to her place. He takes a long, hot shower - one can only imagine how much Charlie’s been stinking up Karl’s place - and finds the clothes Paula leaves out for him. The men’s clothes, along with a razor, let Charlie know Paula’s not always lived alone.

While Charlie’s bathing at Paula’s, things aren’t going so well for Jasmine back in Alpha. She’s come home to find Jobbo, her former “employer”. With a performance similar to Robert Knepper’s T-Bag from Prison Break, Toni Caprari finds the right balance between charm and extreme creepiness, in this scene leaning heavily toward the latter.

On every television 24-7, runs Reena’s picture and news of the hunt for the terrorists responsible for the Vex-Cor explosion. But above the fold on the newspaper - the one wrapping the fish and chips Paula bought while Charlie was showering - is a story about Elliot Krogg’s funeral. With a photo of Conklin. One of the more frustrating things about these early episodes is how easily information drops into Charlie’s lap.

He takes off to find Conklin and rescue Karen.

Plan 01 From Alphaverse

Dr. Conklin shows up at the Glass Door during 01’s pedicure. 01 takes foot care very seriously, so he’s none too pleased with Conklin’s whining about terrorists breaking into the safehouse, and his “position in this community,” but 01’s got dirt on Conklin. When Conklin informs him that Karen has given up the names she was programmed to reveal, 01 tells him to kill her.

Julian’s becoming quite the regular at the Glass Door. This time he’s upset because the feds are poking around Vex-Cor’s files.

01: Who are they looking for?
Julius: Tell me.
01: It’s too early for dumb-shit games, Julius.
Julius: Take a wild guess.
01: Everybody I don’t like.
Julius: Krogg’s girlfriend implicated the entire board of directors you son of a bitch.

Now the plan comes into focus. The entire board is arrested and 01 leaves Julius in place, with the clear implication that he can take him out at any time. Next week should bring some interesting changes to the Vex-Cor board.

The State of the Verses

Here we are, four episodes in:

• Charlie’s embracing the role of hero
• Paula’s got the hots for Charlie
• Things are looking grimmer and grimmer for Jasmine
• Reena’s been kidnapped/rescued by armed men in masks
• 01 controls the board of Vex-Cor

Did I miss anything? What did everyone else think?