Journeyman seems to be one of those TV shows that was doomed from the start. Given a ‘plumb’ spot right after Heroes just as Heroes went off the boil and started haemorrhaging viewers, damned by critical reactions to an iffy first episode and then caught in the writer’s strike of 2007, the high-concept science fiction series never made it past thirteen episodes. In many ways, it’s a pity, because this slowly develops into a really, really great show – but on the other hand, at least it never had a chance to be drawn out for several years of slowly decreasing quality and narrative padding. Thanks to the efforts of everyone involved – the likely fate of the series known as early as episode three apparently – it is a rare case of a series cancelled mid-season that still manages to warp up its story arc and reach an actual end. It’s this fact, above all others, that make this curtailed show worth seeking out while others can happily remain forgotten. It doesn’t feel like an incomplete story.
Kevin McKidd plays newspaper reporter Dan Vasser, whose life is remarkably uneventful, beyond certain tensions with cop brother Jack (Reed Diamond) resulting from Dan having married Jack’s ex-girlfriend Katie (Gretchen Egolf) – and that had happened years earlier, after Jack and Katie split and she connected with Dan following the death of his fiancee Livia (the splendidly-named Moon Bloodgood) in a plane crash.
OK, that makes it sound extremely eventful, I know… but now, Dan and Katie are happily married with a young son, Zack, and life is pretty normal. Until Dan suddenly finds himself being pulled backwards through time. This is understandably confusing for everyone involved – for Dan, who suddenly finds himself in the past (but always within his lifetime) where his money looks counterfeit and his phone won’t work, and for everyone else who naturally find his explanation of why he has gone missing for two days rather hard to swallow.
It soon becomes clear that Dan is being sent back in order to change events of the past – to alter the lives of certain people so that they can become different, important people in the future/present. He also discovers that Livia, far from being dead, is also a traveller, who meets up with him to help him find out what he is supposed to do on each trip. But while Dan has to work out who he is supposed to help on each trip, he also discovers that any mistake – trying to make the wrong changes, leaving behind evidence – can have major and unpleasant consequences.
There’s no way around the fact that on paper, Journeyman sounds like a Quantum Jump imitation. In reality, it’s a very different show, not only in tone – this is much darker – but also in style. Dan’s time jumps come in chunks, needing him to make small changes in the lives of others on several occasions over a period of days, months or years, and in between he returns home. Smartly, the show doesn’t keep Katie in the dark for long – by the end of the first episode, she finds out the truth about what is happening to Dan, and the tension of their relationship then comes from his vanishing at inconvenient times and from the strain this puts upon their relationship – especially when she finds that he is seeing Livia in the other time periods. Jack proves harder to convince of the truth, as he tries to work out if his brother is crazy or criminal, but in time, he comes to see the truth too.
Journeyman takes a while to settle in – early episodes downplay the science fiction elements as much as possible, but it’s only when it becomes less embarrassed about what kind of show it actually is that it really begins to fly. Things start to get good with episode 3 (where Dan finds that the person he has to save is himself) and it really becomes excellent around episode five. The show starts to work in other elements – a scientist who knows rather more about the time trips than he lets on, a dodgy FBI agent who has worked out what is happening and sees the opportunity for financial gain – that hint at a conspiracy theory plotline that you imagine would’ve been expanded on if the series had continued. What we don’t get is an explanation for who or what is behind the time jumps – some mysteries don’t need to be solved though.
Journeyman starts roughly but ends up being genuinely compulsive. Certainly, I watched the final eight shows in one sitting, and you don’t do that unless you are fully hooked in. That, of course, is the joy of the DVD box set – I imagine that had I seen this on TV, I might have quickly lost interest, but the box set means that you have the opportunity to really delve into the show and it’s a rewarding experience. Of course, if you didn’t know that the show became more rewarding as it went on – indeed, if you hadn’t even heard of it before – then the chances of you buying the box set to begin with are rather slim. It’s on Amazon Prime in the US, but not in the UK. Ho hum.
There’s smart, literate writing (overseen by producer Kevin Falls, who came to this from The West Wing), and excellent performances – McKidd and Diamond look remarkably alike and so are convincing as brothers, Egolf makes a lot of what could be a pretty disposable character, Moon Bloodgood is both gorgeous and haunting as the woman who had to give up the love of her life – and plotlines that stay grounded in reality while still exploring the full gamut of opportunity that the concept allows… all make this rather brilliant. And the fact that the final episode brings a sense of closure to the ongoing story is welcome. You’re left wanting more, but not needing more.
DAVID FLINT
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