If I could (conveniently) turn back time…

Series 2 closes with a double episode thriller (to use the term loosely) as we pick through the wreckage. Strap in for some classic La Brea tropes, the likes of which you’ve frequently seen before.

Immediately, the cliffhanger from the previous episode is resolved, and we learn that everyone we know and love is safe, and James and Kiera are dead. Huzzah! Oh no wait, everyone’s now stuck in prehistoric California.

For your delectation, we have the ‘character revealing news that undermines their behaviour since day one‘ entrée, with a generous helping of ‘almost dead from a nasty injury / attack but then perfectly fine a couple of hours later’ scenario. Then we’re served the ‘something that apparently can’t be solved being fixed almost immediately’ trick, washed down with ‘overcoming sudden orphanhood overnight and laughing with your recently un-estranged wife about having a crafty shag’.

A wild goose chase! An interrupted election! Finding random things that are suspiciously connected to the random gang who fell down that La Brea sinkhole all those years… erm, months… days (?) ago.

We’re not even through the first part of this double episode yet.

Oh bloody hell, Kiera’s not dead.

But that’s a solid twist right there, I didn’t see that coming.

Oh bloody hell, James isn’t dead either.

It would be easier to get sucked through a time portal than to keep track of all this, and I think I may have lost the will to live. Maybe the amount of time elapsed could be made clearer with the use of the secret, spare portal that we’re suddenly using to go back hours rather than aeons? Because it’s not normal to experience pregnancy symptoms that soon after hopping on the good foot and doing the bad thing.

Curses, there’s not one but two plot twists at the very end, damn you La Brea. I suppose there’ll be a third series then.

Verdict: Some good moments in an incohesive show that doesn’t know what it is. 4/10

Claire Smith