Beneath the Outpost, Talon, Wren, Janzo and Yavalla are locked in an epic quest to find an ancient relic in a cunningly wrought maze. On the surface, Gwynn and Zed are in a battle of wills, while Tobin and Munt continue to make for Aegisford.

Another week, another episode of The Outpost and once again everything is telegraphed, hackneyed and cliched. Having discovered the entrance to some underground labyrinth at the end of the previous episode, Wren fetches Yavalla who is determined to go straight down and reclaim the Kinj. But Wren is determined that Janzo must accompany them as they may need his smarts, and Talon isn’t about to let Janzo out of her sight and so we have a quest for the four of them and can we see where this is going yet?

Think Indiana Jones but with much less of the budget, none of the imagination and an awful lot of very similar looking sets that couldn’t look less like ancient stone and more like cheap plyboard if they tried. Throw in a dash of that cliché that The Outpost loves so much, with lessons about sacrifice and other noble character traits along the way, shoved in the viewers’ face by earnestly delivered dialogue telling us the very thing the actions are amply demonstrating. And then bring to a simmer with a truly laughably constructed bit of wire work and poor CGI. It’s less epic quest and more beginners’ LARP. Oh well.

Above ground, things are a little (though not much) more serious, as Gwynn finds herself outwitted by Zed, who has guessed she’s sent Tobin off to raise an army from Aegisford, and sets his Lu-Qiri after him. Gwynn counters with a plan that…look, let’s not go into that too much. Considering that these are supposed to be two highly cunning and intelligent people the actual substance of what passes between them here is insultingly dumb. Let’s just leave it there.

Meanwhile, Tobin and Munt are making their slow way to Aegisford, with Munt taking the opportunity for lots of character development given that he’s main cast now, I guess. It’s certainly quite fun watching the big lug actually get some time to be something other than just a punchline, and he and Tobin seem to be developing a genuine, if odd, respect for one another. One that may or may not be reinforced by their encounter with the Lu-Qiri chasing them, or the fact that Munt may well be more well-liked in Aegisford than its absent Lord.

Verdict: Mostly still awful, though with occasional bright spots (i.e. the fun bits with Munt and Tobin). Everything else is drearily predictable, cliched and silly. So pretty much as normal. 5/10

Greg D. Smith