ZeroHourS01E03E04Ep3: ABC, 28 February 2013

Ep4: Fox Spain, 22 April 2013

Albert Einstein’s blackboard in Harvard University offer new cluse to the Modern Skeptic gang, while Laila is finally rescued—but is she all that she appears to be?

Zero Hour lives—it’s coming back to ABC from mid-June, but Fox in Spain couldn’t wait and has begun screening the unseen episodes (in English). ABC dumped the show just as things were really getting good, with Albert Einstein’s last words playing into the plot in ‘Pendulum’. It shows the level of mad invention on this series that this is all played dead straight by the cast.

It was clear that the chase after kidnapped Laila couldn’t go on for long, and following a confrontation with Vincent (in which he is wounded) in ‘Pendulum’, she is finally able to escape in ‘Chain’ and return to Hank. However, by the end of the episode it is clear that she’s somehow connected to the plot against Hank, making her curiously co-incidental ‘discovery’ of the first clock in the opening episode make a bit more sense…

The best thing about ‘Chain’ is Anthony Edwards brilliantly lame German accent—when playing the part of his historical doppleganger in flashbacks he seems to have decided to channel Arnold Schwarzenegger at his most incomprehensible. It’s great! The madness doesn’t stop there as we finally see what’s in his mysterious box: it’s only the ‘true cross’ upon which Christ was crucified! Hurrah! That’s typical of Zero Hour‘s ludicrous, but madly brilliant, plotting.

Laila’s betrayal will hopefully give the next few episodes a different narrative hook than the chase to find her, and might even shake Hank up into the bargain.

Verdict: Madly entertaining as ever (a series you can laugh at and with), it’s a shame US broadcasters were not prepared to give Zero Hour a fair go…

Episode 3 ‘Pendulum’: 7/10

Episode 4 ‘Chain’: 7/10

Brian J. Robb

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