Introducing Warehouse 13's Relic Roundup: H.G. Wells, Bad Guy?
I know why you watch Warehouse 13. It's not for the Mulder and Scully-like partnership between Pete and Myka, or for Claudia's sharp glibness or for the generous doses of steampunk. It's all about the relics -- the apologetically cheesy, ultra-satisfying history tweaks that make SyFy's sophomore drama the best thing the network has spawned since last year's post-Battlestar Galactica rebranding. And, yeah, of course a little steampunk flavoring never hurt anyone.
And so, delightfully cheesy artifacts fresh in mind, behold Movieline's compendium of those relics from last night's season-two premiere Time Will Tell, ranked by covetability.
Last season ended with the agents' nemesis -- MacPherson (Roger Rees) -- apparently blowing up warehouse master Artie (Saul Rubinek) before fleeing the warehouse for unknown, surely nefarious purposes. And nefarious indeed! MacPherson breaks H.G. Wells out of the warehouse's "bronzer" (yes, it looks a lot like being encased in carbonite) where the first of our artifacts is uncovered:
Artifact: H.G. Wells
Specifications: According to Warehouse lore, Wells was actually sort of a man-hating lady (Dexter's Jaime Murray), which is a big surprise for Pete and Myka, who unknowingly run into the charming author in her London home. She explains she was "bronzed" because her peers would rather believe in the possibility of time travel than the possibility of a woman dreaming it up. She's been stewing about that for a hundred years or so, completely immobile. Season two, we have a villain!
Covetability: N/A.
Artifact: Durational Spectrometer
Specifications: Details about this one's origins are slim, but scanning an area with the durational spectrometer tells you what's passed through it in the last five hours.
Covetability: Low. This is what security cameras are (much better) for.
Artifact: Harriet Tubman's Thimble
Specifications: Slip this puppy on your little finger and you can transform into whoever you want! This week, it helps MacPherson impersonate/frame Claudia for letting him escape the bronzer.
Covetability: Medium-high. If only Polyjuice Potion were so easy to whip up.
Artifact: The Phoenix
Specifications: Good news: It protects Artie from MacPherson's bomb. Bad news? Anyone who hasn't touched it is in danger of spontaneously combusting. Fortunately, it's only MacPherson who bites it in this episode. And he was so last season.
Covetability: Low. This one's more trouble than it's worth.
Artifact: The Pearl of Wisdom
Specifications: Implant this into your target's ear and you can make them do or think anything you want.
Covetability: Medium. Tempting, but certainly not very practical. It practically takes an outpatient procedure to install it, which doesn't make it too helpful in a pinch.
Artifact: The Imperceptor Vest
Specifications: This steampunk-inspired corset makes you move so fast that you can't be seen. Wells uses it to navigate the Warehouse vault and grab up M.C. Escher's compact, which she's apparently been fantasizing about during her 100-year stay in the bronzer.
Covetability: Medium. It's hard to imagine you could move so fast in something as bulky as hell.
Did you catch last night's premiere? Tell us how much you want Harriet Tubman's Thimble. Or are you holding out for a Farnsworth?
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Comments
I do not need to watch the show because it has already been done. It was a TV series called "Friday the 13th". Check it out, and it was way better than this show.
Really? the best thing since Battlestar Galatica?! Unfortunately, I have already seen this premise and done a lot better. It was TV series called "Friday the 13th". The actors in "Warehouse 13" are freakin annoying. No chemistry and nothing like Mulder and Scully because they are trying to hard.
Speaking of which, I've seen your comment before, and it was done a lot better at 12:47.
Okay. I've been debating whether to add W13 to my increasingly daunting DVR burden and this article has pushed me to record it. Something has to give though and I think it'll be The Fabulous Beekman Boys and it's all your fault Lindsay.
By 12:51, I already had 3 shots of jagermeister.
"grab up M.C. Escher’s compact"
I believe she was getting her own personal effects (locket, ring, and conpact). They are only stored in Escher's vault. They were not his.
How did I end up watching this show? I noticed all of season one On Demand few weeks ago. That coupled with some looooong nights = hooked. Not bad hooked. Like caffeine hooked, not heroin/LOST hooked. Not pick here. Seems like they're getting more liberal in their logic leaps. Joshua gets breathed on and he goes flipping over the railing and nobody thinks to grab MacPherson when he is right there? Also...the bald, asian driver died last night, didn't he?
Meant "nit pick here."
Meant "nit pick here."
Warehouse 13 is better than Friday the 13th series - it leaps it forward into the current steampunk trend and the first episode of the 2nd season didn't disappoint. The Imperceptor Vest does exactly what one would hope for using the steampunk mythos (although I do think adding Cern was a little far reaching). And it's about time we had a good female villain. Kudos for the 1st episode - can't wait to see more!
The insult to HG Wells is unbelievable, and it has completely spoiled my appreciation of the show. When this character reappears, and it will, I will turn it off and never watch again. Wells was the father of science fiction; no SF show should ever excrete on him this way. There was no "Wells" in the last two shows, and it still made me furious to watch it. No more.
Wo-ho-ho. Perhaps we'll have to agree to disagree here. I kind of see the Wells thread as just another example of the reverence for genre that it's so completely grounded in. Kind of a nice tribute, even — a villain who just runs around thwarting our heroes with cavorite-infused vests and other stuff that you have to be familiar with the author to appreciate. I think that's pretty swell. Yeah.
I dont think i could have said it better myself, mrsquint. I actually found this by searching "warehouse 13, friday the 13th 2010." The show is truely awful, feels like it was done in the 80s, and is NOT better than friday the 13th. Do not lie to yourselves, my sad, delusioned friends. Still trying to give it a shot though, i really want to like it.