Primeval has been on a strong run of late, and this episode is the best of the bunch.
With Connor having succeeded in his project to create an anomaly in order to harness its power as a new source of energy, Phillip is eager to test things, which leads to a genuinely tense stand-off in the lab during the opening moments of the episode. Connor is firmly sided with Phillip and Prospero, while Abby, Matt and the others try to steer him back towards the light.
Connor has always been a somewhat naive character, and this episode proves that – however much he may have grown over the course of the series – that particular trait hasn’t changed. Connor believes that Phillip is a good man, who intends to disseminate the technology for free, when of course his motives are more nefarious. This split between the main characters provides some better drama than the show usually manages, but – as usual – it doesn’t make too much sense when you sit back and take stock. If Abby and Matt would just tell Connor about the imminent future destruction of the planet, he would surely stop and all of this would be avoided. There’s no reason for them not to just come clean. In that sense, it feels like false tension on the part of the writers, but it’s nicely portrayed all the same.
Aside from the danger from within the group, there’s also danger from without. When the anomaly that Connor has opened spits forth a legion of small but deadly beetles that swarm throughout the base, suddenly everyone in the ARC finds themselves at risk.
The beetles make for a fantastic creature feature. The sight of tens of thousands of them pouring through the anomaly – in an effect reminiscent of The Mummy – gives a real sense of danger. This episode, like the recent submarine adventure, has done a much better job of creating peril than we normally see in Primeval. The beetles are scary; you never get the sense that they can just be tranquilised or pushed back through the anomaly. Their sheer numbers make us think that these characters might genuinely be at risk, and the entire cast plays that sense of urgency well. And that’s not to mention the larger concern of what might happen if these voracious creatures found a way out of the locked-down ARC…
It’s not a new plot; the notion of some sci-fi creature swarming through an enclosed location is common in sci-fi (just look at Star Trek’s ‘Tribbles’, or Stargate’s ‘Replicators’), but being unoriginal can be forgiven when it’s all handled with such aplomb. There’s even an appearance from everyone’s favourite flying lizard Rex (the first of the series?). Unfortunately, his appearance gives way to a typically Primeval lapse in plausibility, as his presence causes Abby to act like she’s had a frontal lobotomy and run out into the danger area after him, putting not just her own, but several of her friends lives at risk. It’s contrivances like this that are so stupidly unbelievable that they take you out of the moment, and impact on your sympathies for the characters.
But that small moment aside, this is a fantastically exciting instalment, utilising the entire cast (minus Ben Miller’s Lester) to great effect, with everyone seemingly playing to their strengths. The only weak link is Janice Byrne as Prospero eye-candy April. Byrne really is awful, delivering her lines as if she doesn’t really speak English; just struggling to make the sounds phonetically. It’s bizarre and distracting, but even worse when – unless they have big plans for her in the final two episodes – her character appears to serve absolutely no purpose on the show.
As for these final two episodes, they certainly hold plenty of promise, given the way the board is set by this episode’s end. Connor is back on Team ARC, and playing double-agent at Prospero, while there’s a tantalising shot of a much, much bigger problem than Connor’s little prototype…
Aired at 8pm on Tuesday 14th June 2011 on Watch and at 5.30pm on Saturday 7th July 2012 on ITV1.