What I’m Watching: Warehouse 13

Warehouse 13: Season 1, Episode 9 “Regrets” (B)

I neglected to review last week’s episode, “Duped,” because I was determined to give up on this show. All I’ll say about the not-too-bad, not-too-good episode is that it appears Joanne Kelly is actually capable of some half-decent acting when she’s playing bad. It’s interesting to know, and certainly a surprise.

This week’s installment strikes me as exactly the kind of episode this show should be striving for, more so in setup than in execution. It probably helps that this episode reminded me a great deal of the “X-Files” episode “The List,” but I think it’s more than that. Starting off the episode with the accidental suicide of a guilt-ridden inmate set a great tone for the episode, and calling in Pete and Myka made sense. Joe Morton is always a great guest star to have in your corner, and the somewhat supernatural and divine implications of the episode gave it an extra oomph. Their eventual discovery that the prison was lined with hallucinogenic material was cool, and also, like a lot of things in this episode, made sense. Having things add up really enhances this show. It also made for the best effect-of-object yet, especially in the way it related to everyone, even those not guilty but plagued by uncertainty, like Myka and especially Pete. I can’t decide how I feel about the continual search for objects, and how in each episode they try object after object before discovering the real one. In a sense it drives the episode along, but at the same time, it also stalls it considerably. The major takeaway from this episode is that there is hope for this show, and perhaps in the future it can have episodes just as good as, or even better than, this one.