Timeless Season 2 Episode 8 Review: The Day Reagan Was Shot
Dale McGarrigle
at
.
Well, that was a particularly loopy time-travel adventure!
Finally, the backstory of how Agent Christopher ended up the head of the Rittenhouse resistance was revealed on Timeless Season 2 Episode 8.
Did anyone else feel old having the team travel back to an historical event he or she remembered, not needing Lucy's recap of the action?
I found out about the Reagan assassination attempt while working at my college newspaper. So, yeah, I'm old. Or, as I prefer, experienced.
That's one of the beauties of TImeless is that it sometimes brings viewers back to touchstones of their lives. But it equally well unearths and features obscure characters from throughout American history. It's an attractive blend.
Related: Timeless Season 2 Episode 7 Review: Mrs. Sherlock Holmes
Rittenhouse going back to the day of Hinckley's attempt on Reagan didn't immediately make sense. Reagan was a Rittenhouse kind of guy (white, Republican, favored business), so surely they wanted him to keep living.
Instead, the target was a young DC cop named Denise Christopher. Then, suddenly, it made sense.
It was pretty ingenious. Take out Christopher, and the Lifeboat crew would never have come into existence. With one shot, the resistance would be gone.
In other words, this one's personal.
Lucy seems to have a warm spot in her heart for Christopher, probably because Christopher is the only one among them that is still living with her family.
This begs the question: why hasn't Rittenhouse gone after either Christopher's or Rufus's families as leverage? That whole "secret organization" status doesn't exist anymore for Rittenhouse, so why not make that obvious move?
Anyway, it's clear that Christopher has gone through some shit to go from being the uncertain rookie cop she was in 1981 to the hard-ass she is today (except around her family, of course).
Related: Watch Timeless Online: Season 2 Episode 7
Still, I could see the connections between the two, both in their speech patterns and their ideals.
I loved Christopher's heartbreaking story about how she became a cop, even adopting the name of the female officer who comforted her after her father got killed in a carjacking.
She also made the right call in taking Denise Christopher as her cop name. At that time, a female officer would have enough obstacles without having an unpronounceable name as well.
Denise's "smother" was an interesting character. You would have to grow up strong to stand up to that force of nature. I certainly understand why she wanted her daughter in a less-dangerous profession, such as doctor's wife, after her husband got killed during a crime.
The real revelation in this episode was Jiya, who flourished in the field. The others may be jaded with the idea of time travel by now, but Jiya loved the chance to visit one of her favorite time periods.
Sure, she slipped up using modern slang too often in her enthusiasm. And choosing Cagney and Lacey as code names for she and Lucy was an iffy choice. I tried to remember if it had been on the air yet. I do recall it took a while to draw viewership in any event, so no harm, no foul.
Related: 18 Catchy Tunes That Dominated TV
Jiya and Lucy were a great team, as they were able to play off each other despite their limited time together in the field.
They were hilarious as a would-be gay couple, trying to get Christopher to see who she could become in the future.
Then Lucy found a use for that flash drive which Christopher had given her earlier this season, in case anything ever happened to her or her family. That would seem to violate the rules of time travel, but then it was essential that she got Christopher back on her life path.
Wyatt and Rufus were used less this episode, but they gained an important clue. Not all the Rittenhouse agents are zealots, like one of the 1981 sleeper agents. Some, like the other sleeper agent, are drafted or blackmailed, in exchange for Rittenhouse's financial help or to keep their families safe.
This concept is making Jessica seem more suspect. Her brother that Wyatt remembered dying from leukemia is still alive, thanks to cutting-edge surgery. Who funded that wasn't answered, as Jessica blurted out that she was pregnant.
Another idea that may be getting retired is that events are fated to happen. Jiya and Rufus were determined to find a way to keep him being killed as she foresaw in her premonition. In other words, his death isn't necessarily fated.
Also, neither Flynn nor Connor was able to go back to 1981, since versions of them were living at that time.
But Flynn's story about how he got Lucy's journal suggests that a future version of Lucy came back to give him the journal, during a time when a present version of Lucy existed. So, what's the deal there?
That's a lot of ground to cover in the last couple of episodes. Let's hope there's a third season because they can't possibly tie much of anything up by the end of Timeless Season 2.
I admit to being confused after watching this episode. Did Christopher know all along about how the Lifeboat crew saved her history, or did she just know that at the end? I think it was the latter, but I'm not sure.
To try to figure out these paradoxes, watch Timeless online.
How did you like young Christopher? Any chance we'll ever get Connor's backstory? What is most important to be addressed by season's end? Comment below.
Dale McGarrigle is a staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow him on X.
