Hi out there in SF Obscure land! This week, let’s talk a bit about a fun comedy-drama show with humor and science and goofy nerd stuff that was Eureka.
Eureka is based around a community of scientific geniuses who work for Global Dynamics- a secretive advanced research facility. Most of the residents of the town have a genius of some type-the owner of the cafe is a culinary genius; the police deputy is a security specialist. The show generally begins with Jack Carter, the town sheriff being called in to investigate a crime involving one of the scientists or their inventions. Jack Carter is not one of the scientific geniuses, so generally the concepts have to be explained a clever way to info dump) and he uses his street smarts to solve it. Occasionally, there are longer episode arcs involving government cover-ups, corporate rivalry etc.
The real strength of Eureka is it’s characters. Jack Carter (Colin Ferguson), the sheriff; his daughter Zoe (Jordan Hinson), later reveled to have a genius IQ; Dr. Allison Blake (Salli Richardson-Whitfield) mother to an autistic son, who is the later head of Global Dynamics and later Jack Carter’s love interest; Henry Deacon (Joe Morton), a brilliant scientist; Dr. Nathan Stark (Ed Quinn) former head of Global Dynamics and kind of evil; Jo Lupo (Erica Cerra), the deputy and firearms enthusiast, and Dr. Douglas Fargo (Neil Grayston), scientist, outsider, nerd, annoying foible character.
Through five seasons the cast grows considerably. Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day make guest appearances for several episodes. A reset timeline adds Dr. Grace Monroe (Tembi Locke) as Henry Deacon’s wife. And there is an android sheriff. And there is an alternate universe timeline; and a space exploration subplot, and …. a lot of stuff.
It may seem a jumble, but because Eureka sticks to being a comedy-drama it works. It makes a show about science and intellect a good hour of entertaining TV. I always enjoyed Eureka.
So readers, any fans of Eureka out there? Don’t you wish you can live in a town like that?
Smart Girls love SciFi 