JOURNEYMAN Recap: Home by Another Way

 I don’t know what it’s going to take for NBC to keep JOURNEYMAN on the air after the WGA strike, but I really hope they give this show another shot.  Over the past few weeks we seen story progression and character growth that has really brought the show to the next level, and last night’s episode was no exception.

Although I can’t say that Dan’s traveling adventure was the most exciting we’ve seen all season, it did serve an important purpose for his family – the family that all too often is neglected because of his unique abilities.

It’s Christmas Eve and Katie is furiously baking and preparing for the Vassar Family Christmas party. This ain’t no ordinary shindig, unless of course your holiday party includes a florist doing the arrangements and a carolers to entertain the guests. Katie is all too happy to put all of her effort into the party if it means it can distract her from her the events of week’s past. Bennett, the man who shot Dan and kept Katie hostage, is haunting her thoughts and putting quite the damper on her Christmas spirit.  Adding to her bah humbug is Dan’s passive aggressive mother who is in town for the holidays.

Dan gets a call to come down to the paper only to find out that he’s been laid off.  He angrily confronts Scrooge, aka the publisher of paper but to no avail.  Then zip bam boom, Dan is transported back to Christmas Eve 1978 and is at the paper’s holiday party. There Dan is joined by Livia and the two run into Nancy, a co-worker of Dan’s in the present, who was always rumored to have job security because she was having an affair with the then publisher and was with him when he died…at the Christmas Party in 1978 . The long and the short of it is, Nancy didn’t have an affair with the publisher (played by John Aniston whom many know as Victor Kirakis of Days of Our Lives, and others know as Jennifer Aniston’s Dad) and wasn’t there when he died.  She just said she was so she could provide an alibi for the publisher’s son who WAS in fact there when his father had a heart attack and didn’t do anything to help him. Nancy in return would get future job security and a promotion to reporter.  Fast forward to the present day and the publisher’s son is now Dan’s publisher – the guy laying everyone off.  Well he was planning on laying everyone off until Dan blackmails him with the news that he knows he let his father die.  The publisher calls his bluff until Nancy comes in and backs up Dan’s story. In the end, no one loses their jobs and Dan is once again the quiet hero.

Ah, but what I failed to mention was that back in 1978 Dan also ran into his father, Frank, who was the paper’s photographer at the time. Dan knows that it was the very next day (back in 1978) that Frank abandoned Dan, Jack and their mother and forever changed the life of his family.  Frank and Dan have a few heart to hearts during which Dan gets a glimpse into his father’s state of mind at the time, and Dan learns that his father left because of his own insecurities and shortcomings, and it had nothing to do with his lack of love for his family.  He thought they were better off without him.  Dan tries to get him to stay, but has no luck. But what he did do what alter the past so that Frank at least took a moment to tell young Jack and Dan that he was leaving. And that little change in personal history might have had a small effect on Jack, who seemed a bit kinder and gentler (and a hell of a lot more likable) in this episode.

Back in the future, Jack catches Theresa snooping in the medicine cabinet.  She tells him that she was looking for some kind of anti-psychotic meds for Dan.  Jack tells her that it’s none of her business, but she tells him it is, because if Dan has a mental illness then so could Jack, and then in turn so could his baby that she’s pregnant with.  Since it wasn’t something either of them had planned, Jack is a bit taken back and the two flee the party.  But Jack, after perhaps being positively affected by now knowing why his father left, tells Theresa that he’s not going anywhere, and that he is excited at the idea of being a father. Good boy, Jack.  But are you going to tell her that you are still secretly in love with Katie…come on you know you are.

Speaking of love, Livia is in love too.  We learned in past episodes that Livia is a time traveler who lives in the past and travels to the present.  Well in her present (which I believe is 1948), Livia is in love – a fact she never shared with Dan.  And Livia is anxious to leave Christmas 1978 because she wants to be with her love in 1948.  And it seems he wants to be with her too…forever.  Livia accepts her love’s marriage proposal.

Back in 2007, at the party, Katie’s flashbacks to Bennett keep her holed up in her room while he guests are enjoying the party downstairs.  But comfort comes from an unlikely source as Dan’s mother , Barbara, tells her that she is strong and capable of taking care of herself.  Barbara worries that Katie thinks Dan will leave and never come home (if she only knew), just like his father did. When Katie confirms her suspicions, Barbara tells her she has nothing to worry about because she doesn’t need to Dan to survive – she can do it on her own.  No, not the warmest of mother’s but the point was well taken and Katie took comfort in it.  But as he always does, Dan shows up in the nick of time and tells Katie that he’s not his father, and he won’t ever leave.  Well, that is until he disappears again.

So another great episode of JOURNEYMAN has wrapped.  We have another new episode next week, but I’m not sure how many more after that.  There are still a number of questions out there that I want answered so NBC best not pull this show.  I know I’m not going to get my answers to all my questions soon, but here’s one to tackle for this week:

> If Dan and Livia were together for years, and this whole time she was a jumped who was really living in 1948 – then how the hell did he never notice?  Come on, he was “afflicted” for one day and Katie knew something was up.  This perplexes me.  Have any thoughts on the matter?

Are you still loving JOURNEYMAN?  Any chance you are a newbie who got into this show late after all my constant badgering to give it a chance?  Let me know!