The Dead Zone: Denouement

Johnny: "All this time, we thought he was a puppet. We thought wrong, Gene."See, I knew Greg was still evil.How would marrying Sarah have stopped Greg from causing the Apocalypse? Does Greg truly have feelings for her? Would he have tried to be a better man for her sake? Or would she have discovered his true nature and found a way to stop him? (I'm guessing that last one.) After Johnny

The Dead Zone: Ambush

Jake: "Sheriff, did you see who did this?"Sheriff Turner: "Abraham Lincoln."I was so-so about the Abraham Lincoln killer plot. I sort of felt Anna's death coming, but then she didn't die, and I was actually mildly disappointed. The killer was obviously Doug O'Connell, too; he was a floating character introduced early on, and those are always big red plot flags for me. Plus the only other

The Dead Zone: Exile

Alex: "That's why I always see pink spoons on my birthday."I like Alex. She's as freaky and gifted as Johnny is. They even sort of communicate in shorthand. He showed up in handcuffs, wanted for murder, and Alex acted like it happened every day. And I really liked the way she resolved her own inescapable death by car trunk. I was thinking that, if I were in that situation, I'd duct tape

The Dead Zone: Drift

Stark: "I take it you're not a horse person."Johnny: "It's a safe bet."I saw this coming a long time ago. Greg Stillson is definitely after Sarah. He's been warm for her since he first met her.He wants to be president, which means he needs a smart, photogenic wife. Sarah would be a perfect first lady: widow of a fallen hero with two adorable young children, a ready-made family. And

The Dead Zone: Transgressions

Johnny: "I somehow still feel guilty about it all."Sarah: "That's probably because of all the Catholics you've been hanging around."A christening and an exorcism. They don't usually go together.They again did a good job exploring a possibly theological solution for Johnny's visions. (And fortunately, they didn't presume to give us an answer.) Men of the church always seem to think the

The Dead Zone: Outcome

Johnny: "This is serious, okay? Real death. Real pain."Elaine: "You don't think I know real pain? I'm in my mid-thirties and I'm still dating."This was a perfect example of the winning Dead Zone formula.Johnny and Sarah's friend Elaine worked together to resolve one of Johnny's visions of upcoming death and destruction. Essentially, Elaine was doing what Bruce used to do: acting as Johnny's

The Dead Zone: Numb

Dr. Cole: "Lions and flowers and the sheriff."Sarah: "Oh, my."Johnny and Sarah back together again, after twelve years apart. That was sort of major.This season is starting to feel like a re-set button. For six seasons, nearly everything revolved around two major plot points: Johnny losing Sarah while he was in the coma, and Johnny's vision of Armageddon via Greg Stillson. Now Stillson is

The Dead Zone: Switch

Johnny: "I'd have to touch you."Maggie: "You have permission. I won't tell Sarah."Boy meets girl, romantic train trip, chased by murderers. Sort of like North by Northwest but with a psychic. Johnny does lead an exciting life at times. It also felt a little like one of my favorite Dead Zone episodes, "Deja Voodoo": a heavy-duty flirtation for Johnny, him saving her life, and his eventual

The Dead Zone: Interred

Johnny: "Excuse me, sir. Do you dig the graves here?"Groundskeeper: "I tend the whole grounds. Digging graves is just a perk."I didn't like this one much. I wonder why? Well, let me think. I don't care for buried alive plots. I don't like Sheriff Turner. Hey, I think I've figured it out.Why don't I like Sheriff Turner? Maybe because she was all about catching the bad guys and much less

The Dead Zone: Big Top

Lorenzo: "Whoever's doing this clearly hates mirrors."Weird. Not necessarily in a bad way, though.What I found most intriguing was the flashback to Johnny and Sarah at the carnival at the beginning of the series. That was the night of Johnny's first serious psychic flash at the wheel of fortune, J.J.'s conception, and Johnny's near-fatal car accident. I think they went back to the

The Dead Zone: Re-Entry

Greg: "If there was anything wrong, I'd be the first to know about it."Johnny: "No, I think that would be me."Has Greg Stillson done a 180? Really? Hard to tell, wasn't it?Greg was still all about the ambiguity. Even though he came to Johnny for help with the space shuttle crisis, his motives were as clear as mud. Sarah apparently believed that Greg had truly changed and she could be right

The Dead Zone: Ego

Johnny: "You know, you can have your own wing."Walt died in the last episode, and Sarah and J.J. are already moving in with Johnny? Wow. That was fast.Let me elaborate on that a little. Johnny has always taken his responsibility toward Sarah and J.J. very seriously, but has kept his distance out of respect for Walt. It was completely in character (and commendable) for him to be there, and

The Dead Zone: Heritage

Sarah: "First I lose you, and then I lose Walt. I must have banked up some really lousy karma."They weren't kidding when they advertised that everything would change. I was ready for some change. Maybe not this much, though.Sarah has again lost her man while pregnant with his child. That last scene in particular, where the dying Walt was saying goodbye to Sarah -- knowing that Johnny would

The Dead Zone: The Hunting Party

Johnny: "Frost is just a patsy. It's Oswald all over again."Again, Johnny tried to help a maladjusted, obnoxious schmuck. Only this time, he didn't succeed. And the "heroic" Greg Stillson is now on the way to the White House, and there's a good chance he will indeed be vice president in 2008.The parallels between vice president Danbury and the current vice president (hunting enthusiast,

The Dead Zone: Into the Heart of Darkness

Sarah: "They say you can't love two people. But they're wrong. They're wrong."At first, I wasn't buying in, because I've been way too disengaged and nitpicky with this show lately. But when J.J. was left bound and gagged on the highway, this episode started to get to me. And it just escalated from there. This was the strongest, most emotional episode they've done in a long time. It

The Dead Zone: Revelations

Bruce: "A wealthy widow being taken in by a charismatic man of god. It can't be all coincidence, John."Gene was once a religious scam artist?As Bruce so eloquently said, Purdy always has been "iffy." So I guess it didn't surprise me that much that, when he was young and cute, he was also a very bad boy. In a way, Purdy in his Reverend Gold-Digger guise reminded me a bit of Greg

The Dead Zone: Vortex

Cop: "Does the name 'Waco' ring a bell?"Now this one worked. Maybe I'm reaching the point where non-arc episodes just don't have as strong an impact on me. I mean, it's just strange having whole episodes with no mention of the looming Armageddon.Yes, Cyrus Carter and the Seekers (good name for a rock group) were transparent analogs of David Koresh and Waco, but that was okay. In fact, it

The Dead Zone: Symmetry

Johnny: "It's like I'm stuck in a vision. Some kind of vision loop."I got through most of the teaser before I realized it wasn't Johnny we were seeing.There were things I liked about this episode. I liked the idea of Johnny stuck in a "vision loop" and not knowing what was real, and who he was in the vision. The definitive shot of Johnny at the point of entry into the vision loop, when he

The Dead Zone: Lotto Fever

Marsha: "You're not a millionaire, Boyd. You're a mailman with a mental condition."Cue the "going postal" jokes. Johnny has been kidnapped before. I don't mind story repetition when it's done well. This wasn't done well. I mean, here we have this guy, Boyd Lumely, the postal worker. Lumely, quite irrationally, blamed Johnny for poor decisions that Lumely made all on his lonesome. Lumely

The Dead Zone: The Inside Man

Johnny: "Finger bone of a dead prophet: millions of dollars. Restored faith in God: priceless."I've fantasized more than once about Johnny solving some of the great mysteries of the world. Did Lizzie Borden really kill her parents? Was there really a gunman on the grassy knoll?So I was definitely on board with the fascinating idea of Johnny touching what might be a finger bone belonging to