Warehouse 13: Burnout After Thoughts

This week, we were treated to an unusually serious and poignant episode of Warehouse 13.

Burnout opens with an explosion at a police station in St. Louis that fried a bunch of gangbangers and two police officers. While investigating the source of the explosion, Myka and Pete find a skeleton handcuffed to a pipe deep in the basement. Myka fishes out the man’s I.D. and low and behold, he’s a secret service agent — a former Warehouse 13 agent, to be exact.

It’s a pretty gruesome image for the usually lighthearted series, not so much the body itself, but the idea that Jack laid there, handcuffed to that bed until he died — and from what? Did he starve to death? Was he murdered? And what, if anything, does he have to do with the fried bodies upstairs. Now, here’s where I get a little confused. Did we ever acutally find out what caused the explosion? Did the thing in the basement gather enough energy after so many years to escape and take down a whole room full of people? Or was there an actual gas leak expolsion, which coincidentally led to the thing getting out?

Anyway, back to the story and back to the Warehouse. where Claudia and Artie are involved in their usual verbal sparring match. These two have marvelous chemistry together and their banter is some of the best moments in the show. It was a great idea giving Artie a young foil and I hope they expand on this relationship as we go forward. Artie goes to a special section of the Warehouse and opens up a box which is actually the compressed bedroom of former agent Jack. It contains all of his possesions and is exactly as he left it on the day he disapeared. A cool trick, but a tad morbid, don’t you think? They search the room and find evidence of a lover and an address in St. Louis. Myka and Pete follow up and find the lovely Rebecca (Roberta Maxwell) who fills them in on Jack’s last days before his disapearance. Unbeknownst to Myka and Pete, Rebecca was also a Warehouse 13 agent but she’s been in hiding since Jack disapeared.

Between Rebecca, Jack’s old notes and Artie’s investigative skills, they find out that the artifact casuing the trouble is a metal, lobster-spine gizmo which attaches to the back of the victim, turning him into a raging killing machine with the power to electrocute anyone he touches. The creature hitches a ride on the head of the gang unit who goes after more gangbangers, then it sets a guy after his ex-wife and finally it attaches itself to Pete. Oh yes! Oh no!

Eddie McClintock goes all out with his performance as he writhes in pain, fighting to keep from giving in to the demands of the artifact. In his painfilled stupor, he knows what he has to do. He has to sacrfice himself in order to save the world from this creature. But instead of locking himself away like Jack did, Pete has a plan to kill the beast, 1,000 of volts of electricity channeled right into the little bugger oughta do it — ofcourse, that much voltage means Pete will be a goner, too. He begs Myka to do the deed, but she can’t. She’s already lost one partner (a mystery we still don’t have all the details on) and she can’t stand losing another. Much to my surprise, Rebecca steps in to do what Myka can’t. She attaches jumper cables to the creature and floods it and Pete with a burst of electricity that kills them both.

Though this show always has a serious action moment at the end, the visual here was unusually bleak with Rebecca using a fire extinguisher to smash the creature to bits while Myka desperately performs CPR on Pete. I’m done in! Well, at least I can count on a humorous tag, right? So what do we get? Artie takes Rebecca to Jack’s preserved bedroom then hands her a gift he found in the drawer of Jack’s desk. It’s an engagement ring. Looks like old Jack was going to give up the Warehouse life and settle down with his lady love after all. It’s a horribly sad moment made all the worse when Rebecca offers Myka some advice. Get out now, while you still can. It’s an ominous warning that is likely a portent of more dark episodes to come.

Overall, the artifact part of the plot was a miss for me. The “rules” for the artifact didn’t make sense and there were too many plot holes. But the character bits more than made up for problems in the story. Kudos to Roberta Maxwell in particular for a job well done.

What did you think of this episode of Warehouse 13?

WAREHOUSE 13 — “Burnout” Episode 106 — Pictured: (l-r) Eddie Mcclintock as Pete Lattimer, Roberta Maxwell as Rebecca, Joanne Kelly as Myka Bering — Syfy Photo: Philippe Bosse