Review: Warehouse 13 1.01 – “Pilot”
Original Airdate: July 7th, 2009
Rating: TV-14 (Recommended for people 14 or older)
Right off the bat the show begins with two highly different Secret Service agents: Pete Lattimer, a free-wheeling, improvising maverick, who acts purely on intuition, and Myka Bering, a straight-laced, uptight bookworm who relies on facts and figures. These two are re-assigned to the eponymous location after they both succeed in stopping an assassination attempt on the President’s life, not to mention Pete’s involvement in a bloodstone incident.
From there on, they are introduced by a mysterious woman called Mrs. Frederic to a world unlike any other, which is oddly located in South Dakota. They are introduced to the hidden archives of the United States government, Warehouse 13. This place is looked after by fellow SS Agent Artie Nielsen, who gives them a general tour of the place, whose sheer size would rival most military bases on any continent, and some basic information concerning the founding of the place in 1898 and its history.
While in the warehouse, the wallet of one Harry Houdini stows away in Myka’s briefcase, and Pete suddenly has a magical tea kettle attach itself to him which ends up giving Myka a pet ferret. Later on they meet Leena (who seems to have a long-standing relationship with Artie already), a low-level psychic who gives them shelter in the form of her rustic B&B. While in their new “home,” Pete and Myka spend some bonding time to establish some sort of a rapport. So their first day on the job ends on a note that would rate an easy 11 on a 1 to 10 “Weird-o-meter” scale.
Their next day starts off with a little breakfast meeting in which Artie gives them their first assignment as rare items hunters: to investigate some weird occurrences in a small town in Iowa around a college student named Cody and his violent outbreaks. Before they depart, they are given some tools of their trade: a ice cube bucket filled with a purple neutralizing ooze, a special electro-gun invented by Tesla, and a little communications device called Farnsworth.
When they get to Iowa, Pete and Myka interview Cody and during the interview he starts reciting some old Italian text and suddenly gets an adrenaline rush that gives him the strength to flip the table over, sending the two agents to the floor. Pete and Myka later meet the kid’s godmother and legal counsel, Mrs. Soliday, with whom they have a nice chat. They then leave to try to translate the text with the help of Artie, who does not provide them with a lot of help. They translate the text with the help of Professor Marzotto. Later on in Iowa, Pete and Myka interview Cody’s girlfriend, Emily Krueger, and find that she’s not the root of the problem.
Meanwhile, back at the Warehouse, Artie tries to find out more info on the translated text for them. Pete and Myka try to find out more about the Professor and realize that he has been lying to them. So the case turns hot when they follow an ambulance and find Marzotto’s body is a charred mess. Luckily, he left his office keys on a pump, which is noticed by the agents who immediately go back to the office to check it out.
When they get there, they find that one of Marzotto’s book has the same Italian text that Cody was speaking. Back in the Warehouse Artie finds the text and finds the painting that correlates to it. Only one problem: he forgot his Farnsworth in his office at the other end of the warehouse. So he drags the painting back with him to show his field partners.
Meanwhile, at Marzotto’s office, Pete and Myka are searching for an object that fits inside the book and are interrupted by Mrs. Soliday. They share a tense exchange of words and decide to go check out a Renaissance-themed party that accompanies a production of a play by Machiavelli. On the way to it Pete sees a hair brooch on Soliday’s hair that closely matches the empty space in the book. While in the car, Soliday goes into a trance-like state and causes the car to spin wildly out of control and crash horribly. After a brief hallucinatory dream, Myka revives and gets Pete out out of the wreckage. While they’re recuperating on the side of the road, Artie rings in and tells them that the brooch belonged to Lucretia Borgia, a 15th century woman whose family was associated with a reign of terror in Europe.
Pete and Myka deduce that Marzotto found the brooch on a trip to Italy, gave it to Soliday (who was his lover) as a gift, and she is gonna use it to get Cody to finally kill Emily and be her prince in a new world order. Myka and Pete decide to go to that party, stop her, and get that brooch to the Warehouse before anyone else can get at it.
At the party, Pete walks up to the stage alone and faces Soliday who has placed everyone in the crowd in a trance and is about to have Cody throw Emily in a fire. While Pete confronts soliday, Myka sneaks around and tries to take out Soliday, but Soliday overtakes them and they end up forcing the brooch out of her hands and placing it in the ice bucket. Pete and Myka end up saving the day.
The day after, Artie stores the items back in the Warehouse, Pete is out practicing some football moves with a super-football, and Myka ends up deciding that she is better off working at the Warehouse.
Overall, this show seems to be a mix of The X-Files, Indiana Jones film series, and the James Bond films, all with a dollop of comedy that provides a much needed relief from all the overwhelming sci-fi stuff.
I would give it 4 out of 5 stars.
