“Simon Says” begins with some promise, with the understanding that a recent solar flare has caused havoc with the power supplies for the police androids. MX models are given charging priority over DRMs, which means that Dorian is left underpowered. And when Dorian is underpowered, it messes with his emotions. The potential for comic relief is great, and we’re treated to some of it right out of the gate, and Michael Ealy is, as usual, fantastic. The problem with this scenario is…weren’t all of the police force’s DRM’s decommissioned? If Dorian is the only active DRM on the force, how is “prioritizing” all of the MXs over one DRM really going to make any difference, particularly when it means leaving one officer potentially exposed with a malfunctioning partner? It’s annoying. Felix Gaeta…erm…I mean, Alessandro Juliani is always a welcome sight, even when all he’s got going on for the evening is the role of “certainly doomed first civilian on screen in a police procedural.” The cheerful, clean cut gent is driving his car when it’s stopped by a seemingly homeless person offering a spray-on “electro-wash” which recalls the dubious “glory days” of New York City and its fabled army of squeegee window washers, who would “wash” your windows (with filthy rags or newspapers) at every intersection, whether you wanted them to or not. It’s cute, but this reference is a little 1991, no? Of course, the “electro wash” is actually a knock-out gas, and the poor fella in question (a loan officer at a bank, as it turns out) wakes up with an explosive collar, a host of miniature cameras mounted around his car and his person, and thousands of grim internet viewers waiting to see what happens next. You see, if this guy goes and robs the bank he works at, the criminal mastermind behind this will give him the code to unlock the bomb collar, and everything will be fine. Of course, that isn’t going to happen. There’s more, of course. There are other victims planned, who fit a rather predictable pattern, as they’re targeted by an emo badguy who has scores to settle with folks who have “wronged” him in the social arena. So, just in case the “unwitting dupe with a bomb” isn’t familiar enough to anyone who’s ever watched a cop show for more than five episodes, now we’ve got the “creepy doofus taking his revenge via the internet” coming to the party. It’s really not very good. And yes, of course his next intended victim is a pretty girl who jilted him after an online date gone awry. Points for the use of The Hollies’ timeless “The Air That I Breathe” I suppose, but I still fail to see the significance. Oh…wait…I get it! It’s because that tune features virtually the exact same melody and chord progression as Radiohead’s “Creep” which I suppose would have been too on-the-nose even for this decidedly unsubtle episode, right? The problems continue throughout the episode, but I’ll spare you the gory details. A rather clumsy and exposition-y attempt to tie this clown’s motives to the botched mission that cost Kennex his leg was a ham-handed (and failed) attempt to give some of the show’s backstory a little actual relevance in what was otherwise another recycled cop show plot. Even if the rest of “Simon Says” lived up to my expectations, this throwaway interaction with Captain Maldonado would have felt out of place and forced. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter for all news updates related to the world of geek. And Google+, if that’s your thing!
