Meanwhile, Clark gets the Magus cameras going, so that we can have more angles and shots for the next seven episodes to follow, and that part was kinda neat: The generator starts up, the cameras come up one by one, and he's right there in the editing bay watching all of this happen as we get like twenty or fifty angles on every part of the boat. It's like this thing was made specifically for a documentary or found-footage television program or something -- which, both inside and outside the story, of course, it was.

Valenzuelas: "For all our hysterical suspicion and superstition about -- apparently -- everything, not to mention the fact that we're right about pretty much all of it, we sure are happy to help these white people with whatever they need."

I will say that one of the things I like best about this pilot is the way you see both Linc and Tess using the cameras to get shit done in a way none of the other characters could even comprehend, because their last thirty years were lived under surveillance. It's very specifically delineated (in the pilot, at least) that they're doing this on purpose; so much so that it's the last line of the script. And I really like that, because it muddies their intentions more than anything, because if everything is a performance... Like:

Random Tess Moment: "Well, people always tell me that the reason they loved Emmet's show was not because of the travel or the adventure but because they wanted to be part of our own perfect little family. I mean yeah, we had our problems. Everybody does, sure. Our secrets. But who doesn't?"

Who talks like that? People who know they're on TV, that's who. (People who are covering their asses, on TV, particularly.) It's interesting, and intentional, and maybe later episodes will work with it, but based on the second hour I think that's a subtlety that didn't make it into the show Bible, so the subtext just becomes text. But in this particular hour, it's really compelling.

CORPO SECO

Inside the panic room, we find: PANIC!