The new SciFi Channel series Eureka has a stro central conceit – a secret little town populated by quirky obsessive inventors, the mad scientists and absent-minded professors of other works.
As with almost any quirky town series, the tale starts with an outsider entering. Cross the mundaneness of Northern Exposure’s Joel Fleishman with the federal copness of Agen Cooper from Twin Peaks, and you have the federal marshall who stumbles across the town of Eureka, a company town for federal secret projects.
The set-up should be good for a sci-fi Northern Exposure, quirky people doing their quirky things. But the series doesn’t settlein there. Instead, it has an ongoing tale of a big evil scheme. Serious plot, and this doesn’t settle in with the more whimsical aspects. It’s hard to take the big plot seriously in this context.
Watchable, but I’m not convinced that it will hae much point, nor take joy in its pointlesness.
