In spite of the entirely unbelievable premise, antique B-movie formula plots, tired characterizations and a droolingly idiotic presentation of science, "Eureka" undeniably has charm. The charm is almost entirely reliant on an excellent cast, which against all odds has managed to invest this (literal and figurative) farce with warmth and plausible emotional engagement. However, in the latest season (2009)even those lightweight justifications for existence have disappeared.
The premise: America's best scientific minds are sequestered in a charming but entirely secret little town in (apparently) California's mountains. Despite the fact that Eureka has existed since the 1950s, no one outside the town has notice the steady stream of miraculous explosions, implosions, disappearances, multiple-duplications of heavenly bodies, contamination of the atmosphere, interferences with the order of the solar system and the inner workings of planet Earth, etc. Ever. The resident scientists are unbelievably brilliant, able to effect all the above happenings, sometimes while still in grade-school, but are also somehow completely incompetent at controlling them. They must be repeatedly rescued and set straight by the slightly dim, handsome-but-ordinary good-guy sheriff. Heroically, using a pencil eraser and a bottle of milk of magnesia.
It's not Science Fiction. It's not Sci-Fi (or SyFy, whatever that is). It's Skiffy, and it's not even good Skiffy. It's too silly.
The premise: America's best scientific minds are sequestered in a charming but entirely secret little town in (apparently) California's mountains. Despite the fact that Eureka has existed since the 1950s, no one outside the town has notice the steady stream of miraculous explosions, implosions, disappearances, multiple-duplications of heavenly bodies, contamination of the atmosphere, interferences with the order of the solar system and the inner workings of planet Earth, etc. Ever. The resident scientists are unbelievably brilliant, able to effect all the above happenings, sometimes while still in grade-school, but are also somehow completely incompetent at controlling them. They must be repeatedly rescued and set straight by the slightly dim, handsome-but-ordinary good-guy sheriff. Heroically, using a pencil eraser and a bottle of milk of magnesia.
It's not Science Fiction. It's not Sci-Fi (or SyFy, whatever that is). It's Skiffy, and it's not even good Skiffy. It's too silly.