Roswell, NM – #102 So Much For The Afterglow – Review by Leonard
Written by Leonard
Liz is at Rosa’s grave late at night. Max spots her and says the cemetery closes at sunset. Liz says she jumped the gate, and since it’s after midnight so it’s now the 10th anniversary of her sister’s death. Max says he won’t arrest her because it’s too much paperwork. He drives her home. He asks if Liz has been avoiding him. She tells him she got a grant for her research in San Diego. She tells him he still wants to kiss him once she gets through the day, so she tells him to meet her at sunrise at the turquoise mines. The handprint is now almost gone.
At Project Shepherd, Sgt. Manes shows Kyle a picture of the corpse of Hector Valenti, badly burnt from the evening of the UFO Crash. The corpse had a handprint on it. Kyle refuses to break doctor-patient confidentiality to tell him who he saw had the handprint. At the police station Max’s partner Cameron gives him traffic cam footage of the shooting. She says that Valenti had already arrested Gerardo Guerrara. Max doesn’t believe it’s actually him. Cameron recognizes the truck belongs to Wyatt Long, whose sister died in the accident that killed Rosa. Cameron says they will go visit Long in the morning after Max gets some sleep.
Back at the Crashdown, Liz hears noises from the restaurant. She goes downstairs and finds Isobel and Michael looking for “late night snacks”. They try to intimidate her. Liz assures them she won’t tell their secret. Isobel asks how’s Liz’s fiancé in Denver. Michael threatens Liz. Max arrives and punches Michael. Michael and Isobel leave. Max apologizes and leaves too.
Liz comes down and finds the Crashdown still closed. Arturo says the restaurant is always vandalized on the anniversary so after the shooting, he’d rather not risk it. She asks him to come with her to California. He asks Liz to try to forgive Rosa.
Michael arrives back at his trailer on Foster Ranch and finds Alex. He tells Michael he has 24 hours to move his trailer as the Ranch has been sold to the government. He tells Michael what happened at the reunion can’t happen again.
Liz is back at the hospital and asks Kyle to access Rosa’s autopsy so she can look at the toxicology report. At Isobel and Noah’s, Noah is trying to untie his favorite tie from the bed. Isobel tells him he thinks something is off with Max. Noah offers to take Max out. Isobel says if Max won’t talk to her he won’t talk to him, but maybe he’d talk to Michael.
We find Liz at church lighting a candle when Max arrives. Liz asks Max to show her his memories of Rosa. Max reluctantly agrees. We see teenage Max watching Liz, Kyle and Rosa through the window of the Crashdown, him watching Liz and Rosa outside the Crashdown and Liz and Rosa bumping into each other and spilling a milkshake in the Crashdown. Max tries to break the connection but Liz sees one more image of Rosa pushing Max with “a fraudulent zodiac” written on her hand. She hugs and thanks Max. As they stare at each other, Cameron radios in and says she has a location of Wyatt Long. Max leaves but says he’ll see her at sunrise.
Michael and Isobel are drinking at the Wild Pony. Michael tells Isobel the reason he likes staying at Foster Ranch is because as a kid at night he would sneak out of his foster home, go there and wait hoping to be picked up.
Max and Cameron confront Wyatt and his friends who are outside drinking. He mentions that if that family had not come here from “Me-hi-co” his sister would still be alive. Max sees Wyatt’s gun in his belt and challenges him to a shootout, with Cameron. Wyatt hits 2 of the 3 cans while Cameron easily hits all 3, the 1 he missed and a tire on his truck.
Alex arrives at the Wild Pony and is greeted by Maria. They spot Michael at the bar, Maria mentions that he got kind of hot. Liz arrives and greets them. Max holding a bullet from Wyatt’s gun, tells Cameron once they match it with the Crashdown shooting they can arrest him. He tells her he’ll go keep an eye at the Crashdown.
Back at the Wild Pony, Liz asks Maria if she knows what “a fraudulent zodiac” is. Maria tells her it’s a Third Eye Blind lyric from “God of Wine”, a song she’d play on the jukebox. She tells Liz that she wrote that lyric on her hand the night she died. Liz barges into Kyle’s office. He shows her Rosa’s autopsy report. Nothing suspicious in it until Kyle reminds Liz of the time Rosa was rushed to the ER because her appendix burst. The autopsy report on file marked her as having an appendix. He pulls out the real autopsy report. Liz grabs it from Kyle opens it to see a picture of Rosa’s face with a handprint over her mouth. Kyle says he thinks Rosa was murdered by an alien.
Back at the Wild Pony, Isobel continues to try to convince Michael to talk to Max. They overhear Wyatt talking about the shooting and wanting to send the illegals back where they came from. Max is watching Arturo take out the trash when Noah drives by. He tells Max that Gerardo was cleared of the shooting but is in ICE custody because he’s undocumented too. Wyatt and his friends are beating up Arturo until Max intervenes.
Back at the hospital, Kyle asks Liz who put the handprint on her chest. She doesn’t answer, flipping through the pictures until she sees one of Rosa’s hand with “a fraudulent zodiac” on it like Maria said.
Max catches up to Wyatt. He asks Max if he’s going to arrest him for doing his job. They continue fighting until Max gets on top. He puts his hand on his chest and begins using his powers until he’s thrown back by Michael. Wyatt gets up but is immediately tasered by Isobel. Max admits that ever since he healed Liz something is wrong. Maria and Alex are talking about home.
Liz comes home and finds Arturo. He tells her she just missed Max who saved him tonight and that he would always come in, order coffee, never drink it, tip well and ask about her. Liz meets Max and he tells her that ever since he healed her he’s felt wrong. She asks when was the last he saw Rosa. He tells her the day he asked her to drive to the desert for a bio project. He asks Liz when she is leaving. She says she’ll stay. She offers to do some tests on him but Max doesn’t want to be an experiment.
Michael is packing up his trailer. He finds a picture of the 3 of them and a picture of him with Alex. Max is at Cameron’s house. She tells him Wyatt has been arrested but no police report was filed because he didn’t want Arturo on record because he’s an illegal. We cut back to Michael hooking his trailer to his truck. Alex asks what he’s going to do. They talk about who he was before the war. They go inside the trailer and have sex, interspersed with Max and Cameron having sex as well. Liz is back at Rosa’s grave. Kyle arrives and asks who did this. Liz says she’s not going anywhere, she’s going to find out who killed Rosa … even if it was Max Evans.
Two episodes in and we are definitely going in a completely different direction. I don’t mind the Max and Liz characterizations; it’s everybody else I’m still not connecting with. This Michael character is the character I feel no empathy towards. While reckless, original Michael still ultimately cared for Max and Isobel. I don’t get that vibe from this Michael. This version of Kyle seems to be taking the position of the original Alex as Liz’s confidant on the outside. At this point, it’s looking like Liz was either in the car as well when Rosa was killed or witnessed its immediate aftermath. Max tried to save Rosa but couldn’t, which is why there’s a handprint on her and Isobel wiped Liz’s memory of the accident to cover it up.