Immediately after watching “Isn’t that a Paradox?”, I turned on the radio. Milky Chance was on, and the first line I heard was, “We don’t talk about it.”

That seems an apt reaction to this episode.

Most sci-fi shows will eventually accumulate at least one or two episodes the fans would sooner pretend never happened. I believe we have come to that point in Dark Matter’s history.

Okay, so, time travel. I’m not in love with the idea of time travel in Dark Matter to begin with. Its strength is its characters, not in its sci-fi elements, and it just doesn’t really seem to fit in with the grittier tone of the universe.

Still, it might be forgivable if it was used to tell an interesting story, but it isn’t. It’s just an excuse for an endless string of fish out of water gags. To be fair, some are pretty funny, but it’s not enough to carry an episode.

We also need to acknowledge the fact that, by all appearances, a blink drive can be used to travel through time as easily as space. This means that from now on either the series is going to solve every problem with the deus ex machina of traveling back in time to fix every mistake, or be constantly raising the question of why the crew isn’t going back in time to fix their mistakes. The latter is preferable, but neither is desirable.

And do not even get me started on the utterly cringey sub-plot about the tweenage boy falling for Five. That was physically painful. I mean, I always say I love seeing Five get screen time, but not like this.

Not like this.

The requisite end of episode teaser for the next episode looks interesting, at least. We’re overdue for a good Sally episode.

Overall rating: 5/10 I was going to give it a four, but I’m adding an extra point because it references Dungeon Siege III, one of the most criminally underrated video games of recent memory.

I want to believe Five is an Anjali main. Two would play Katarina, of course.

New articles:

I’ve been getting lax about linking my recent articles for MMO Bro, so it’s time for a good old-fashioned link dump.

First, I do a two part series looking at what Western MMOs can learn from their Eastern counterparts, and vice versa.

Next, I run down a list of the best level-scaling systems in the MMO genre. I really do love level-scaling, and the more I play games with it, the more I wish it was universal. It opens so many doors.

Finally, I get a bit more serious and talk about the issue of player toxicity in MMOs. Specifically, some practical solutions for how I think communities could be improved.