I don't have much to say about No Ordinary Family this week. As a Battlestar Galactica fan it was great to see Tricia Helfer and Lucy Lawless both guest-starring, particularly as the latter is playing Dr King's superior Mrs X. Lawless has proven herself a better actress than I gave her credit for on Spartacus (a show name-checked here), although I'm pretty sure the scripts of No Ordinary Family aren't going to stretch her beyond Xena's level. But we'll see how things progress.
Helfer, predictably, played a super-babe who could seduce men by giving off pheromones, soon enslaving George (Romany Malco) and Jim (Michael Chiklis) with her aroma. A wittier show would have made Helfer's character less of a beauty queen, for added fun and the potential to elicit sympathy about the power's misuse. This isn't that show.
Good to see Daphne (Kay Panabaker) bring her dopey friend Chris (Luke Kleintank) into her confidence about her family's abilities, once she accepted that her ability to "push" his suspicions aside are only a temporary fix. Hopefully this development will last and not get reversed, as it's about time the Powell siblings got confidants to aide storylines at school. It may be a problem that Chris' father is the defeated superhero from last week's episode, though, as that kind of dirties the water.
Dr King also created another supervillain here, with the help of a conflicted Stephanie (whose gift at giving people simple jabs can't be undervalued), but I think we need some clarity about what Dr King's hoping to achieve with all this. His latest subject was a Death Row inmate (24's Eric Balfour), wisely choosing to swap a lethal injection for a super-injection in shades of Terminator Salvation. But why does King want a murderer doing his bidding, with the dull ability to sprout claws from his knuckles? I'm still not sure what King's deal is, creating a stream of super-henchmen, and that's frustrating considering we're nearing the end of this season (and most likely the series).A very brief review this week, hope you don't mind. It was just a very average episode, buoyed by three familiar guest-stars. Feel free to chip in about anything I missed in the comments below.
written by Kate Barnow & Elisabeth R. Finch / directed by Peter Werner / 1 March 2011 / ABC
