Adventures of Brisco County Jr. 20 - Bye Bly

Plot: Professor Coles told Brisco at the end of "Fountain of Youth" that his final conflict with John Bly was yet to come. Well, the day has come, thanks to an corrupt, power-hungry federal agent, and Pepe Bendix, ze stereotypical French safecracker of Bly's gang. Brisco has the assistance of Karina (Melanie Smith), a time traveler from the year 5502. Her people created the Orbs, but she's come back to help Brisco keep Bly from using them to, as he told us previously, return to his time and take over the world. Except, as is typical for time travelers, she's real stingy with the useful information until after it's too late. So it'll come down to Brisco vs. Bly after all, and you had better believe there'll be time travel shenanigans.

Does Brisco use his gun? Brisco shot Agent Brown's gun from his hand while holding his own upside down.

Stuff Comet does: N/A

Kiss Count: 0 (19 overall). Hard to believe he passed up the chance to kiss a pretty time traveler, but her immune system was probably taxed badly enough by the general conditions in 1894 as it was. Or maybe she was afraid of giving him something.

John Bly Spreads His Arms Dramatically Count: 2 (13.5 overall). This concludes the John Bly Arm Spread Count.

Is Pete Hutter In This Episode? No.

Pete Hutter Quote: N/A

Non-Pete Hutter Quote: John Bly - 'The terms are even.' Brisco - 'You shot my friend, so I give myself the advantage.'

Brisco's Coming Things: N/A

Gang Count: 2 (10 or 14 overall). Pepe Bendix (shot), John Bly (defenestrated, er, turned to ash).

Stuff the Orb Can Do: Nothing we didn't already know about.

Other: The events of "A.K.A. Kansas" occurred a month ago. Which suggests Bly was only trapped in that Orb for a week or two, tops.

Apparently clothes are only an impediment to long-distance time travel, since Brisco didn't need to doff his for his trip back to get the Orb. Sorry, ladies. Bowler as Brisco's "faithful companion" made it from the dime novels into the history books. Sorry, Bowler. Turns out Bowler lives in Nob Hill, which is the same part of San Francisco as a relevant character from "The Brooklyn Dodgers".

This'll come up again, but the government has a funny way of asking for help. Not just evil Agent Brown, who we saw previously in "Crystal Hawks", but even the ones who ask for Brisco's help keeping the Orb away from Brown do so at gunpoint. At least U.S. Attorney Breakstone is nice enough to ask politely, if in the most deadpan voice possible.

There are some things about the time travel in this episode that make my head hurt. Brisco travels back once, to get the Orb in the Nevade government lab, as we saw him do at the end of "A.K.A. Kansas". His dialogue doesn't match, which feels like it should be a screw-up somehow. Unless we're operating of the idea that by seeing himself travel back to take it, the future of the Brisco who was in the present during that episode was changed, since he knew he would at some point come back and get this Orb. Though what he said was less helpful the second time.

Brisco then goes through a second time portal after initially killing Bly, because the stupid Orb won't save Bowler. He goes through without the Orb, but somehow travels back to the moment just after he returned from his earlier trip in the past with the Orb. So rather than there being two Briscos, one with an Orb, one without, there's only one Brisco, like the one amking his second trip back displaced or overwrote the one from the first. Yeah, this post is getting the "time travel" tag. Ugh, my head.

There are just certain things in this episode that require people to behave stupidly. When Pepe breaks into the safe Brisco stored Professor Coles' Orb in, why did he bother to pull out one of the rods? So he could see Bly trapped within, drop it, causing it to leak whatever that fluid is, allowing Bly to escape, naturally. Why do first Bly, then Karina, open time portals, then screw around long enough for Brisco to go charging in ahead of them to where he wants to go? And how does that work? Does the Orb just open a door in time, and you jump in a tell it where you want to go? Because otherwise, Brisco should have wound up in either 5502 or 2506, depending on whose portal he was using. And after Brisco used his portal, why couldn't Bly get it to open another one for him? That I might be willing to attribute to the Orb not liking Bly (though Karina explained what the Orb is, and none of the words she used necessarily suggest awareness as part of it's powers), but if it dislikes Bly (or likes Brisco), why wouldn't it help Bowler, for Brisco's sake?

I think, as far as send offs for Bly go, "Fountain of Youth" was the stronger one. Brisco finishing his father's work, with a little help from his father's gun, and trapping Bly within the object he so coveted seemed appropriate. More so than a time traveler appearing and being generally unhelpful until after the fact.