'Terra Nova' Season 1, Episode 7 Recap - 'Proof'

At long last, a few questions about the logic of "Terra Nova" were answered in last night's episode, in particular the matter of just how in the heck these guys communicate with the future when the portal is a one-way street.

"We're cut off from 2149, remember?" says Boylan, explaining to Josh why he can't just get Kara in the 11th pilgrimmage himself. But Mira has a magical little device that allows her to communicate with the future.

Apparently the way that the Terra Novans communicate with the future is to do so while the portal is open, which is the only time the channels of communication are open. Fair enough.

But things get confusing again when Maddy tells her science hero, Ken Horton, that she read his book about Terra Nova wildlife before she came to Terra Nova. So, they use that small window of communication to send books through?

By the way, not a ringing endorsement of a show's storytelling abilities when I'm paying more attention week in and week out to how the heck they talk to the future than to what's actually going on.

What is going on is this: Josh has to steal some medicine from Elizabeth's lab to deliver to the Sixers in exchange for the Kara deal, Maddy meets the aforementioned Horton but begins to suspect that he's a fraud, and Taylor goes out into the wilderness to care for the soldier, Curran, whom he banished a couple of weeks ago.

Josh ends up returning one of the vials and getting Boylan in big trouble, but seemingly once again getting off with little to no punishment. So much for all that talk of being lucky if he's just banished, as Skye said. Josh, it seems, is above the law. It's because he's doing it for love, I suppose.

We spend the most time with Maddy (lucky us), whose plotline in unmasking the fraud who says he's Ken Horton takes center stage. During this time with Maddy, we learn that she's both very intuitive and smart (she does, after all, piece this mystery together) and that she's also a complete idiot.

Two problems: one, if there's a murderer on the loose, go tell the security team before running to the school to pick up your sister, so they know what's going on. Two, don't keep trying to talk your way through a complex mystery with your 8-year-old sister, then act all surprised when she keeps just talking about vampires or ponies or whatever. She's 8 years old, she's not a frickin' detective.

Oh, and that vampire joke was hilarious all night. All eight or nine times they used it. Every time, a laugher! In fact, I think it got even funnier every time they repeated it! LOLZ.

Taylor, who remains the only really interesting character on this show, decides to pursue Curran, whom he saves from a stalking komodo. He then gives the convicted murderer a proposition: infiltrate the Sixers and find out who the spy is, and maybe Curran can come back to Terra Nova. That should go over well with the other residents, knowing that there's a convicted murderer walking around free.

This episode was fine, but it suffered from an interesting problem: there wasn't really any reason for this episode to be set in a prehistoric past accessed through a dystopian future. This episode could have happened in almost any setting, it just would have had less technology and super-dino-futurefishing.

And on top of that, a familiar problem remained: the technology is frustratingly inconsistent. They have the ability to make amnesia-inducing sonic pistols and scanners that read dna instantly without even touching the surface, but they don't have the ability to make the special future-communication device that Taylor's genius son made? Shouldn't that be their top priority?

Well, two more episodes of "Terra Nova," and then it might be gone forever. Get it all in while you can, folks.