About:
Previously: On the ten-year anniversary of her sister’s death, Liz decides to reopen the case when she realizes Rosa’s accident may not have been so accidental. She lets Kyle in on her suspicions that Max Evans is the culprit and an alien from outer space. Meanwhile, Alex and Michael can’t keep their hands off each other, and Isobel continues to be annoying.
THIS WEEK ON ROSWELL, NEW MEXICO
Liz uses the excuse that she wants to learn more about Max’s alien physiology to interrogate him on the sly. Her questions agitate him to the point where he accidentally singes her (and her science equipment; damn, that’s gotta be expensive to replace) and she is horrified to see that the burns are very similar to the marks she saw on Rosa’s body.
After Isobel runs her off from playing “alien autopsy”, Liz and Maria follow clues off a mix CD Rosa made that leads them to her old haunts and her secret stashes. Liz learns that Rosa may have been having a secret affair, and when she finds a love note from Max Evans, she puts two and two together and gets: oh, snap, my alien crush killed my sister!
Liz’s hot-and-cold responses to Max leave him feeling frustrated and rejected, so he takes Jenna, his partner-in-the-law, on their first official date…which Liz promptly ruins by pulling him aside to accuse him of muuuurder (sorry, Jenna!). And Max does confess—his feelings of intense love for Liz! He also tells her he did see Rosa that night she died, but only because she caught him leaving that love note for Liz, and he feels super guilty that he knew Rosa was drunk and high but didn’t get her help before walking away.
Meanwhile, Kyle is going toe-to-toe with Master Sergeant Jesse Manes about Project Shepherd and gets duped into procuring his father’s old notes about the Roswell aliens. He thinks he’s doing a favor for a friend of his late dad, but Sheriff Valenti informs Kyle that the two men were less than friendly. Kyle gives Manes the documents, but in exchange he wants to be left alone. He feels justice will be served in due time without him breaking doctor-patient confidentiality, and that our legal system means you’re innocent until proven guilty. Manes uses Patriot Act logic and agrees that justice gets served…but usually only after disaster strikes.
YOU’RE FROM WHERE?!
– Ah ha, Project Shepherd Manes is the one who gave Kyle Rosa’s actual autopsy. Glad they cleared that up from last episode because I like my plots devices to be logical.
– So they don’t drink acetone because it’s tasty, but because it’s like an alien painkiller. This makes me curious about the flavor. Does it still taste like acetone or is it milder to their alien palates? (Asking the hard questions around here.)
– Geez, what is Max and Kyle’s old beef with each other? (I mean, obviously we know why Kyle dislikes Max right now, but Max doesn’t know that Kyle knows he’s an alien.) Is it just because Kyle dated Liz in high school and Max is jealous, or is there something more going on we haven’t seen?
– So Liz’s ex-fiancé is named Diego, and he’s perfect but she couldn’t connect with him. Because obviously his name isn’t Max and he hasn’t been pining for her for his entire life. Sorry, Diego.
WE DON’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THESE CZECHOSLOVAKIANS
– Wow does Max turn into the whiny younger brother around Isobel. As much as I dislike her, I do like them having a sibling connection like the OG Max and Isabel. You can see how much she perked up when he seemed to take her advice.
– That little RV bed of Michael’s looks like the most uncomfortable place to, ya know.
– So when Michael and Alex started making out in last week’s episode, they were still out by the crash site. When did Michael move his RV to the junkyard? Between cuddles?
– Interesting take on making Maria more of Rosa’s friend than Liz’s back in high school. It does give Liz a handy way to get all these secrets about Rosa’s past uncovered.
– Speaking of, I love treasure hunts! But why would Rosa leave that random mix tape in a bar behind a sign for Liz to oh-so-conveniently use to track down answers about her final days?
– Who else feels sorry for Isobel “having” to go into people’s minds and it feeling icky? No one? That’s what I thought.
– My husband scoffed hard at the likelihood of the Pisces star arrow pointing directly to the electric box containing Max’s letter. “The stars rotate across the sky!”
– Liz/Jeanine looked fantastic in that red lipstick near the end of the episode. I wonder what shade that was!
ROSWELLIAN OF THE WEEK: Maria
Maria got to hang out with her friend’s little sister and reminisce about the good old days, and even got a joint for her troubles. No one else had that good of a day.
SAY WHAT
“You HAVE a clue. You just keep ignoring it because…is it because he’s tall? Never mind that he explodes expensive things with his brain.”—Kyle
“I need a motive.”—Liz
“Okay, Nancy Drew.”—Kyle
“So while you were getting your bachelor’s in biomed engineering, I was dating a Chad.”—Maria
“Ugh.”—Liz
“Uh huh. Changed my relationship status and everything.”—Maria
“Why do parents name their kid Chad? All the Chads end up being Chads.”—Liz
(Truer words were never spoken)
[Reading Max’s letter] “’I feel like I’m disappearing until you look at me and then I’m so completely seen. I’ve never liked that feeling before.’ Wow, you really captured her. ‘Somehow you always stand in the part of the room that the sun hits first.’”—Liz
“I wrote that note for you, Liz.”—Max
“Don’t lie to me! ‘You touched my lips and I stop breathing for a week.’ This isn’t about us! You and I never kissed.”-Liz
“No, we didn’t! It was April, senior year. I had hot sauce on my lips and no one told me for, like, three hours. And then you wiped it off with your thumb in the lab.”—Max
“The day we…got sent home early because of a school…blackout?”—Liz
(Nice callback to the OG Tabasco! Also, teenage Max had a lot of feelings.)
“Liz, I have loved you my entire life. Including every single day that you were gone in the last decade.”—Max
“That’s not what this is about.”—Liz
“That’s what everything is about for me!”—Max
“Jim and I had our differences, yes. But we shared one goal: protect our town and our world from the imminent alien threat.”—Manes
“Imminent? The crash was in 1947. If they pose a threat to humanity they’re taking their sweet time. Unless your boy Paul Ryan is an alien.”—Kyle
WE NEED ANSWERS
– Rosa was secretly dating someone in town who went by the nickname Ophiuchus. Dare we assume they were of the alien persuasion?
– So were Rosa and Isobel friends way back when? Or perhaps even lovers? Is Isobel Ophiuchus? Do I just assume that Isobel is a cold-blooded killer, even if she does like The Land Before Time? (That answer to that last one is yes, at least. Her crying moments with her husband were super weird and frenetic.)
– Who here doesn’t think Diego the ex-fiancé is going to show up right when Max and Liz are getting closer?
– Are we ever going to get a flashback about what happened between Alex and Michael? Because it seems like there was a specific moment where everything blew up.
– What is happening to Max at the end of the episode when he causes the blackout? This seems to go beyond just healing Liz, no?
Are you finding yourself becoming more invested in the show yet? I don’t dread watching it, so that’s a plus. I did find myself getting a bit swoony at some Max and Liz moments, which I was not expecting.
Next episode: “Where Have All The Cowboys Gone.” Max demands Liz’s true feelings while Isobel gets ghosted—literally.
