Patricia Arquette stars in MEDIUM: Car Trouble(2008).
© NBC

Mania Grade: D+
Episode: Car Trouble
Starring: Patricia Arquette, Jake Weber, Miguel Sandoval
Written By: Robert Doherty, Craig Sweeney
Directed By: Vincent Misiano
Network: NBC

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MEDIUM: Car Trouble

This week’s episode of Medium is probably the worst of the season. The goal of the episode is to start a story arc that the series really doesn’t need, a conflicted husband dealing with a potential affair with his cougar boss. This is a horrible nighttime soap opera sort of turn for a show that’s always been able to rise above nighttime trash.

The case this week isn’t really a case for the series in the traditional sense. Alison’s opening dream is a fairly jolting nightmare about her car exploding when she is taking the kids to school. Her dreams are always up for interpretation and the interpretation is that the car is broken. The car is so damaged in fact that Joe decides to buy Alison another vehicle, a slightly used one. For most people a slightly used vehicle is no problem, but for Alison – a woman who can see the past and future of people through objects they own- is a dangerous proposition. Of cours,e something terrible happened to the previous owner of the vehicle.

The actual investigation of what happened to the previous owner of the car is to say the least, boring. There aren’t any thrills and there’s no suspense, and the Rube Goldberg plot twist, while amusing, just isn’t exciting. The one thing that’s interesting about the case is the Maximum Overdrive sort of takeover that happens to the car during Alison’s investigation. The most amusing sequence involves the car’s navigation system directing her to the location of the murder. The worst sequence is the completely predictable scene where Alison discovers why the first person she saw in her dream wasn’t the actual killer. This realization was painfully predictable from the first time she saw the face in her dream.

Meanwhile, Joe is waiting to hear back on the patent for his invention. If the patent doesn’t go through, his dreams are over. There’s no drama here either because Kelly Preston has been brought on board for this story arc, so we know she’s going to be around for a while. Alison’s jealousy is fun in that it’s so realistic. She’s not acting Desperate Housewives crazy here, she’s reacting like a normal and realistic wife. Her secondary dreams are of Joe’s boss/partner making an aggressive pass at him and the show ends with this very thing happening. The cliffhanger here is that we don’t know what Joe’s reaction is. This kind of cheesy soap opera thing is just annoying on a show that’s been so well done and realistic so far, well other than all the paranormal stuff of course.