TV Review - Continuum: Season 3

Victor Webster (left) and
Rachel Nichols in "Continuum"

By the end of Season 2, it looked as if the series had painted itself into a corner with no way out, which makes the prospects of how they're going to get out that corner for Season 3 all the more intriguing.

The premise is a woman who is a future cop from 2077 travels back in time to the present 2013. She does so to chase after terrorists who have also gone back in time. Those terrorists want to change history. Kiera, played by Rachel Nichols, hides the fact that she's from the future by pretending to be a government agent and partnering with a detective with the Vancouver Police Department named Carlos Fonnegra, played by Victor Webster (Mutant X and Charmed) who last season found out that she's a time traveler and is doing his best to deal with it.

Also helping Kiera is Alec Sadler, played by Erik Knudsen, a young inventor who discovers that Kiera is a time traveler because it turns out that he's the creator or originator of a lot of the technology that Kiera uses 60 years into the future, including a CMR suit that grants her super abilities. What was also learned last season is that Alec's brother Julian Randol, played by Richard Harmon (The Killing and Bates Motel), is kind of the creator or originator of the terrorists, known as Liber8, that Kiera is fighting.

Julian isn't exactly the founder of Liber8. He's more like an inspiration or key instrument. The terrorists who travel back in time have used and manipulated Julian, so he's distanced himself from them, but he still agrees with their philosophy or ideals. Liber8 opposes corporations and what is becoming a corporate takeover of the government and world.

Aside from Kiera and the terrorists being sent back in time, which Kiera realizes wasn't accidental, it's also revealed that there are others who have come back in time long before Kiera and Liber8 did. Those people are known as the Freelancers. The Freelancers become more of a presence in this Season 3 and how they're involved are like the fulcrum in a seesaw when it comes to time travel. They want to keep the balance.

The Freelancers have their work cut out for them at the beginning of Season 3 when Kiera gets the pieces to the time machine put together and instead of sending Kiera and Liber8 back to the future, Alec uses the time machine to go back in time in order to save his girlfriend Emily, played by Magda Apanowicz, who got shot and killed at the end of Season 2. This changes the timeline such that there are now two of Alec Sadler.

The Freelancers want to fix this, so they send Kiera back in time after him, which also creates two of Kiera. The mystery is made that one of the two Kiera is murdered. The other Kiera then has to solve the killing of herself.

While the timeline is all screwed up, the writers of this series, led by Simon Barry, is somehow making sense of it. The 80-year-old Alec who was seen back in Season 1, seemed like a great leap, but oddly enough his origins are becoming more clear despite the growing convoluted nature and twists.

The first five episodes don't really delve into the Freelancers as much as I would have liked. Their presence has only be hinted for the past two seasons. We see them, particularly Curtis, played by Terry Chen (Combat Hospital and House of Cards), but the series still keeps them at a distance. I wish Chen was more integrated as he was in Season 1 but only in this new capacity.

Curtis was a member of Liber8 in Season 1 and now for Season 3, he's a member of the Freelancers. The transition between the two is not explored or explained in the first half of this new season. That exploration and explanation might be forthcoming, but its absence is felt.

The show is forgiven because it handles all the political and time-travel intrigue well. It handles a lot of the personal drama with Kiera very well. It also does personal drama with Liber8 members very well. Episode 5 focuses on Travis, played by Roger R. Cross (24 and Arrow), who is currently the only black character. There is Stephen Lobo (Little Mosque on the Prairie and Smallville) who plays Matthew Kellogg, but Travis is the only African-American. Episode 5 has Travis going to his family and them having to deal with his terrorist status. It's moments like this where the show excels.

Four Stars out of Five.
Rated TV-14-LV.
Running Time: 1 hr.
Fridays at 10PM on SYFY.