Terra Nova continues past the half-way point of its first season eight-episode order with tonight’s ‘Nightfall,’and with it darkness falls as a meteor’s EMP knocks out all the colony’s technology, leaving it vulnerable to attack. As the Sixers look to take advantage, Jim (Jason O’Mara) and Maddy (Naomi Scott) find themselves trapped away from the action while Elisabeth (Shelley Conn) fights to save the life of young Hunter (Sam Parsonson).
Didn’t get a chance to watch? Well, read on for everything you need to know about Terra Nova‘s ‘Nightfall’!
As the Shannons prepare for their upcoming day, Jim whisks young Zoe away to a special surprise as Maddy sneaks off for a romantic picnic outside the colony with her soldier boy Mark Reynolds (Dean Geyer). Josh encounters Skye (Allison Miller) on his way to work, clutching a distressed Hunter, who after a quick trip to the infirmary is revealed to have a giant parasite in his intestines!
Meanwhile, Jim takes Zoe to her surprise, an underground ‘eye’that acts as a holographic encyclopedia and simulator to show her anything she wishes to see! Jim shows her the house in Chicago they had her illegally delivered, and even a ride on a roller coaster, but everything, from Maddy’s date to Hunter’s surgery to Jim and Zoe’s roller coaster gets interrupted when a meteor passes over Terra Nova, creating an EMP that disables all electronics and a sonic wave that nearly decimates the colony!
Once the dust has cleared, Taylor briefs the soldiers that no electronic device in the entire area will work, and as such Terra Nova remains defenseless. Indeed, everyone remains trapped as the power loss sealed Jim and Zoe in the room, stranded Maddy and Mark in the wilderness, and forces Elizabeth Shannon to perform Hunter’s surgery ‘the old fashioned way.’The only thing anyone can think to do is utilize the ‘chip fabricator’to replace Terra Nova’s damaged machinery, but the device itself requires a new chip. After some gentle ‘coaxing’by Commander Taylor, wily barkeep Boylan (Damien Garvey) agrees to manually repair the chip necessary to start the process.
Jim finds an access port in the room where he and Zoe are trapped, but only Zoe herself is small enough to crawl through and open the door from the outside. Terrified of spiders, Zoe only agrees if Jim continually sings his made-up song for shooing away her eight-legged tormentors. Meanwhile, Maddy and Mark cover one another in mud to throw predators off their trail, but nykoraptors having caught the scent drive the pair into a nearby tree, where they share their very first kiss! Aww.
Love isn’t only in the trees however, as Skye is force to take over the delicate parasite removal procedure until Hunter declares his decidedly un-brotherly love, after which the parasite snaps and burrows back inside! But who has time for young love when Mira (Christine Adams) and the other Sixers have decided to use Terra Nova’s weakness to their advantage, herding a giant Spinosaurus to break down the wall! Thinking quickly, Taylor and a newly-liberated Jim utilize the only non-mechanical weapons they have to fend off the attack, launching flaming arrows to ignite a wall of fire that drives away the giant beast! However, Taylor quickly realizes they’ve been duped, the dinosaur merely a distraction from the true mission of recovering Mira’s mysterious box.
When Boylan completes his work on the chip fabricator’s chip, the first order of business is to create a bio-bed chip to complete Hunter’s surgery, which proves largely unnecessary as the creature dies inside. His danger now over, the excitement shifts to Taylor and Jim, who fight off and chase down Sixers looking for Mira’s box. One foe nearly gets the drop on Taylor until Boylan comes to the rescue with an ‘older model’revolver with no mechanical components, but Jim’s Sixer manages to escape the colony with the box. Bummer.
The next day, Maddy and Mark return to the colony largely unnoticed, though even after a shower Maddy’s mud camoflauge still manages to stink up the house. But the real story lies out in the jungle, where Mira brings the box to its true owner, who chides their progress and reveals the box to be a holographic display of complex equations.
But who is this young lad? Why, none other than Lucas, Commander Taylor’s long lost son!
Did you get your fill of dino-action? What did you think about the episode? Join us next week for an all-new episode recap of Terra Nova on FOX!
The appearance of spinosaurus pretty much gives you the general geographic location of Terra Nova
Which location is that? There's a lot of mystery behind this "alternate timestream" people believe Terra Nova to be in, so it'll be interesting if the first season sheds some light on what dimension/Earth/time they're actually in. And if the show proves to be a big enough success, it'd be great to read any tie-in books talking about the science of Terra Nova!