Title: Flame's End
Airdate: 1/29/1986
My Age at Airdate: 2 years, 6 months, 13 days
Episode Type: Conspiracy Investigation
We've officially started the disc of MacGyver that I have watched the most. Just a fun bit of trivia. It's Season 1 Disc 4. And if I do my job, you'll understand next week why I've watched this disc so much!
We open on what looks like a nuclear power plant. A cute blonde is doing work when the phone rings. It's the cops telling her that her boss's car ran off the road and he's dead.
Cut to MacGyver in full hockey gear. He's playing the hockey equivalent of foosball with his cute landlord. I don't remember her being a recurring character, but she's definitely in the next episode as well. MacGyver has affected this Canadian accent that's weird. He's doing voiceover work and it's all fun and games.
Back to CB who is just getting off the phone. The music shifts back to ominous. She goes to a file cabinet and starts rifling through some files. Finding the one she needs (marked 'eyes only') she pulls it out and dials the phone. A pair of gloved hands cuts the phone line. Someone's in the lab with her. It's super ominous. She quickly leaves the room and right behind her is someone in a radiation suit.
Back to MacGyver's recreational activities. He's a kind of a jerky competitor, actually.
CB is running into some sort of containment chamber and hiding the file. Radiation Suit is after her with a flashlight. She ducks out of the way and RS passes right by her. So she starts to hurry back the way she came.
It's a weird juxtaposition between the lighthearted table hockey scenes and the very tense, almost slasher movie style scenes. Mac's flirting pretty hard with this lady who I just realized we don't know is his landlady, yet. She's just some blonde, so far. I think.
CB has found another phone. She calls and the phone rings at MacGyver's house. She tells him that she needs him, that she's in trouble. He tells her he'll be there in the morning. She tells him to meet her at "Their Beach". Suddenly RS is behind her. She runs off and Mac frantically calls after her. RS slowly and creepily hangs up the phone. RS breathes like Darth Vader.
OPENING CREDITS
A plane lands. MacGyver drives up to the beach in an Oldsmobile. He's reminiscing about the past. He dated CB way back when.
Flashback: CB is in her truck listening to "Crocodile Rock" and MacGyver drives up on a motorcycle. He's going to travel around the Greek Isles as a cook on a freighter. She's upset. They're building a nuclear plant right down the road. She says that he should get a job there and use his newly acquired science degree. He wants to see the world. She says she didn't realize that his dreams were this crazy. He is surprised that she thinks that his dreams are crazy. She drives away in her truck and he stands there in his leather jacket, brooding. "Crocodile Rock" has ended and "Time in a Bottle" is playing. Good choice for mood music, MacGyver crew! Also, the music sets the time to be roughly spring/summer of 1974 (because "Time in a Bottle" came out in November 1973 and if they just graduated from college, that would make the most sense. Although that's not necessarily true. It just can't be BEFORE November 1973.)
Back to present day. MacGyver is still looking wistfully at the sea when a brown car drives up. It parks some distance away from MacGyver. The driver honks and Mac turns. He smiles at the cute blonde behind the wheel and waves (this is the image at the top of the page). AND THEN THE DAMN CAR BLOWS UP!!!!
I can't really describe the surprise and horror of this turn of events. It's very surprising. Let's just leave it at that. They do a weird slow-mo/freeze-frame of MacGyver shouting CB's name, but they don't go to commercial. They cut to the coroner's car driving away. And a guy pulls up. Hey, it's Nightmare on Elm Street's Robert Englund! He comes over and says hi to MacGyver. It's been a while, but they know eachother.
The sheriff comes over and tells MacGyver and NoESRE that the lab boys think it was a gas leak mixed with an overheated tail pipe. MacGyver gives the sheriff a piece of gas tank he found. There's a hole in it that is going INTO the tank instead of out of it like you would expect from an explosion like the lab hypothesized. There's some residue around the hole that Mac thinks is probably Magnesium Oxide.
Mac asks if CB was still in contact with her Aunt or this one friend of theirs and NoESRE replies no to both, but she was rooming with this girl who called in sick to work on Friday (I guess this is like, Sunday?) and she probably won't be back for the funeral tomorrow. TOMORROW?! Ok, so this car blew up a matter of hours ago and the funeral's already scheduled? Can someone talk to me about the accuracy of this? Does this ever happen? The sheriff says it's a "coroner's case". And CB's mom and dad are already dead. So, maybe she doesn't have any next of kin, so they just bury her? It seems really weird, though, doesn't it?
Ok, so now we're at the funeral. But this is more than just a paperwork thing. This is friends and loved ones. Weird.
So MacGyver's leaving the funeral. CB IS IN HIS BACK SEAT! SHE'S ALIVE!!!!!!
MacGyver drives up to CB's Dad's old place. She explains that it was her roommate in the car. CB was too afraid to meet MacGyver at the beach so she sent her roommate instead.
She cries on Mac's shoulder for a bit and then he asks her why someone wants her dead. She says that she was going through some records at the plant and found that someone had covered up the theft of a bunch of Uranium. Enough to build a bomb with. She told her boss this. Her boss that ended up dead.
Now we're at the plant. A clean-cut security guard asks NoESRE if he wants some coffee. NoESRE declines. He's busy reading some data, or something. Oh. It's a yearbook. He's looking at the page with the "Science Club" officers on it. Him, MacGyver and CB. NoESRE's caption says "Most Likely to Succeed" and C-CSG ribs him about how wrong they got that. Under MacGyver's picture it says "Already Has It" which is a weird thing to say, isn't it? NoESRE's lab coat is blocking what it says under CB's picture. NoESRE is really brooding over the hopes he had when he was in school.
He gets a phone call. It's the coroner's office telling him that it wasn't CB's body in the car. He thoughtfully chews on his thumb.
MacGyver gives CB some coffee to...calm her nerves? She cries a little more and then is suddenly "ok now". I mean, I guess when you're done crying, you're done crying, right? But she's looking up at him. I'm betting on a kiss in the next 10 seconds. Ok it was like 30 seconds. But there it was. (Kiss slut.) She tells him that she still remembers how he tastes and that phrase always gives me the heebie-jeebies. She tells him she's glad he's here because everyone she knows and trusts is dead. He tells her that they'll get to the bottom of it.
So here's something to consider. It's 23 minutes into the episode. That's basically halfway. We have yet to see any sort of MacGyver trick. He hasn't really done anything stereotypically MacGyver-ey at all in this episode. Weird.
So basically, the Uranium has been slowly being stolen in small increments which means that it's probably someone inside the plant and the Uranium might still be hidden somewhere in the plant. So they're going to go to the plant to get that folder she hid and then they're going to publicize the theft.
They pull up to the plant and the security guard lets them in, but a shady looking guy in a shady looking Ford Taurus stops all of sudden and watches them enter. Then he drives off.
Mac and CB are going to where she hid the folder which she reveals is the "disposal chamber". Oh no! There's RS! So they go into the disposal chamber and CB starts telling MacGyver about how bad it would be if they were in there when the valve opened and all the radioactive slush came pouring in. See, that's the kind of thing I'd want to hear about LATER. But no, they're just taking their sweet time...
So MacGyver moves the party along a little by suggesting CB grab the report and they get out of there, but when she grabs the report, they look at it and comment about how it's all downhill from here. They DESERVE to get slushed on for that kind of hubris, you know?
Of course, the chamber closes and RS walks away. The door can't be opened for another 60 minutes. And the valve opens. CB tells an incredulous MacGyver that they have about 10 minutes before the heat from the oncoming slush makes it impossible to breathe. So, plus side: they're not going to have to deal with the slush. Minus side: they're going to die.
We've got some nice interstitial stock nuclear power plant footage.
C-CSG is watching a ballgame and NoESRE is reading some data with his back to the board telling him that the chamber is closed. So no one knows that they're down there.
Mac's plan is to speed up the timer on the lock to the door. They'll hit the timer with a hot electrical surge and set up a violent secondary vibration. Basically, this involves taking a wire from the timer and hooking it to another wire. It's certainly not very impressive, MacGyver-wise.
C-CSG notices the flashing warning lights indicating the chamber is open. He tells NoESRE and NoESRE runs to the chamber just in time to see MacGyver and CB get out of the chamber and close the door before a bunch of yellowy-orangey puke-looking stuff comes pouring out. Of course, CB said that they would be dead LONG before the sludge came out, so I guess she was a little off in her estimation of their demise, huh?
NoESRE comes over and does some poorly-acted stuttering about "What's going on?"
So now MacGyver and CB are going to suit up in Radiation Suits to try to find the missing Uranium. NoESRE is going to go call the NRC (that's Nuclear Regulatory Commission to you and me) and get some authorities down to the plant.
CB gives MacGyver a film badge to test for radiation. Now, when I was in school (and also later, at my job), our film badges measured the dosage of radiation we'd encountered over the course of the year. You sent them to be tested and that was it. Here's CB explaining this slightly different film badge:
CB: Mac, this film badge reacts to radiation. When you're near anything hot it starts to turn black.
MacGyver: When it's all black, do they give you a new one?
CB: When it's all black, they give you a coffin.
MacGyver: Oh. Good....
Now it could be that they have these badges in places where the potential to encounter acute, lethal amounts of radiation is high. Because you want to know right away if you're in that kind of trouble. So it's not completely farfetched, but it DOES feel a little TV-friendly, you know?
So now they're in the storage room. Their radiation suits don't have opaque black respirator masks like the radiation suit that RS wears. That's because it's ok if we know who they are. This is how you build suspense, you know? And intrigue.
CB tells Mac that she and her boss checked through all these containers and didn't find the Uranium anywhere. They know it has to be in this room, because the alarms would go off if that level of radiation was present anywhere else in the plant.
Mac's Geiger counter starts going crazy near a sign that is being held in place by one of those concrete bases. CB tells him that there's no way the Uranium is in there, but then Mac tips over the base and shows her that it's hollow and contains the Uranium. This is actually pretty ingenious because concrete would emit a low radioactive baseline and would be good to conceal something like that. Good job again, writers!
So now they have some evidence.
They go into the decontamination chamber and there is NoESRE pointing a gun at them. MacGyver is not surprised (is "nonplussed" the right word here?). CB asks why NoESRE did all this to her when they had grown up together and everything. He says he never intended for it to go this far. However, when Mac asks him to put the gun down, he refuses, saying that it's too late now. He's in too deep now to get out.
MacGyver guides CB away from NoESRE, even though he's pointing a gun at them. Mac basically says that he doesn't believe NoESRE will shoot them. That he's not a killer. And NoESRE doesn't shoot them. It was pretty tense there for a moment.
So MacGyver and CB run into the control room and tell C-CSG to call Washington and alert the authorities, but he just sits there, stonefaced. All of a sudden, there's the Sheriff holding a gun on them. He's selling the Uranium to a buyer in Canada, but that shouldn't concern them because they won't live to worry about where the Uranium goes.
NoESRE runs in and tells him not to shoot them. There's been enough killing. But the Sheriff is going to shoot them anyway. NoESRE lunges for the gun and gets shot in the struggle. The Sheriff also shoots the control panel and the control panel starts talking about a pressure overload. Sending the reactor out of control into a meltdown situation.
So, C-CSG has a bullet wound in the arm and NoESRE has been shot in the gut. The reactor is heating up and when it gets to critical temperature, it will explode and meltdown. Or maybe just meltdown? I don't know how these things work exactly. They have about 12 minutes.
Basically, if MacGyver can open this one valve manually, then this other coolant injection system can get in there and fix everything.
CB: Mac, no! It'll kill you!
MacGyver: No way! I haven't paid my taxes, yet.
--MacGyver: Badass. Responsible citizen.
The Sheriff is carting the Uranium off and MacGyver is running to the valve. CB and NoESRE are sitting at the control station trying to get that injection system to do the whole "stopping the meltdown" thing from happening.
MacGyver happens upon the Sheriff who, of course, shoots at him. MacGyver runs off and the Sheriff takes chase.
Here's something that bothers me about this episode: NoESRE is basically bleeding to death. I guess they don't call an ambulance because that would endanger more lives? I dunno. I recall there's an opportunity to do something later on. We'll see when we get there.
NoESRE tells CB to go help MacGyver. He can stay and regulate the flow (or whatever it is that makes the valve the only thing needed to fix this problem).
Sheriff and MacGyver are yelling back and forth about the Uranium and the money and all that. Then MacGyver swings around and knocks the Sheriff down. His gun fires and he's hit by a bunch of radioactive steam. His badge turns black. Suddenly afraid, he doesn't fight them as they carry him off to washdown, the only place where he has a hope for survival.
The core temperature continues to rise.
NoESRE sends C-CSG off to tend to his flesh wound. C-CSG doesn't really think twice about leaving. What a jerk.
So Mac and CB are at the valve. Mac gets the wrench and has CB shoot him with washdown water. It's kind of like in Hellfire, actually. The valve is stuck. Mac tries really hard to pry it loose, but the wrench slips out of his hand and goes down a grate. MacGyver asks for the Sheriff's gun. He takes the barrel off the gun and uses the gun as a wrench to successfully loosen the valve. It works!!! They celebrate.
Cut to NoESRE who is DYING in the control room. Um, Mac? CB? he could use a little help, you know? He sees the temperature fall back down and his hand goes limp.
I guess he died because now we've cut to MacGyver and CB later. She's walking him to his car.
They do a little bit of final reminiscing and he leaves. To a sexy saxophone version of the MacGyver theme.
So they really just left both bad guys to an unknown fate? I mean, I GUESS they could both be ok. But they are probably both very dead and it feels like maybe that should have been addressed, you know? Or at least the fate of NoESRE. He redeemed himself in the end! Shouldn't that mean that we get to find out if he lived or died?
Also? I'm not really sure why this episode is called "Flame's End". Ideas? Thoughts? Pop 'em in the comments section!
Thanks for reading! See you next week!
NEXT WEEK: THE EPISODE THAT WILL VERY LIKELY BREAK THE BANK ON YOUR PATIENCE FOR MY RAMBLING EPISODE COMMENTARY: COUNTDOWN
We've officially started the disc of MacGyver that I have watched the most. Just a fun bit of trivia. It's Season 1 Disc 4. And if I do my job, you'll understand next week why I've watched this disc so much!
We open on what looks like a nuclear power plant. A cute blonde is doing work when the phone rings. It's the cops telling her that her boss's car ran off the road and he's dead.
Cut to MacGyver in full hockey gear. He's playing the hockey equivalent of foosball with his cute landlord. I don't remember her being a recurring character, but she's definitely in the next episode as well. MacGyver has affected this Canadian accent that's weird. He's doing voiceover work and it's all fun and games.
Back to CB who is just getting off the phone. The music shifts back to ominous. She goes to a file cabinet and starts rifling through some files. Finding the one she needs (marked 'eyes only') she pulls it out and dials the phone. A pair of gloved hands cuts the phone line. Someone's in the lab with her. It's super ominous. She quickly leaves the room and right behind her is someone in a radiation suit.
Back to MacGyver's recreational activities. He's a kind of a jerky competitor, actually.
CB is running into some sort of containment chamber and hiding the file. Radiation Suit is after her with a flashlight. She ducks out of the way and RS passes right by her. So she starts to hurry back the way she came.
It's a weird juxtaposition between the lighthearted table hockey scenes and the very tense, almost slasher movie style scenes. Mac's flirting pretty hard with this lady who I just realized we don't know is his landlady, yet. She's just some blonde, so far. I think.
CB has found another phone. She calls and the phone rings at MacGyver's house. She tells him that she needs him, that she's in trouble. He tells her he'll be there in the morning. She tells him to meet her at "Their Beach". Suddenly RS is behind her. She runs off and Mac frantically calls after her. RS slowly and creepily hangs up the phone. RS breathes like Darth Vader.
OPENING CREDITS
A plane lands. MacGyver drives up to the beach in an Oldsmobile. He's reminiscing about the past. He dated CB way back when.
Flashback: CB is in her truck listening to "Crocodile Rock" and MacGyver drives up on a motorcycle. He's going to travel around the Greek Isles as a cook on a freighter. She's upset. They're building a nuclear plant right down the road. She says that he should get a job there and use his newly acquired science degree. He wants to see the world. She says she didn't realize that his dreams were this crazy. He is surprised that she thinks that his dreams are crazy. She drives away in her truck and he stands there in his leather jacket, brooding. "Crocodile Rock" has ended and "Time in a Bottle" is playing. Good choice for mood music, MacGyver crew! Also, the music sets the time to be roughly spring/summer of 1974 (because "Time in a Bottle" came out in November 1973 and if they just graduated from college, that would make the most sense. Although that's not necessarily true. It just can't be BEFORE November 1973.)
Back to present day. MacGyver is still looking wistfully at the sea when a brown car drives up. It parks some distance away from MacGyver. The driver honks and Mac turns. He smiles at the cute blonde behind the wheel and waves (this is the image at the top of the page). AND THEN THE DAMN CAR BLOWS UP!!!!
I can't really describe the surprise and horror of this turn of events. It's very surprising. Let's just leave it at that. They do a weird slow-mo/freeze-frame of MacGyver shouting CB's name, but they don't go to commercial. They cut to the coroner's car driving away. And a guy pulls up. Hey, it's Nightmare on Elm Street's Robert Englund! He comes over and says hi to MacGyver. It's been a while, but they know eachother.
The sheriff comes over and tells MacGyver and NoESRE that the lab boys think it was a gas leak mixed with an overheated tail pipe. MacGyver gives the sheriff a piece of gas tank he found. There's a hole in it that is going INTO the tank instead of out of it like you would expect from an explosion like the lab hypothesized. There's some residue around the hole that Mac thinks is probably Magnesium Oxide.
Mac asks if CB was still in contact with her Aunt or this one friend of theirs and NoESRE replies no to both, but she was rooming with this girl who called in sick to work on Friday (I guess this is like, Sunday?) and she probably won't be back for the funeral tomorrow. TOMORROW?! Ok, so this car blew up a matter of hours ago and the funeral's already scheduled? Can someone talk to me about the accuracy of this? Does this ever happen? The sheriff says it's a "coroner's case". And CB's mom and dad are already dead. So, maybe she doesn't have any next of kin, so they just bury her? It seems really weird, though, doesn't it?
Ok, so now we're at the funeral. But this is more than just a paperwork thing. This is friends and loved ones. Weird.
So MacGyver's leaving the funeral. CB IS IN HIS BACK SEAT! SHE'S ALIVE!!!!!!
MacGyver drives up to CB's Dad's old place. She explains that it was her roommate in the car. CB was too afraid to meet MacGyver at the beach so she sent her roommate instead.
She cries on Mac's shoulder for a bit and then he asks her why someone wants her dead. She says that she was going through some records at the plant and found that someone had covered up the theft of a bunch of Uranium. Enough to build a bomb with. She told her boss this. Her boss that ended up dead.
Now we're at the plant. A clean-cut security guard asks NoESRE if he wants some coffee. NoESRE declines. He's busy reading some data, or something. Oh. It's a yearbook. He's looking at the page with the "Science Club" officers on it. Him, MacGyver and CB. NoESRE's caption says "Most Likely to Succeed" and C-CSG ribs him about how wrong they got that. Under MacGyver's picture it says "Already Has It" which is a weird thing to say, isn't it? NoESRE's lab coat is blocking what it says under CB's picture. NoESRE is really brooding over the hopes he had when he was in school.
He gets a phone call. It's the coroner's office telling him that it wasn't CB's body in the car. He thoughtfully chews on his thumb.
MacGyver gives CB some coffee to...calm her nerves? She cries a little more and then is suddenly "ok now". I mean, I guess when you're done crying, you're done crying, right? But she's looking up at him. I'm betting on a kiss in the next 10 seconds. Ok it was like 30 seconds. But there it was. (Kiss slut.) She tells him that she still remembers how he tastes and that phrase always gives me the heebie-jeebies. She tells him she's glad he's here because everyone she knows and trusts is dead. He tells her that they'll get to the bottom of it.
So here's something to consider. It's 23 minutes into the episode. That's basically halfway. We have yet to see any sort of MacGyver trick. He hasn't really done anything stereotypically MacGyver-ey at all in this episode. Weird.
So basically, the Uranium has been slowly being stolen in small increments which means that it's probably someone inside the plant and the Uranium might still be hidden somewhere in the plant. So they're going to go to the plant to get that folder she hid and then they're going to publicize the theft.
They pull up to the plant and the security guard lets them in, but a shady looking guy in a shady looking Ford Taurus stops all of sudden and watches them enter. Then he drives off.
Mac and CB are going to where she hid the folder which she reveals is the "disposal chamber". Oh no! There's RS! So they go into the disposal chamber and CB starts telling MacGyver about how bad it would be if they were in there when the valve opened and all the radioactive slush came pouring in. See, that's the kind of thing I'd want to hear about LATER. But no, they're just taking their sweet time...
So MacGyver moves the party along a little by suggesting CB grab the report and they get out of there, but when she grabs the report, they look at it and comment about how it's all downhill from here. They DESERVE to get slushed on for that kind of hubris, you know?
Of course, the chamber closes and RS walks away. The door can't be opened for another 60 minutes. And the valve opens. CB tells an incredulous MacGyver that they have about 10 minutes before the heat from the oncoming slush makes it impossible to breathe. So, plus side: they're not going to have to deal with the slush. Minus side: they're going to die.
We've got some nice interstitial stock nuclear power plant footage.
C-CSG is watching a ballgame and NoESRE is reading some data with his back to the board telling him that the chamber is closed. So no one knows that they're down there.
Mac's plan is to speed up the timer on the lock to the door. They'll hit the timer with a hot electrical surge and set up a violent secondary vibration. Basically, this involves taking a wire from the timer and hooking it to another wire. It's certainly not very impressive, MacGyver-wise.
C-CSG notices the flashing warning lights indicating the chamber is open. He tells NoESRE and NoESRE runs to the chamber just in time to see MacGyver and CB get out of the chamber and close the door before a bunch of yellowy-orangey puke-looking stuff comes pouring out. Of course, CB said that they would be dead LONG before the sludge came out, so I guess she was a little off in her estimation of their demise, huh?
NoESRE comes over and does some poorly-acted stuttering about "What's going on?"
So now MacGyver and CB are going to suit up in Radiation Suits to try to find the missing Uranium. NoESRE is going to go call the NRC (that's Nuclear Regulatory Commission to you and me) and get some authorities down to the plant.
CB gives MacGyver a film badge to test for radiation. Now, when I was in school (and also later, at my job), our film badges measured the dosage of radiation we'd encountered over the course of the year. You sent them to be tested and that was it. Here's CB explaining this slightly different film badge:
CB: Mac, this film badge reacts to radiation. When you're near anything hot it starts to turn black.
MacGyver: When it's all black, do they give you a new one?
CB: When it's all black, they give you a coffin.
MacGyver: Oh. Good....
Now it could be that they have these badges in places where the potential to encounter acute, lethal amounts of radiation is high. Because you want to know right away if you're in that kind of trouble. So it's not completely farfetched, but it DOES feel a little TV-friendly, you know?
So now they're in the storage room. Their radiation suits don't have opaque black respirator masks like the radiation suit that RS wears. That's because it's ok if we know who they are. This is how you build suspense, you know? And intrigue.
CB tells Mac that she and her boss checked through all these containers and didn't find the Uranium anywhere. They know it has to be in this room, because the alarms would go off if that level of radiation was present anywhere else in the plant.
Mac's Geiger counter starts going crazy near a sign that is being held in place by one of those concrete bases. CB tells him that there's no way the Uranium is in there, but then Mac tips over the base and shows her that it's hollow and contains the Uranium. This is actually pretty ingenious because concrete would emit a low radioactive baseline and would be good to conceal something like that. Good job again, writers!
So now they have some evidence.
They go into the decontamination chamber and there is NoESRE pointing a gun at them. MacGyver is not surprised (is "nonplussed" the right word here?). CB asks why NoESRE did all this to her when they had grown up together and everything. He says he never intended for it to go this far. However, when Mac asks him to put the gun down, he refuses, saying that it's too late now. He's in too deep now to get out.
MacGyver guides CB away from NoESRE, even though he's pointing a gun at them. Mac basically says that he doesn't believe NoESRE will shoot them. That he's not a killer. And NoESRE doesn't shoot them. It was pretty tense there for a moment.
So MacGyver and CB run into the control room and tell C-CSG to call Washington and alert the authorities, but he just sits there, stonefaced. All of a sudden, there's the Sheriff holding a gun on them. He's selling the Uranium to a buyer in Canada, but that shouldn't concern them because they won't live to worry about where the Uranium goes.
NoESRE runs in and tells him not to shoot them. There's been enough killing. But the Sheriff is going to shoot them anyway. NoESRE lunges for the gun and gets shot in the struggle. The Sheriff also shoots the control panel and the control panel starts talking about a pressure overload. Sending the reactor out of control into a meltdown situation.
So, C-CSG has a bullet wound in the arm and NoESRE has been shot in the gut. The reactor is heating up and when it gets to critical temperature, it will explode and meltdown. Or maybe just meltdown? I don't know how these things work exactly. They have about 12 minutes.
Basically, if MacGyver can open this one valve manually, then this other coolant injection system can get in there and fix everything.
CB: Mac, no! It'll kill you!
MacGyver: No way! I haven't paid my taxes, yet.
--MacGyver: Badass. Responsible citizen.
The Sheriff is carting the Uranium off and MacGyver is running to the valve. CB and NoESRE are sitting at the control station trying to get that injection system to do the whole "stopping the meltdown" thing from happening.
MacGyver happens upon the Sheriff who, of course, shoots at him. MacGyver runs off and the Sheriff takes chase.
Here's something that bothers me about this episode: NoESRE is basically bleeding to death. I guess they don't call an ambulance because that would endanger more lives? I dunno. I recall there's an opportunity to do something later on. We'll see when we get there.
NoESRE tells CB to go help MacGyver. He can stay and regulate the flow (or whatever it is that makes the valve the only thing needed to fix this problem).
Sheriff and MacGyver are yelling back and forth about the Uranium and the money and all that. Then MacGyver swings around and knocks the Sheriff down. His gun fires and he's hit by a bunch of radioactive steam. His badge turns black. Suddenly afraid, he doesn't fight them as they carry him off to washdown, the only place where he has a hope for survival.
The core temperature continues to rise.
NoESRE sends C-CSG off to tend to his flesh wound. C-CSG doesn't really think twice about leaving. What a jerk.
So Mac and CB are at the valve. Mac gets the wrench and has CB shoot him with washdown water. It's kind of like in Hellfire, actually. The valve is stuck. Mac tries really hard to pry it loose, but the wrench slips out of his hand and goes down a grate. MacGyver asks for the Sheriff's gun. He takes the barrel off the gun and uses the gun as a wrench to successfully loosen the valve. It works!!! They celebrate.
Cut to NoESRE who is DYING in the control room. Um, Mac? CB? he could use a little help, you know? He sees the temperature fall back down and his hand goes limp.
I guess he died because now we've cut to MacGyver and CB later. She's walking him to his car.
They do a little bit of final reminiscing and he leaves. To a sexy saxophone version of the MacGyver theme.
So they really just left both bad guys to an unknown fate? I mean, I GUESS they could both be ok. But they are probably both very dead and it feels like maybe that should have been addressed, you know? Or at least the fate of NoESRE. He redeemed himself in the end! Shouldn't that mean that we get to find out if he lived or died?
Also? I'm not really sure why this episode is called "Flame's End". Ideas? Thoughts? Pop 'em in the comments section!
Thanks for reading! See you next week!
NEXT WEEK: THE EPISODE THAT WILL VERY LIKELY BREAK THE BANK ON YOUR PATIENCE FOR MY RAMBLING EPISODE COMMENTARY: COUNTDOWN
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