"The Big Snag" is the thirteenth episode of Season Four of SyFy's Warehouse 13, that aired on May 13, 2013.
Synopsis[]
Pete and Myka get sucked into a 1940s detective noir novel in search of an artifact. Meanwhile, Artie, Steve and Claudia chase down a phantom car thief.
Plot[]
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Pete and Myka are in the warehouse aisles using a jade elephant statue to collect static electricity balls. When Pete tries to collect four of them at the same time, the statue artifact overloads, blasting several nearby books. One of them explodes, releasing hundreds of blank pages that fall down on the agents. When Pete and Myka can see again, they discover that they're wearing 1940s clothing and that they're in a black-and-white world. They're in an office and outside is the city of Chicago. Myka examines the title page of the blank book that fell on them and discovers that it's an unfinished crime novel signed by author Anthony Bishop. She's a fan of Bishop and tells Pete that he had writer's block, killed himself in desperation, and thus created an artifact. Artie is playing piano at the B&B while Claudia and Steve figure that he needs a distraction to take his mind off what he did under the astrolabe's influence. They enter the room arguing about stolen c cars and whether it involves an artifact or not. Artie listens in and finally tells them that he'll check it out on his own. Claudia convinces him to let them go with him and Artie finally agrees, saying that they'll take his car, Scarlett. Chapter 1: The Client Artie, Claudia, and Steve go to the car dealership that has the stolen cars. A salesman, Amy, comes over and tries to sell them a car, but they insist on talking to the owner, Josh Lambeth. When he refuses to cooperate with them, Artie shoots a water cooler with his Tesla and demands answers. Lambeth admits that a thief contacts him anonymously and gets him any car that he wants. Claudia checks the account that Lambeth deposits the payoff into, but the thief hasn't withdrawn any money yet so Claudia can't trace it. Steve suggests that they set up a trap and tells Lambeth place a request for Artie's car. Chapter 4: The Ambush When the agents go back to Oliver's office, they discover that Caspian's thugs have searched the place but failed to find a clue. Myka spots a hotel matchbook with the name of Bishop's wife on it and figures it's a clue that Caspian's men wouldn't have understood. The agents go to the hospital and pay off the clerk to look at the hotel register. One name, Augustus Pitt Rivers, has been erased but Pete manages to recover it by shading it with a pencil. Rivers is an archaeologist in the real world and Myka figures that Bishop used the name as a homage. As they go to Rivers' room, a nearby lamp flickers and they figure that someone is using the jade statue. The agents find Oliver dead on the floor and the killer running down the alley outside. When Pete tries to follow, the killer uses the jade statue to fire an electrical blast at him, driving him back. Steve drafts a photo advertisement for Scarlett and makes sure that the hotel parking garage they're using for the trap is visible in the background. Artie tinkers with one of Claudia's Tesla grenade, causing an EMP burst that shorts out her new GPS locator. She nervously takes the grenade away from Artie and repairs the GPS. Chapter 9: The Wife The agents go in back, catch her, and take her to her dressing room. The blonde introduces herself as Lily Abbot and insists that she didn't kill Oliver. Myka demands details and Lily explains that she's just a small-town girl in over her head. When she started singing at the club, Caspian assigned her to get close to Oliver. She wanted to hire the agents to keep Oliver safe but isn't in love with him. Lily tells Pete and Myka that she has her own man and that she'll run off with him once she has enough money to get out from under Caspian's thumb. Myka doesn't believe her and tells Lily to tell it to the police. As Claudia puts the tracker on Artie's car, she complains to Steve over the radio about how Artie is overreacting. The thief, wearing a hoodie, approaches the car, forcing Claudia to hide in the car. Rather than risking Claudia's life, Artie runs over and yells at the thief to stop. The thief gets in the car and drives it through the parking garage wall, like the wall doesn't even exist. As they track Claudia on the GPS locator, Artie tells Steve that he's not going to let anyone else die on his watch. Chapter 14: The Boyfriend Myka tells Bishop that can only escape by finishing the story and asks the writer for the solution. However, Bishop refuses to destroy his world, and the agents realize that Bishop killed Oliver. Myka realizes that Lily is based on Bishop's wife, and that in all of his stories, an innocent gets gunned down at the end. Bishop admits that Lily is destined to die but that he plans to take her away rather than let her die in the story's ending. Pete knocks the gun away, telling Bishop that he's no killer. The writer agrees but runs off, promising that he won't let them finish the story. While the agents go to question Caspian and get a lead, Bishop approaches Lily and tells her that they need to leave town. They've always planned to go to Bora Bora, but Lily points out that they'll need money. Meanwhile, Pete and Myka realize that Caspian is gone. They check with a coat check girl, who tells them that he got a call and left. Pete calls the operator and convinces her to tell him what she overheard, and she gives them the address where Caspian said he was going to buy an elephant. The thief drives to a garage and removes a pair of gloves. Once the thief leaves the room, Claudia gets out of the trunk and reaches for the ground. However, the thief--Amy, comes back and knocks the Tesla out of Claudia's hand with a tire jack. Chapter 18: The Double-Cross At the Indigo Club, Lily looks on as Bishop steals the money from the register. He assures her that he knows where the safe is and they can get all the money they need. Rebecca comes in and fires a lightning bolt from the jade statue and tells Bishop to get her the money or she'll kill Lily. Claudia and Amy fight and Amy rants about how people who lock up their cars don't deserve to have them. She finally knocks Claudia down, takes one of the stolen cars, and drives it through a wall. Artie and Steve arrive and Claudia reveals that she managed to grab one of the gloves. Before they can come up with a plan, Artie grabs the glove, gets into a car, and drives through a wall after the thief. Chapter 23: The Big Snag Claudia calls Artie on the Farnsworth and tells him that the gloves belonged to famous stunt driver Corey Loftin. One-Take Loftin could make any car stunt in one take. Amy crashes through a barrier and they realize that the artifact only lets a car become incorporeal once. Artie tells his friends that he has a plan and then pulls up next to Amy. She brakes and Artie swings around, facing her. Amy backs up but a truck cuts off her escape. She guns the engine and drives toward Artie, who drives toward her in a game of Chicken. Steve and Claudia tell him to swerve, but Artie insists that Amy will swerve. She finally does and blows out a wheel hitting the curb. Satisfied, Artie signs off and Claudia and Steve both realize that Artie isn't fine. Chapter 27: The Goodbye Later, Steve gives a verbal report to Adwin, who has had the agent watching over Artie. Steve admits that he's worried about Artie's irrational behavior. The Regent agrees and thanks Steve for his services. When Steve wonders if they're going to bronze Artie, Adwin tells him to trust the Regents. Pete and Myka read the finished story, and the ending has Bishop and Lily going to Bora Bora and having a happy ending. Myka complains that it's too warm and fuzzy for a crime drama, but Pete suggests that Bishop couldn't finish the story until he realized that he was writing a love story, not a murder mystery. |
Cast[]
Main Cast[]
- Eddie McClintock as Pete Lattimer
- Joanne Kelly as Myka Bering
- Saul Rubinek as Artie Nielsen
- Allison Scagliotti as Claudia Donovan
- Aaron Ashmore as Steve Jinks
Guest Starring[]
- Missi Pyle as Lily Abbott
- Faran Tahir as Adwin Kosan
- America Olivo as Rebecca Carson
- Enrico Colantoni as Anthony Bishop
Co-Starring[]
- Amanda Brugel as Amy
- Marqus Bobesich as Joel Lambeth
- Jefferson Mappin as Caspian Barnabas
- Aaron Stern as Waiter
- Vanessa Smythe as Coat Check Girl
Uncredited[]
- John-Paul Nickel as Desk Clerk
Artifacts and Gadgets Featured[]
- Anthony Bishop's Manuscript: The unfinished loose-leaf manuscript of Kiss Me, Forever by Anthony Bishop. Has the ability to draw people into a black-and-white world reminiscent of a 40s noir film. Those trapped can only escape by solving the narrative's mystery. Deactivated as Pete and Myka finished the story and helped Bishop find his happy ending. This is the main artifact of the episode.
- Carey Loftin's Gloves: Allows the wearer to make any car untouchable, once. This extends to intangibility through walls and people. Can function separately or together.
- Vyasa's Jade Elephant: Belonging to the Vyasa, author of the Vedas. Can absorb and discharge electrical bolts.
- Battery Backpack: Absorbs the electricity collected by Vyasa's Jade Elephant.
- Tesla Grenade: A grenade form of the standard Tesla device, designed to shock multiple targets within its radius when detonated.
- GPS Tracking Device: A custom GPS device designed by Claudia Donovan, used to track Artie's car Scarlett.
Quotes[]
“ | Pete: Myka, you're in black and white. Myka: You're in black and white. Pete: I am not! Aah! I'm in black and white! |
” |
“ | Myka: The 1940s were in color, much like the rest of history. | ” |
Trivia[]
- The episode's title is a reference to the 1946 noir film The Big Sleep, based on a novel of the same name by Raymond Chandler. The film centers on Chandler's hardboiled detective character Philip Marlowe, played by Humphrey Bogart. Coincidentally, Bogart also played the character Rick Blaine in the film Casablanca, which is also referenced in the episode:
- Anthony Bishop's would-be final line to Lily before he decides to remain in his novel, "Be good, kid", may be a reference to Blaine's repeated line "Here's looking at you, kid."
- Pete and Myka leave the novel by walking into the fog. Pete knew this would work because it's the end of Casablanca. Myka retorts that the film stole its ending from one of Bishop's other works.
- Pete uncovers the name erased from the hotel's guestbook using the "writing indentation clue", which he learned from Raymond St. James' noir crime or detective film "Dark Memento". Raymond St. James was an actor whose characters and the films they appeared in featured in "Beyond Our Control", "Dark Memento" being among them.
- Missi Pyle and Enrico Colantoni both starred in the 1999 sci-fi film Galaxy Quest. They played the alien characters Laliari and Mathesar respectively.
- After the teaser, the episode opens with a stylized 1940s version of the "Warehouse 13" logo, with the cast and crew's names in a similarly styled font.
- The episode contains endless noir and black-and-white references from the Raymond Chandleresque title to Myka's observation that finding the elephant will be "duck soup" (early 20th century slang for something that is easy to do), which is also the title of the classic Marx Brothers' movie. The 'crime boss' Caspian Barnabas bears more than a passing resemblance to Sydney Greenstreet.
- According to the scrolling screens throughout the Warehouse Library, it is organized according to the Dewey Decimal System.
- A laptop in the library displays an article on Vyasa, featuring an oil painting of him by Rajasekharan Parameswaran.[3][4]
- A page of Bishop's manuscript near the end of the episode actually uses an excerpt from Murder in the Gunroom by Henry Beam Piper, a science fiction author best known for his series focusing on the future of humanity and several alternate-history tales.[5][6]
- This episode was filmed around early August 2012.[7]
- Mark Giles was a Camera and Electrical Department employee for the series:[8]
References[]
- ↑ File:Dewey Decimal System 1.png
- ↑ File:Dewey Decimal System 2.png
- ↑ File:Vyasa Article.png
- ↑ http://artistrajasekharan.blogspot.com/2011/07/vyasa-maharshi-oil-painting-by.html?spref=pi
- ↑ File:Bishop Manuscript Page.png
- ↑ https://www.gutenberg.org/files/17866/17866-h/17866-h.htm
- ↑ https://twitter.com/ChristineUrias/status/233632667634114560
- ↑ https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0318477/
- ↑ https://twitter.com/ChristineUrias/status/334053709086601216
- ↑ https://twitter.com/ChristineUrias/status/334135590759047168
- ↑ https://twitter.com/ChristineUrias/status/334136906260545538
- ↑ https://twitter.com/ChristineUrias/status/334308368585998336
Warehouse 13 : Season 4 | |||
#01 "A New Hope" | #06 "Fractures" | #11 "The Living and the Dead" | #16 "Runaway" |
#02 "An Evil Within" | #07 "Endless Wonder" | #12 "Parks and Rehabilitation" | #17 "What Matters Most" |
#03 "Personal Effects" | #08 "Second Chance" | #13 "The Big Snag" | #18 "Lost & Found" |
#04 "There's Always a Downside" | #09 "The Ones You Love" | #14 "The Sky's the Limit" | #19 "All the Time in the World" |
#05 "No Pain, No Gain" | #10 "We All Fall Down" | #15 "Instinct" | #20 "The Truth Hurts" |