The Invisible Man
"Beholder"

Airdate: September 22, 2000

The Agency is hot on the trail of The Chameleon, an international assassin whose modus operandi consists of putting bullets only in his intended targets. Everyone else who gets in his way, however, gets their eyeballs burned out with some sort of laser gun. You know, so they can't give a description of his rather non-descriptive self.

Bobby Hobbes, Ladies Man.

After Ebert's funky ViewMaster briefing, Hobbes and Fawkes are sent to tail a beautiful, but blind super-model who had ties to three of The Chameleon's thirty-five blinding victims. While Darien does his invisible trick and follows the model to her boyfriend's house, Bobby makes time with the other beautiful types hanging around the photo shoot. Unfortunately for our quicksilvering hero, he gets caught peeking at the model and her bad-guy boyfriend (You knew he was The Chameleon, right?) and ends up temporarily blinded.

That is, he's blind as long as he's visible. You see somehow when quicksilver is layered over his damaged eyes, he can see. Sort of. Luckily for Darien and The Agency, The Chameleon doesn't know that so when the proper times comes (and that would be in the fourth act), he is thwarted and the world is safe once again for democracy. Or something like that.

Small comments clue the viewer into the fact that "Beholder" was meant to air before "The Other Invisible Man" and after "Cat and Mouse", causing a bit of confusion, but minus the moment of "Dude, he should know that already!" it's a nice romp in the standard buddy-series universe of The Invisible Man. The camaraderie/competition between Fawkes and Hobbes is in full effect during the first photo shoot, but although Fawkes does garner the interest of the lead guest star, Hobbes proves again that he's no slouch in the charm department when he smoothes his way into the circle of models. There's also a few good moments of teamwork where Hobbes puts his trust in his handicapped partner and Fawkes proves his worth to the agency. That's always nice to see.

And although the threat of Quicksilver Madness was mentioned, and even shown in "Beholder", it has somehow lost the impact it had in the early seasons. With the counter-agent so accessible and The Keeper eager to give him the shot, the thrill is simply gone. For all the portents of doom that were uttered early in the series, this is a terrible letdown and a waste of good potential drama and angst.

On the plus side, Darien had to attend a funeral so they brought out his suit again, allowing him to take off that gawdawful Pimp-Daddy leather jacket which is a color that can only be described by the words "baby poop." Unfortunately the guy who died wasn't Jewish so no yarmulke. However, this heinous oversight was countered by the fact that it looked like The Keeper had combed Fawkes' hair (so he stopped looking like a taller version of Brendan Fehr) and that the funeral was attended by many, many, many fine looking Marines in dress blues.

Dress blues. Yarmulke. Dress blues. Yarmulke. Dress blues. Yarmulke.

Okay. Yeah. Gotta go with the dress blues.

There's a moral to the story. Of course. Something about being grateful for your gifts and using your God-given -- or in Darien's case, brother-given -- talents... But who cares about that, eh? "Beholder" gave us Vincent Ventresca in a suit and Marines in dress blues. That's reason enough to watch.

-- Linda M. Najera

The Invisible Man airs at 8pm EST, Fridays on The Sci Fi Channel.

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