Roswell
"Meet the Dupes"

Airdate: November 20, 2000

Three of the New York version of the Royal Four embark upon a journey to Roswell to persuade the other king to join them in a sit-down with members of the other royal families to presumably negotiate a peace agreement. The means which the gangsta rapper wannabes use to persuade Max to go along are not on the up and up, playing on the growing distance between he and Isabel to alienate him to the point where he feels that he has nothing to lose by going with them.

When Roswell promised "more sci-fi" this season, it is now obvious that what they meant was "more, bad sci-fi clichés". "Summer of '47", although not completely bad, gave us the flashback filled episode, "The End of the World" filled the slot for the illogical "time-travel" story, and now "Meet the Dupes" takes its place as the first installment in the "evil twins" scenario with its requisite secrets and cases of mistaken identity/switching.

Surprisingly enough, the brains of the outfit.

On the chick front, Liz and Tess have become so wishy washy that the point of their existence has to have be a real bone of contention to others besides myself. Whatever spine Tess exhibited in her verbal sparring matches with Kyle Valenti in "The End of the World" has disappeared completely. I can't remember a single line coming out of that girl in this episode besides the murmuring of her name. And her double was just as bad if not worse. Meanwhile, Liz's lobotomy seems to have taken full effect as she neglects to mention to her best friend that said best friend's sort-of-ex stuck his tongue down her throat and then later goes on to allow Max to leave Roswell, completely forgetting that the Royal Four have to be kept together or else the world is gonna go to hell in a handbasket. But really I can't say as I'm surprised as I've come to expect as much from Liz.

Isabel doesn't fare much better in "Meet the Dupes" as the one moment where she shows some spine and sticks up for herself, she isn't really herself. Know what I mean? Even more reprehensible is that she allows Lonnie, her double, to mock the well-meaning Alex. While he's no knight in shining armor, the boy has done some pretty extreme stuff to protect Isabel, Max, and Michael. He deserves a little more respect. And a few more lines. And something to do.

Unlike the Roswell Isabel and both versions of Tess, New York Lonnie is a goal-oriented girl, doing whatever it takes to make things happen. Sometimes it involves pretending to be her limp-noodle double, other times it requires that she assist in the killing of her brother. Ya gotta respect such a dedicated chick. If only she didn't have one of the worst accents heard since... well, on second thought, I can't think of a worse attempt at an accent. Still... can we keep her?

The biggest question to come out of "Meet the Dupes", however, is: When did Maria become the brains of the outfit? Sure she's still too obsessed with the-hairdo-fornerly-known-as-Michael for my tastes, but while everyone stands around with their mouths hanging open it's Ms. DeLuca that quickly steps in and saves their bacon in a surprisingly smooth move. (Okay, so the move wasn't surprising, that she did it so smoothly though was.) Even when she commits a faux paus at breakfast with Brody, she has the presence of mind to come up with a believable lie.

It's clear that Shiri Appleby needs to ask Majandra Delfino whom she needs to pay and how much.

Next on the list of bad, sci-fi clichés? Well, I can't say for certain, but they haven't done the "someone loses their superpowers" story yet, have they? Or how about the Freaky Friday episode?

-- Linda M. Najera

Roswell airs Monday nights at 9pm EST on The WB.

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