The Stop Button

As penultimate episodes go, Portal Patrol is a doozy. The team has found themselves stranded in the time stream, so it’s good Joivan Wade got his Cyborg upgrades because he has to make them a little pod to survive. The current stakes are saving the world and April Bowlby (who doesn’t appear this episode), so when they discover holes in time where they might be able to regain their missing immortality, everyone heads out on assignment.

Now, the opening titles spoil a big guest star—Timothy Dalton. Former series regular slash ostensible lead, who’s been dead for seasons at this point, and everyone’s still trying to work through the traumas he’s inflicted. Brendan Fraser (and Riley Shanahan) meet Dalton in the past when he’s on an outing with recurring guest star Mark Sheppard. Except they’re in 1948, so neither Dalton nor Sheppard knows Fraser. And Fraser’s left trying to reason with a fascinated Dalton and a drunk Sheppard. Outstanding acting from Fraser, Dalton, and Shanahan. The body work this episode’s terrific.

Diane Guerrero and Matt Bomer (and Matthew Zuk) find themselves in the more recent past, in the Doom Patrol mansion. Guerrero’s on a combination “dying of old age” and just getting some of her PTSD resolved arc, so she’s drawn to all the old VHS tapes of her (now missing) personas. Meanwhile, Bomer and Zuk confront… Bomer and Zuk. Bomer’s current alien symbiote star child goes to find the former alien symbiote star child, and Bomer gets into an argument with it. Of course, he does.

But Guerrero runs into Dalton, and they sit down for one last session; she’s out of time, he’s fascinated but also worried about the future knowledge.

Speaking of future knowledge, Wade—who sends out an SOS to the time stream, which seems like how you’d bring back a now deceased special guest star, but isn’t—Wade has a heck of a little arc.

Michelle Gomez journeys into her own past, where she briefly encounters Dalton (despite them being renowned nemeses, I’m not sure the show ever gave them a sustained scene) before running afoul of other people she doesn’t like–really good Gomez performance.

Everyone’s really good, of course. Dalton’s so good.

It ends up being Guerrero’s episode, with Fraser, Bomer, and Gomez sharing the B slots, then Wade getting the C. Watching Guerrero in this episode, I had the odd sensation of remembering when she wasn’t good on the show and wondering how that period plays in the greater context of the show. For the someday rewatch.

But for now, there’s one more Patrol to go, and they’re in excellent shape for it.

Big shoutouts to the script (credited to Chris Dingess) and then Chris Manley’s direction. Portal knows what it’s doing.