The King of the Delta Blues

I finally gave up on the series after watching the first few minutes of this episode. It seemed like a chore for the past few weeks, and the claim that everything from the Civil Rights movement to Watergate wouldn't have occurred without rock and roll (which, in turn wouldn't exist without Robert Johnson) was too silly, short-sighted, and pretentious to continue with. Johnson had one minor hit in his lifetime with Terraplane Blues, and was virtually unknown to black blues fans until the 1961 release of a compilation album. You can't influence people if they've never heard your music. As music historian Elijah Wald plainly put it, "Very little that happened in the decades following his death would have been affected if he had never played a note."

The Civil Rights movement wasn't dependent on a style of music, (even then, gospel is the one most associate with it) nor did R&R have anything to do with Watergate or an Asian civil war. The series was just trying to promote another falsehood (while undeniably accomplished, Bass Reeves wasn't the inspiration for The Lone Ranger, either). There had been well-founded complaints on the now-defunct message boards about the lack of historical accuracy, inconsistencies in the show's rules of time travel, and shoehorned agendas, but the series had promise, so I kept giving it another try.

I've finally had enough.

Every episode is a unique and interesting, colorful joyride through history. I have a master's degree and I have a continuous student of History, please believe me when I tell you that those who rate the show any less than an 8 just don't get it. Open your mind, recall your history but try not to apply too much, and enjoy the ride! It's an absolute blast!

This episode was balanced perfectly. Learning a bit more about Conner Mason and Rufus' relationship was wonderful for adding character depth to both of them. We see a dejected Mason gain some much-needed confidence. We see Wyatt struggling with and coming to realize the depth of his feelings for Lucy, we see Lucy learning to trust Flynn and Flynn working desperately hard to gain that trust. Just about every character has a vital role to play in this episode. Even the normally boring Agent Christopher has her moments in this one when she scolds Wyatt and lets her (dare I say it) emotions get the better of her. There is so much in this episode that works.

Sweet moments, explosions, close calls, plot twists, great historical figures, amazing music!

I have to talk about this episode because it really annoyed me reading the review from a person saying this episode was ridiculous and like unnecessary. I've loved the whole series and I am up to this one and all of them have been fantastic it's the best time travel series I've ever seen in fact. But this was the first episode that inspired me to do research on the subject matter and person because the first time there was an historical character I had not heard of or known. And it led me to so many stories and articles on Robert Johnson. So that reviewer who seems to indicate that Robert Johnson wasn't the forerunner to rock n roll and therefore a revolution is so wrong. Maybe they should do their research too. So this episode was different and that's what was so brilliant and it featured so many other revelations that are obviously heading for the finale which I'm not going to watch ahead of time but following on episodic television at the moment. Because I seriously will be sad for it to end as well as being excited about how it will at the same time. This series and this episode is just amazing.