Charlotte
Episode 4 of National Treasure: Edge of History starts with Jess and Tasha receiving a parcel from a shady man outside. It’s from Ethan, apparently. The box in question happens to hold cupcakes. Anyway, Ethan himself is off golfing while Oren, Jess and Tasha decide to try and decipher the mystery using the clues they’ve found so far. Part of that comes from looking into Maliche, but with clues that haven’t been solved in 200 years. So of course, it’s time for some teen angst with Liam! Tasha and Jess end up stalking his socials before Jess decides to tag along, with Oren and Tasha also invited along to Peter’s wake that day. Meanwhile, Billie reveals that she has two pieces of the puzzle and has a clue to the third, which of course happens to be Elvis’ speech she received last episode. Billie heads outside, cracking a joke about Tik Tok, before fighting in the parking lot against Charlie and his goons, who wants the treasure for themselves. Billie comes out on top, naturally. Now, these clues lead them to Peter’s wake, where they learn Riley Poole is going to be in attendance, the same podcaster we saw touch down earlier in the episode. At the wake, there’s more angst between Jess and Liam, before they get Riley involved in the puzzle, as he happens to be a treasure hunter as well as a podcaster. Agent Nichols also happens to be at the wake too and she ends up asking questions about Peter Sadusky and how the kids are tied to him. Naturally, Nichols ends up heading inside, sniffing around the office. She uses an app to decipher a plant and takes a sample. When she leaves, Riley heads inside and finds the office and, by extension, the Hidden Clue room. Unfortunately, Riley ends up touching one of the trinkets and as a result, he ends up trapped inside with Jess when the alarm goes off. The pair remember that Peter had dementia and as such, he must have had his code hidden around somewhere to help them get on. As they try to decipher their way out of the Clue Room, Liam is given some words of encouragement from Myles, Peter’s associate, who reveals that Peter used to listen to his songs as it was the only thing that made him smile. As a result, Liam decides to play a song for him at the wake. At the same time, Tasha heads inside the house and begins messing about with the office, trying to enter the Clue Room, which has been locked from the inside. While running out of oxygen, Jess realizes that Sacagawea is the clue she’s after while they manage to break out of the room just in time. When they open the door, all our characters join together, with Jess filling them all in on what they’ve managed to uncover and how Sacagawea is part of all this. That, in turn, brings them to Meriwether Lewis, who was governor of Louisiana. The journal in question that they’re after was dedicated to his dog and it’s on display at his mansion. After, Jess and Liam end up kissing while there’s some forced angst between Oren and Tasha too. Anyway, Riley leaves but upon doing so, lets Jess know that one of her friends isn’t actually a friend after all. Someone is leaking information. And it seems to be Liam.
The Episode Review
Another episode of National Treasure comes and goes, and alongside the cheap production design, the narrative work is also cheap too. We get some forced Clue Room treasure hunting for the sake of it and big question marks over why the alarms didn’t go off before whilst touching all those other trinkets. Is it specifically just the glasses that can’t be touched? The whole romantic angle between Jess and Liam feels tired and contrived too, while the entire screenplay feels shallow and lacks imagination. Hopefully the episodes ahead can improve but it seems between this and Willow, Disney are in competition with themselves to produce the worst show currently streaming every week!
