I like the scene where Legend is snooping around in the bedroom looking at pictures and is surprised by the grandmother lurking in the background.
I don't know if there is a scene that jumps out at me as a highlight. I really liked Ernest's relationship with his mother - as much as he grumbled about her, she was a really neat lady and they didn't shy away from expressing their affection for each other. I also loved his relationship with Zorelda, who might consider marrying him if he didn't take up entirely too much room.
Visually, I liked the pursuit on the tandem bicycle, although it went on a bit longer than necessary.
And the motives behind Melissa's actions seem flimsy at best. At one point it's revealed that her husband Liam died and left her as the sole heir to the family fortune. Legends adds, "But not if Paytents is a blood relative." If I understand correctly, Paytents and Melissa have the same grandmother which would make them cousins, so then why would Paytents stand to inherit anything from the death of her cousin's husband?
I'll grant you, the plot (or at least the number of characters in play) was convoluted, and I actually had to back up and replay part of it to try to figure out the family tree. My understanding was that Grandmother Walsh had two children - Liam, who came out by boat and married Melissa - and Paddy, who came out by wagon with his wife Mary and daughter Patience and was killed. So in that scenario, Paytents is the bloodline granddaughter and Melissa is only the daughter-in-law, a relative by marriage. (Did I get that right?) Of course, I don't know the legalities of a will - if Melissa had been legally named the heir, I'm not sure that a blood relative showing up afterward would change that - or was there no will? In any case, I leave that to the ruthless lawyer that Mrs. Pratt hired to protect the interests of Paytents and her baby.
Interesting that Paytents came to San Francisco only to "know" her family, without any interest in an inheritance. At least Grandmother Walsh was someone worth knowing.
It's also surprising that Melissa even figured out so quickly who Paytents was and what it meant for her financially, and she had time to hire someone to take care of the problem almost from the moment she arrived in town. After all, everyone had assumed that little Patience had died 20 years ago. She shows up now, an adult, with a different name, and Melissa knows immediately who she is? Those San Francisco reporters sure did a great job of getting the story out!
Not sure they wore button down shirts like this in the 1880's. My wife suggests that perhaps the wardrobe department was facing cuts.
Or RDA has his own taste in clothes.
I wasn't a huge fan of this episode and found it slow and relatively uninteresting, though it was nice to meet Legend's mom. I'm putting it at #8 out of #11.
I liked the scenes with Pratt's mom, and some of the backstory. The plot was confusing and seemed to be trying to make a point about race relations in the midst of a mystery/adventure. I wondered a bit about why the seance had such a prominent part of the episode, but I think that might have been another nod to history. Wasn't this the time when seances and the occult were becoming fashionable?
I would probably put this one somewhere near the middle of the bunch.
Unfortunately, the final episode (which I'd better get started on!) was one of my least favorites, so in my mind, I try to let the series drift away after San Francisco.
Kate