Popular Culture Review Vol. 14, No. 1, February 2003 | Page 119

F o r e v e r K n ig h t

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T he In visib le M an

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her younger brother Richard (Lindsay Merrithew) was fatally wounded in a police
shootout (“I Will Repay”), her niece was murdered (“Undue Process”), and she
was unknowingly dating a serial killer (“Only the Lonely”). Even less is disclosed
about The Keeper. The information we do have is seen through the invisible eyes
of Darien who tracks her movements outside of the perimeter of The Agency (“Im
petus”). She lives in a spacious home with her only companion being her pet ter
rier, Pavlov; she loves to rock to techno-mixes in her bedroom while eating lico
rice strips; and she goes by the name of Claire to the family she has adopted as a
result of one of its members suffering from a tragic experiment under her direct
supervision. If there is any love interest for each of these women, it is directed
towards the hero of the tale. While Natalie and Claire keep their feelings hidden,
at times they do surface. In “Be My Valentine,” the cool and clinical Dr. Lambert
feels inspired on that special day of the year and kisses Nick full on the lips. And
the relationship between Claire and Darien has undergone some changes as well.
Starting out as adversaries, they have advanced to the point where both of them
make “invisible love” in front of a disgusted Hobbes who hears their moans of
ecstasy coming out of nowhere (“The Three Phases of Claire”).
It is logical that the wise young women display some affection for the cursed
heroes. After all, the men are the focus of their attention morning, noon, and night.
Both Nat and Claire want them to be normal so that they can start to cultivate a
romantic relationship with them. Thus, they try any number of ingenious medical
treatments to rid Nick and Darien of their afflictions. Nat uses a series of progres
sive interventions with Nick, ranging from his drinking alchemic elixirs and eat
ing potato burgers (“Dark Knight”) to his holding religious objects (“For I Have
Sinned”) and tolerating elevated doses of Vitamin A in his system (“Be My Valen
tine”). Claire has to be more cautious with Darien since removal of the Quicksil
ver gland will most certainly cause his death. To complicate things further, only
one person has the ability to safely operate on Darien’s brain, his brother Kevin
(David Burke), but the older sibling has been killed in a terrorist attack on his
laboratory (as viewed in the pilot episode). So what Claire comes up with is a way
of retrieving the deceased Kevin’s memories by injecting his RNA into Darien’s
brain so that the brother’s personality can persist for an eighteen-hour period, which
should be long enough to obtain the information necessary to complete the sur
gery successfully. What Claire does not expect is that the “Kevin” thoughts take
on a life of their own and decide that the gland has made Darien a more useful
member of society. Thus, the operation is not performed within the given time
frame, frustrating Claire to an unbelievable degree (“Brother’s Keeper”).
A significant turning point is reached in both series when Nat and Claire find
a way of lifting the curse with a “miracle drug.” Like the Jungian old man who
supplies the hero with a magical talisman that will provide him with the power to