The Town Egghead's Priorities Shift in The Last Days of Eugene Meltsner

I’ve always been a sucker for super-nerdy types in television and movies. In the Christian video series Adventures in Odyssey, Eugene Meltsner (Will Ryan) fits that role perfectly. This brainiac whose eyes are perpetually hidden behind his thick glasses is always tinkering with something, and in The Last Days of Eugene Meltsner, the gangly geek’s mind is preoccupied with a big project. The deadline looms before him, and he does not have the patience to deal with kids messing around with his equipment. However, after giving young Dylan and his sister a taste of his newest contraption, he abruptly changes his focus. What’s going on?

This is an episode that incorporates several fantastical inventions that allow the characters to travel to another place – or at least pretend that they are doing so. We see them traversing the desert hitched up to a team of ants and zooming through the bloodstream in a tiny submersible. Mr. Whittaker (Hal Smith), the kindly proprietor of beloved local hangout Whit’s End, and Dylan have a pulse-pounding virtual adventure, while Eugene has a real one as he gets caught in a bank heist and finds unexpected stores of heroism.

This is an interesting video because of what it reveals about Eugene, who is one of the central characters but is most often used for exposition or comic relief. Here, he’s right at the heart of the episode, and other characters, particularly a cousin named Bernard who works as a janitor, discuss his history, which includes being orphaned at an early age. This exploration is great, since Eugene is such a terrific character, and it’s nice to see him so involved in exciting exploits that include disarming a bomb and dangling from the side of a building.

On the other hand, I found this episode a little harder to connect to than others I’ve watched. It’s hard to say just why. The animation and voice work is perfectly up to snuff, with Ryan being the cast standout this time around as Eugene undergoes a rapidly changing series of emotions. He gets most of the laughs of the episode but also the pathos. Bernard is a fairly engaging side character, but none of the others really entertained me that much this time around. Whit, on the other hand, continues to be a steady source of wisdom and common sense.

Eugene quotes a psalm at one point in the episode, and its theme of treasuring each day because life could end tomorrow carries throughout the story. He seems to take it as an indication that nothing he does matters unless its results are immediate. His abandonment of his experiments is, in effect, a rejection of what makes him so special. Hence, the episode’s focus is using one’s gifts for good and not giving in to despair. It’s a good message, but I’m not sure it comes across as well as it could, particularly since the episode ends on a comical note that robs Eugene of a bit of his dignity.

The Last Days of Eugene Meltsner is a fun video for fans of Eugene, and it also invites contemplation about how one’s priorities might shift when faced with mortality. While I didn’t find it quite as entertaining as some of the others, it is still a solid episode.