Expecting anything more than a sword fight and some beach scenes from Crusoe is like expecting a deep character study on Gossip Girls. Last week’s episode did a fair job of delivering a straightforward plot and some fun action scenes, but can the formula of this show truly be getting stale already? Let’s hope not, but with shows getting the ax left and right, Crusoe seems like it could be ripe for cancelation in a few more weeks.

Friday wakes Crusoe up trying to kill him. At first Crusoe thinks its one of their brotherly tussles (no homo) but is soon made aware that Friday has been driven mad by poison. He tries to get an antidote from the still stranded mutineers.  Their girl pretending to be a boy doctor Olivia/Oliver helps Crusoe, explaining that it isn’t a bite at all, but poisoned honey causing hallucinations. Its really an excuse to try to set up some romantic tension between Olivia and Crusoe.

Friday is ranting and raving in his bamboo cage like a madman.The plant needed for the antidote is growing out of the side of a rock cliff and Crusoe has to repel down the side to get it. After almost falling Crusoe succeeds but Olivia has to strip naked to make a clothing rope for Crusoe to climb to safety. Stay classy NBC.

With the flower needed for the antidote in tow, Crusoe and Olivia find that Friday has escaped his cage and is running loose. Friday turns the tables, capturing Crusoe in his own cage and escapes. After some dramatic over reactions, Olivia and Crusoe lure Friday back to the camp and give him the antidote, saving him.

We finally find out more about Crusoe’s condemnation in England. He was tied to an insurrection against King James through some pretty tenuous relations and is branded a traitor. Crusoe decides to flee to the new world at the behest of his creepy rich benefactor. He is obviously being set up, but its murky as to the reasons why.

This is a wasted opportunity. Instead of having Crusoe be a courageous rebel against the crown or a complete victim of circumstance, he is sympathetic toward the rebels, but without any bravery to go along with it. It seems like a blown opportunity to give Crusoe some deeper backbone.

I prefer it when Crusoe goes man vs nature rather than man vs man in its framing. Its far more true to the proper Robinson Crusoe story and its clearly more believable to have FRiday ingest a poison than to have them running into yet another group of castaways on the least deserted island in the Caribbean. It still remains to be seen if Crusoe can get its bearings and develop into something solid, but this week was a descent demonstration of where the series could go.