The Big Bang Theory: “The Psychic Vortex” – review

Leonard ruins a double-date with Howard and Bernadette, getting into a prolonged argument with Penny over the validity of psychic phenomena. Meanwhile, Raj is desperate to go to a campus mixer and convinces Sheldon to be his wingman only by giving up his full-scale light-up Green Lantern power battery.

Like many viewers, at times this season, I’ve wondered whether Leonard and Penny became a happy couple too soon. Big Bang hasn’t suffered much from it, because all the regular characters are interesting, and honestly I would hate to see Sheldon, Howard, and Raj take a backseat while the show focused too much on Leonard and Penny together. Still, when the writers have built up Leonard and Penny’s chemistry over two years, I don’t want to see it go to waste and given even less screen time. This episode revisited Leonard and Penny’s main source of conflict:  as a scientist, Leonard largely believes in what can be proven and is largely skeptical of what can’t. Penny believes in several things (psychics, ghosts, pyramid power…) that can’t exactly be proven. She also remains sensitive about the intellectual gap between her and Leonard and is quick to assume Leonard is calling her stupid by making fun of her belief in psychics.

The episode nicely contrasted one of Leonard and Penny’s first fights as a couple with how far Howard, Raj, and Sheldon have progressed in the realm of relationships. Howard tried several times to save Leonard from the argument with Penny. Leonard didn’t listen, but I bought that someone as intelligent as Howard would learn relationship etiquette in just a few episodes.

Meanwhile at the mixer, Raj got along well with a grad student named Abby (Danica McKellar), and Abby’s friend Martha (Jen Drohan), oddly enough, seemed perfect for Sheldon. She seemed genuinely interested in both comic book heroes and Sheldon’s mental journeys to a two-dimensional space called Flatland. Martha was even able to give Sheldon new insight into Flatland, but Sheldon, of course, completely missed her romantic advances. I can see Martha recurring if Sheldon ever shows interest in dating.

In a key scene, Leonard asked Howard if he’d have to give up the principles around which he’s built his life to be with Penny. Howard smartly diagrammed for Leonard the tiny cross-section of people who believe the same things he does and people he might want to date. In his final scene with Penny, Leonard offered to go with her to see her psychic. Penny hesitated, and Leonard asked if she would be willing to read a book proving psychics were frauds. When Penny said no, Leonard threw the book in the trash and went with her.

Again it’s great to see characters acting as smart as they’re supposed to be. As Leonard makes an effort to respect Penny’s beliefs, I hope Penny continues to be curious and sees why Leonard believes in physics over psychics.

About Gerald So

Gerald So covers THE BIG BANG THEORY, BONES, BURN NOTICE, NCIS, NCIS: LOS ANGELES, and PSYCH each week for BSCreview. His personal blog is If You Want to Know About My Life.