This episode introduced a new character: Natalie, one of Toby's friends from her modelling days. That's right, Toby the computer geek/girl genius used to be a burlesque model in her college days. She was, or is, also gay, a new character development, when compared to IP's previous shows.
When compared to Samantha, the deceased girlfriend of Mac, Natalie appears to be more intrigued by the time anomalies; where Sam, in "Fear of Flying", was okay in staying away from the big glowing time portal, Natalie was ready to touch the time anomaly and maybe even to go through. Considering that in the original show people that went through the time anomalies usually were the villains of the show, this does not promise anything good in regards to Natalie's moral character. (Of course, just like Sam, she may end up eaten by the next dinosaur, mammal-like reptile or some other creature that comes through the time anomaly, but still...)
Natalie is also one of the titular 'babes', and she is also quite eager to resume her relationship with Toby, at least at the end of the episode. Mac, who probably will end up Toby's boyfriend, doesn't mind, but I think that he has his own issues to worry about. In "Undone", as you remember, his own girlfriend got eaten by the Lycaenops (which is most definitely not a dinosaur, no more so than a monkey is), and he spent at least two-thirds of the next episode "Clean up..." getting over it; he was morose, taciturn, and clearly unhappy with the way Evan was handling the dinosaurs and co. Now, he is cracking jokes, is busy downloading model pics off the internet and is generally acting nonchalant. Just how much time has passed for him to get over Sam at last? Or is he going to another extreme of dealing with his loss - trying to overcompensate? Honestly, if the latter is the case, I'm not impressed with Mac's behavior at all - he should go and have therapy instead.
For Toby's part, she wasn't particularly happy with Mac's behavior either: meeting Natalie and the rest of the girls has clearly opened some old wounds and memories for her, her CP partner (they and Natalie got separated from the others in this episode) acted like a horny college student most of the time (when he didn't try to take on a brown bear with a taser), there was a sense of a love triangle in the air, and there were man-eating dinosaurs out and about. Oh, and Evan acted like a jerk, again.
Evan, for most of his part, is a good man and a good team leader, but occasionally he comes off too abrupt: he was so with Ange and Dylan in the beginning of "Angry Birds", and here with Toby. Yes, it's obviously good that Evan has no problems with Toby's modelling past, but did he have to be so direct and unemotional? "Yes, Toby, you were a model but we don't care. Now let's get going and deal with the time anomaly." Nice personal skills, Mr. Leader!
On the other hand, Evan appeared to have no problems in dealing with Ange: after the events in the last episode, she did decide to stay...and to actually see for herself, what was the excitement in catching dinosaurs and similar beasties. This, of course, put her into a confrontation path with Dylan, who sees herself as Evan's girl Friday in such outdoors outings and doesn't see what Ange is bringing along for such a ride? Plus Dylan's got the bigger taser of the two.
To make matters worse, Evan appears to be thinking about moving on from his wife's death - he left his wedding ring behind when they drove to this mission, and I doubt that he was worried about losing it in the great outdoors; he certainly didn't in "Sisiqutl". And since he had a history with Ange (well, a much longer history with Ange than with Dylan), I'm guessing that he's thinking about her first. He's thinking about Dylan too, he certainly helped her with the dislocated arm, but as a guy I doubt that he fully understands that he's setting himself up for a love triangle, and as Dylan's behavior indicates at the end of the ep, she doesn't really want to play Betty to Ange's Veronica (or Veronica to Ange's Betty? Who was the dominant girl in Archies?), so the next episode should be really awkward to her and Ange and Evan.
Ange, I should add, while she does hold her own against a dinosaur at the end, but somehow I doubt that she'll have the same enthusiasm for dinosaur hunting as Evan, Dylan or Ken Leeds have, so I am not quite sure if she'll go to the great outdoors next time, or any time soon. It is also interesting what Ken will think about the new shift in the relationship between Ange and Evan, especially since last time, on their not-a-date, he asked Ange if she wanted to be his instead. Sigh. The next episodes may have some manly posturings between Ken and Evan with Mac egging them on due to his new mindset (and he may be still angry with Evan).
Finally, the creatures from the episode. The dinosaurs were based on the Ornitholestes model from Walking with Dinosaurs (1999), just with a completely different coloration. It isn't fully established yet if they had feathers or protofeathers on their bodies, but they did lack nasal horns: the initial specimen that was used as a basis for the WWD model had broken nasal bones instead. Considering that over a decade had passed since the release of WWD, IP people could've gotten this straight and created hornless Ornitholestes instead. Of course, maybe it was some other dinosaur, Proceratosaurus, for example, but the model was certainly that of Ornitholestes from WWD.
And then there was the grizzly bear that Mac and the girls encountered in the woods. Got to admit that was a nice touch, but the bear wasn't CGI'd - it was image imposed. I don't have a problem with that, a fully grown grizzly can weigh 200 kg (males even more), be 2 m long, over 1 m tall in the shoulder and are armed with teeth and claws much bigger than those of a lion or a tiger - and it is not an animal that is easily trained to work with people either. Obviously the staff of P:NW had no intention of working with a live grizzly on the set... but did they have to superimpose its image so poorly. Last time I saw such a poor job was on a Disney show "Suite Life of Deck", but that was a children show, so it doesn't count.
So: interesting plot twists, an intriguing new character (if she doesn't get eaten by the next dinosaur that comes to Vancouver), amazing outdoor location, great acting (as always), and decent animals as well. A good episode, better than its predecessor too.
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