The truncated second season of Northern Exposure got underway on 8 April, 1991 with Goodbye to All That. Written by Robin Green the show opens with Chris-in-the-morning (John Corbett) giving us the broad strokes of the series for any new viewers.

Chris is living at the radio station because his trailer got pancaked by a falling tree, Holling (John Cullum) has ordered a satellite dish for the bar, but it backfires when Shelly (Cynthia Geary) becomes addicted to television.

And poor Joel (Rob Morrow) gets a letter from Elaine. It’s a ‘Dear John’ letter. Poor Joel. Ed (Darren E. Burrows) and Marilyn (Elaine Miles) worry about him and try to get the town to help cheer him up. Chris arranges a double date, but in the end, Joel has to look at his relationships and how he deals with women, while Ed helps him get some closure by asking Maggie (Janine Turner) to be a stand-in for Elaine.

And now that the off-screen relationship between Joel and Elaine is over, we can really start to dig in and enjoy the continued banter between him and Maggie.

Joel has been in Alaska for eight months now, and the series has really found its groove embracing its eccentric characters and making for some wonderful viewing. This episode has some great bits, most of them around Joel, including the conversation with his younger self in the local movie theatre, and the way he sees himself when he gets the Dear John letter.

Season two has been set up, reintroduced us to all the characters and now, let’s have some fun.

The Big Kiss was penned by Henry Bromell and first aired on 15 April, 1991.

Ed, following a screening of Spencer Tracy’s Boys Town, decides to seek out information about his own parents, but everyone in the tribe seems to have a different take on Ed’s story. He finds he is aided on the journey by the spirit One-Who-Waits (Floyd ‘Red Crow’ Westerman), though Joel insists the chief is merely imaginary, though there’s a moment when it seems Chris can see him when they enter Holling’s bar.

But Joel has another problem, one he can’t find a cure for because he has a hard time believing it. Chris has lost his voice after encountering a beautiful woman (Jessika Cardinahl) who asks him for directions. This means that until he gets his voice back, someone else will have to run the radio station. We know Maurice (Barry Corbin) can’t do it. So it looks like Holling’s turn, though he doesn’t seem much more capable than Maurice was.

Chris has figured out the cure though, or rather One-Who-Waits tells him through Ed what he must do. All of this makes Joel roll his eyes. He must sleep with the most beautiful woman in town. So he reaches out to Maggie. When Joel mocks the whole thing, Maggie considers it.

Maggie can’t go through with it, but she won’t give Joel the satisfaction of knowing he was right, so she lays a huge kiss on Chris that seems to do the job.

Ed gets a bit of a payoff at the end of the episode when One-Who-Waits’ advice seems to have come true…

It’s a quirky and delightful episode that pontificates on family, love, and the pains of the heart. Man, this show is great.