As it is with Eureka the key to success of this show will be the likability of the cast and when you have the instantly recognizable mug of Saul Rubinek playing the role of Warehouse 13 caretaker, Secret Service Agent Artie Nielsen, you’re headed in the right direction. One of television’s most noticeable character actors, Rubinek takes the lead on comic relief and being the quirky guy who has probably been in the warehouse a tad too long. There is no denying though that the results are often positive and humorous.

In the pilot we are also introduced to our two intrepid heroes. Eddie McClintock plays Pete Lattimer. Think of him as your All-American handsome stud who goes to college on a football scholarship then joins the Secret Service for some adventure. He’s just a good American boy who grows up and serves his country. Joanne Kelly is Agent Myka Bering. A polar opposite to Pete she is organized and focused and looking to move up the ladder within the agency. If she’s black and white, Pete’s all shades of grey and Artie is all the colors of the rainbow. This is your full spectrum of characters. The only other key character whom we will not have met after the pilot is Claudia Donovan. Played by Allison Scagliotti she would appear to be your obligatory young, hip, brilliant techno wiz kid who is too smart for her own good. Apparently she’ll break into Warehouse 13 and persuade Artie to let her stay and help with their missions. After the pilot I thought the trio worked really well together. Once Claudia enters the picture we will see if her Ed is complementary to the show’s Spike, Jet and Faye. Uh-oh did I just uncover an inspiration or make an unfair comparison? Time will tell.

As far as the pilot is concerned I’ve watched it a couple times now and it didn’t lose its charm. And the humour still worked as well. There is this one scene in the opening sequence during our introduction to the main characters in the show that bugs me though. There is an awful takedown scene involving Agent Bering that looked like the editor was trying to meet the cut quota for the entire episode in those 15 seconds. Nothing, not even strobe light editing practices can hide that your actress hasn't got a handle on her takedowns. Poor. Still, it was rather nice to see the Royal Ontario Museum in all its glory. I’ll have to find out if the show was completely filmed here in the Toronto area. I digress. The story in the pilot involves our Agent duo heading out to Iowa to investigate unusual happenings and they come upon a cursed Italian artefact. Plenty of time is given for humour and action (unlike the laughable takedown in the first scene) and I’ll have to give it a go again once it airs to see how the final product comes out. That’s the trouble with advance stuff is you never get the completed show so I can’t say how effects crazy they are or not on this show.

If you really want to know what Warehouse 13 is like I almost want to say it’s X-Files Lite. ‘Yeah, there’s stuff out there that will likely kill us until we figure out a clever way to stop them but by golly let’s have fun with it in the mean time’. The pilot was entertaining enough that I will like to catch upcoming episodes. If things continue along this way SyFy may have another ratings winner and a it’ll be given a chance for renewal.

The following is the promotional trailer for the new SyFy. A who`s who of SyFy shows this coming year.