"likable teenage boy" who deserves more running time. Handlen thought that Michael sounded "reasonable", and Sepinwall said "Awake...[has previously done] a good job of making the guest characters involved in [Michael]'s cases interesting enough that I care about what happens in each investigation." He thought that until this episode the writers had been wise on guest stars and on not focusing on them too much; he also wrote that actors Lawrence and Valderrama did not seem to match each other. Handlen was rather impressed with the storylines of the "red reality" and gave the episode a "B+", writing that "Jake reminded [him] of Al Pacino's aging [gang member] in Donnie Brasco." Sepinwall liked Jake's actor, Lawrence, praising his appearance on the Awake episode. Fowler showed disappointment as the entry gave no "twists" or "problems" regarding Michael, or his therapy sessions. He compared "Nightswimming" to other Awake episodes, claiming that other entries offer more "plot" and "emotional" problems, while Preece called the entry "strange". She thought that the storylines of the "red reality" were more "interesting" than the "green reality" storylines, and Fowler was disappointed with the song choice for the installment, claiming that the R.E.M. song "Nightswimming" should have been played instead. Preece described the "Nightswimming" episode as a "dull procedural episode" that is devoid of any mythology or forward motion; she called the installment "flat". Despite saying that she was "losing patience" with Awake, Preece said that she was still "keen" to see more. While Preece wrote that the episode was missing key elements from previous episodes, Fowler criticized the installment, since the first fifteen minutes of the entry were about Marcus and Elena and their lives. Despite this, Fowler praised the final scene of the episode, and Preece called Michael and Hannah's relationship "lovely". Fowler gave this a "7.5" "good" rating, the lowest score for an Awake episode at that time. Preece thought that the episode made "little mistakes", which Awake could not afford to make. McHatton said that "Nightswimming" contains "No conspiracies, no killers, not even murders", just a "procedural case that mirrored [Michael]'s life at home". Despite this, he praised Michael and Hannah's relationship, claiming that "it's nice to watch as they reconnect with each other"; he gave it a "4.5" rating out of "5.0". Meanwhile, Yeoman stated that the entry opened to "a certain amount of whimsy" and that, "starting [the episode] off with the