The biggest dilemma with TNT and FX's sci fi spectacular is that it's not quite as spectacular as billed. In action one we rushed into the action before we'd even had a chance to meet any of the characters in any depth and when action two dropped by we were again thrown into set piece military skirmishes, featuring rapist goon survivors and our first prisoner of fighting. Pope's an ex-con who's risen from solitary confinement inmate to camp chef in just one episode - aside from him, personality-wise we still don't really have much to go on with any of the actors in performance involved. In fact, enfant terrible Pope's the only one who's been given any decent lines at all and he seems quickly to be becoming the programme's only source of comic relief. That's quite difficult to take from a character who, only one episode ago, appeared to condone sexual mistreatment within his ranks. All these military forces manoeuvres in lieu of a plot you can get your teeth into might be a good thing if the conflict was anywhere near as mind-blowing as the trailers make out, but for the most part scenarios play out in the dead of night and seemingly follow the exact. Same. Pattern. Every time. It usually goes something like this: A immense ED 209 stolen from Robocop gets blown up by a human-lobbed grenade, then another one comes along and wards off the human survivors who manage to grab what they came for, or something comparable. Then the humans all go back to camp (an abandoned school) and agonise about military forces issues, seemingly completely safe from any ufos. Despite the fact the aliens have way superior armament technology, and are pretty furtive when it comes to swiping little kids. That school must have magical powers to not show up on their alien science, inbuilt transhumanist, heat-seeking vision-eyeballs. We already know that the ETs like to grabchildren and wire them up to organic brain-wiping machines before using them as slave-workers and, thank the alien-ridden heavens, at least we've had a little plot development in that department. Ourhero, Tom Mason seems to recognise the returning Doctor Harris, and he's immediately sign-posted with a gaudy neon light-show which screams 'USEFUL VILLAIN - USEFUL VILLAIN', just like we saw on Pope's arrival. It turns out Harris might've had something to do with Mason's wife dying, but he's also a dab hand at removing the mind-control baby-alien necklaces the adversary like to whack on their chain-gangs. So expect him to hang around being both a handy addition to the team and a right pain in the backside over future episodes. In fact, I'll put finances on him getting punched in the face again next episode. Aside from that, we've had a much better look at the aliens over the past two weeks, and they appear to be much more impressive in the flesh than they do in CGI chrome mode. Having shotgun-knocked a couple of limbs off one of the adversary in an one-on-one smackdown, we were treated to the sight of Mason dragging its still living carcass back to home-camp, so they could imprison it and probably do tests on it, or just really tease it for chuckles while it's shackled. But the complication with this is two-fold. Firstly, anyone who's seen a hi tech fiction film or two in their time knows that aliens often come in radioactive flavours, or have acid for blood - so it might've been wise to have kept it a long distance from the kids. Secondly - whichever flaky cast member decided to cage it next to a recovering child wins a Falling Skies 'Absolute Bozo Award' (ABA). But he'll have to get in line if he wants a chance to win his pendant, because so many of the actors in performance have already won one, and we're starting to run out. If you're still in for episode four, check out the summary of action three below...
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The biggest complication with TNT and FX's sci fi spectacular is that it's not quite as spectacular as billed. In action one we rushed into the engagement before we'd even had a chance to meet any of the actors in performance in any depth and when action two dropped by we were again thrown into set piece military skirmishes...
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