FALLING SKIES: MOLON LABE REVIEW

By Sean Smyth

 Fish Face Returns

There are few shows on TV now that have the ability to build on top of each episode. Most times there is fatty episodes that have nothing to do with anything that is going on or very little happens to further the every expansive story in any way. Molon Labe doesn't disappoint as it manages to steer clear of this ever increasing trend and only further it's well, awesomeness.

Being quite a few days late on this review I will be brief.

Molon Labe is a very intimate and action packed episode filled with loyalty, honor, heroism, lies, betrayal, love, hate, shooting, and loss.

After the events of last weeks episode, Karen and Ben escaped only to find Karen, as was suspected, was working against the Second Mass. and using Ben to uncover the Skitter Rebel alliance for her Fish Face of a boss, The Overlords, who has taken a risk in coming to see Ben in person. The Second Mass. manage to ambush them and take the Overlord captive, while Karen escapes. From there things just spiral well out of hand.

The Alien version of the "Shit" face.

Karen comes back to get her boss and lays siege to the Second Mass. with a series of assaults that grows progressively more hostile, violent and deadly. Meanwhile Ben is feeling guilty for bringing down the alien hand upon his family and friends, and Tom is doing his best to deny the obvious. Ben is dangerous, and it will only get worse.

The episode starts off in a rush of running and gunfire, and the pace never lets up. It continues to grow in tension, action and complexity as a new alien being is introduced that creates an even greater issue for everyone as time ticks on.

Everyone brings their A game per usual and no one seems underused or the damsel in distress. They all have use and manage to hold their own when the chips are down. That is probably the best thing about this show. Everyone pulls their own weight. Their aren't any characters sitting by the wayside just waiting to die. They are all well rounded characters. Which is great considering the epic scale and plot and story being displayed throughout the series. If the characters weren't right the whole show will fall flat on it's face.

Now two things I want to bring up that may be potential spoilers that really stood out to me in this episode. One, we found that The Overlords are not invincible and they are scared, they have several human traits and are here on Earth for something that has not yet been revealed but I expect is something beyond the needs of human slavery.

The second thing I want to point out is a scene, one of the final scenes of the episode, that involves Ben and Tom. A very heartwarming scene that really displays this shows ability to excel dramatically. It hits home as the show is centered around this family, a normal family with bothers who butt heads, constantly except their are aliens involved.

Where he going?

Overall the show is only getting better, and I constantly look forward to the following week in hopes to find out more instead of waiting to see if the show gets better much like how I do with True Blood, another show I review.  It is because of this that I give the show a straight 5 out of 5.

So there you have, short and sweet. What do you think? You looking forward to see what happens next for Ben, Tom and the rest of the Second Mass.? Let's hear what you have to think. Comment below and thanks for reading. 

TRUE BLOOD: IN THE BEGINNING REVIEW

By Sean Smyth

Lies, Deceit, and Drunken Vamps! 

I didn't start watching True Blood till maybe Season 4, but I managed to check out Seasons 1-3 in just two weeks. It was a good time. Sitting in class waiting to take the train home and watch a few more episodes, before I had doing the same thing the next day. Those were the days. 

Now, watching the show is like a chore. Straining to understand what is going on, who hates who, who wants what? It's just getting to be a little out of the control. The past Season's arcs came together and all the stories pretty much interwove for the most part, but this Season people are just bouncing all over the place and their is so little time to get invested in something before another thing comes along. It's like, they've run out of things to do on the show for certain characters so they just give them crappy side stories because True Blood doesn't like to kill of it's main characters.

I swear if you take one individual character's story, lets say... Sookie for right now, her entire arc of scenes and story could be done in maybe two or three episodes. Instead she gets an entire season to wallow around and just cry about being different. 

I mean, each character (especially Sookie) have faced a life threatening moment in the show at least once, but they've all overcome those moments because someone else saves their ass, or instead the baddie trying to kill them has a change of heart or just doesn't feel like doing it at the moment, even if that character's story has run its course Season's ago. 

Well, In the Beginning has plenty of those moments and is made up mostly of those crappy side stories that you just don't care about and it feels a lot like a supernatural melodramatic Soap Opera. But even Soap Operas kill off their characters now and again. 

Some of those moments include; Andy visiting the old Sheriff Dearborne to ask if he sucks at being a cop, Arlene watching her Wedding Video with Holly while at work (they wouldn't be getting a tip from me with that kind of service), and Terry and Patrick gallivanting in a field and being mocked by the Fire Demon.... I don't know about you, but shouldn't these scenes be used more efficiently to produce greater understanding of what is going on in this already confusing show? 

Oh yeah, and this scene was pretty useless too. 

Besides Bill and Eric's excellent adventure with The Authority, or at least what's left of the Authority since the Guardian was betrayed by Salome (like I said, but the way they went about how she did it was anything but smooth. She basically just says, yeah I followed you when you were burying Russell, saved him and now I want to praise Lilith.), the rest of the episode is just there.

That's another thing this show has become known for doing. Over explaining. It feels as though we only learn one or two new plot points each episode because we are forced to sit through things that we learned in episode one because, and this is just my guess, the writers of the show think we are stupid. Hey Alan Ball take a page out of Justified or Breaking Bad and stop telling us what's happening. Just show us. I mean that's screenwriting 101. I learned that my first day in school. Lazy... 

But I digress, as usual...

Bill and Eric discover the plot to overthrow the Authority is centuries in the making,  Nora and Salome are a couple Vampire Bible thumpers and Russell is just being Russell. Ripping off heads and making a mess. 

This thing on? Is anyone listening to me? 

You see this episode is supposed to mark a change. A reversal if you will for the remainder of the season. Though I felt like things were just getting good with the Authority. Like we should have had the rest of the season with them being the big bad. Instead Russell comes in stakes the Guardian and things just fall apart. Russell apparently finds religion and doesn't want to hurt his nemeses he vowed to destroy and everyone in the council gets drunk of old Vamp blood and wanders around what looks to be New Orleans. 

Man does that leave a bad taste in my mouth. It is just boring. Even the climatic scene feels as though it falls short of being interesting, and has one of the worst special effects I've ever scene on True Blood (It literally made me laugh out loud). Hopefully the much talked about Human/Vamp War that keeps being discussed comes about and we can get out of this whole Soap Opera vibe and hit the more Epic tone as the show should be. At least Eric sees things are getting a little weird...

Besides Bill and Eric staggering around with the Authority and what I mentioned as pointless scenes before, we have the following:

Sookie learns she can be Fairy no more, Jason hates Vamps again, Jessica is feeding up on humans, Hoyt joins up with the Supe Murders, Tara makes a good stripper but her mom hates her so Tara looks at Pam as a new mother figure, Sam argues with Luna and smells stuff while looking for the people who shot him, and Lafayette goes to see Jesus' uncle who is not to pleased with him.

Overall the episode kind of falls flat on it's face. After having so much promise from it's previous episodes, and so much build up, things just bounce off the ground instead of landing. I don't know, maybe I'm not the target audience anymore. Maybe that audience has grown to be middle aged housewives or something... But this episode did nothing for me and thus only gets a 2.5 out of 5. 

Do you agree with that? Is True Blood falling apart or is it the best it's ever been? You tell me in the comments below. And as always, Thanks For Reading.  

FALLING SKIES: HOMECOMING REVIEW

By Sean Smyth

Karen... We Hardly Knew Thee. 

Homecoming is a great stride forward in the series filled with already fantastic episodes only this one is alien free.

There is zero aliens in this episode. Zero, zilch, none. But it was probably one of the strongest episodes thus far. Why? Tons of stuff happened that reveal some big twists to come and because they reintroduce a de-harnessed Karen back into the fold. Hal's old flame is back in a big way and totally untrustworthily looking from the get go, but we'll get to that in a second.

Tom and Anne start things off this time around two weeks after the events of last weeks episode. Second Mass. has really made this new hospital their home and really falling back into a stint of normalcy which was nice to see.  The newfound couple have a nice intimate moment discussing what life used to be like before everything went to shit and really making a connection. It was truly a sweet moment that actually made me smirk. So kudos to to Noah Wyle and Moon Bloodgood. They are really pulling off the couple vibe well. 

That can't be good.

From there we go to a daily scheduled meeting hosted by Weaver, who has a fit as a result of a bite from a harness creatures a few episodes back. Turns out the infection has spread through his whole body and is killing him. Weaver passes out leaving Tom in control for the first time, only he doesn't really seem up to the task of heading up the Second Mass.  He is far from informed on the duties especially when he learns that Weaver has been using the gas from the cars to fuel the generators at the hospital. From there the shit just keeps rolling down the hill as more and more continues to pile up on top of Tom's already large plate.

The biggest piece coming from an old friend. Karen, who Hal finds laying naked and de-harnnessed in a pile of dead kids covered in leaves returns to camp being carried by Hal.  Tom orders a quarantine  for her to be questioned, while Ben advises not to trust her and that he will stay on watch. 

Soon a divide between Hal and Ben spawns on how to treat Karen with Maggie (suspicious but willing to give her the benefit of the doubt), while  Anne and Tom argue on how to care for Weaver's infection. Both are interesting pieces of story. You really feel Ben's opposition towards Karen while Hal desperately wants to believe every word Karen says.  The trick is, you honestly can't tell if you can believe her or not as Jessey Schram plays the scenes she is in (she is the bulk of the episode) perfectly. 

I prefer freak over tool any day.

Meanwhile Tom and Anne fight over moving Weaver to Charlotte or treating him there at the hospital. The argument really gets heated and rocks their relationship casting out the honeymoon phase for sure. Tom pulls rank and Anne pulls the I'm not a solider card. It was great seeing them on opposite sides of the fence for a change seeing as how they've always been one and the same since the beginning. As usual Tom folds to reason, thank god, and gives Anne twelve hours to come up with a treatment. 

All the while Pope makes a dramatic return with urgent news that is problematic for Second Mass. Turns out not more than two days ago Karen was looking for Ben with her Overlords, or "Fish Faces" as Pope calls them, to help find the Skitter Rebellion. So that doesn't really help Karen much. 

The episode ends on a cliffhanger of a note, as usual, making you wonder what will happen in the week to follow, and just how everything will be affected.

Overall the story was very personal, which most of the series is. That is why I like it. Having these characters fighting for a bigger cause and yet still dealing with family and trust and betrayal, really makes the show one of the better shows on TV. The lack of special effects helped contribute to the plot and characters growth instead of constant shooting and running, so seeing actual scenes, especially scenes with characters who have yet to interact with one another, Ben/Karen, Karen/ Maggie, was great. 

That awkward moment when your Spikes make you kiss.

This show only has been getting better and better. The twists were easy to see but you hoped they wouldn't happen for the sake of the characters you love. That being said I enjoyed "Homecoming" so much, as well as my new found crush n Jessey Schram, that I will give this episode a 5 out of 5. 

Pros/Cons

Pros:

Alienless.

Intimant stories.

Interesting character scenes/sequences

Increased mythos

congruent, linear arch.

Cons

I can't think of any that's how good this episode was.

Oh wait, the little spat between Maggie and Hal in the woods before finding Karen was a little cheesy, pointless, and coincidental, but hey, I forgot all about that by the time they found her in the leaves. So I forgive it.

So what did you think? Was this episode a game changer that will affect the rest of the season? Lets hear your thoughts in the comments below. And as always Thanks for reading.