They are back!
Falling Skies – Season 2 Premiere – World’s Apart; Shall We Gather At the River – The new season of Falling Skies is here, and after watching an unnecessarily long 2-hour long premiere I have come to a couple of conclusions–I could have made better use of my time leveling my newbie vampire in Skyrim; or I could have used the “one-on-one-off” approach, and took each episode in stride by allowing for a break in between. I can understand that fans of the show would ignore the problems with the show’s script. I had such high hopes for this season in that the writing collaboration would improve–it was on the precipice of something awesome–and it failed to live up to that intention and that is what made this premiere indeed frustrating. I must give credit to the absolutely fantastic production aspect of the show. The CG is breathtaking. The aliens are amazing. Now if we can just get by the constant mediocrity of back and forth dialogue and we would have had a winning start to a second season.
There is definitely a different look about this season; it seems that the show took everyone from occupying abandoned schools and warehouses to throwing them out in the open where they are not only exposed to the elements, but has increasingly made them vulnerable to what ever wanted to come at them. The rationale for this may be they are trying to locate to a safer location–a sturdier stronghold? If it was mentioned during the two hours I have to apologize–it may have been during a moment of many moments of needlessly long character stories. This is one of the problems with the series–there are two separate collaboratives (story and characterization) going on here and it seems there are problems with meeting in the middle.
Would it be saying too much about what happened to Tom (Noah Wyle)? Understanding that we were stuck in a series of flashbacks–or dreams–where Tom was trying to find the 2nd Mass which proved difficult for him do–and for viewers to watch. What more, he spent most of the episodes nearly unconscious. Perhaps resting up for what’s to come further along in the series?
Good ole fashion sibling rivalry.
Ben Mason (Connor Jessup) is still with the Mass and still has the ‘spikes’ from the harness he wore in the first season. Something is different about Ben this go round–he is more assertive and is practically super human! If the show is careful they can potentially develop a stellar character profile. Ben still has “connections” to the Skitters who kidnapped him–he can still tune into their frequencies–they can either make him a hero–or a mole for the alien parents who abducted him. Can he be trusted? Lot’s of potential here. As for Tom’s other son, Hal (Drew Roy), he notices that Ben is not the same and even he questions just how trustworthy his own brother is. Maybe this is a conflict worth tuning in to.
Pope (Colin Cunningham) is practically the only reason for watching that show. He is a rebel. He likes to stir up trouble–he is the show’s enduring personality. Quite possibly the only one–aside from Wyle’s star power–who can keep the show a float. Especially if you can stand to watch the acting of the younger cast members, but I am sure that they will progress as the season moves along. Also, I will not speculate into why this or that happened in last night’ episodes. It is certain that it all had to come out with what happened to Tom when he was aboard the alien ship. Oh and what dafuq was that centipede alien thingy?
Also I will not further speculate as to why something happened or did not. It’s still too early to comment on. However, it’s worth tuning in to also see how a generous budget result in some absolutely spectacular results. It is certain that production graduated to some serious badassity.
Overall, Falling Skies is difficult beast to truly narrow down. If the series can nail down the writing aspect of the show, we just might see some longevity here. At the pace it’s going now–I wondering what more we have to look forward to. To which I’m afraid, may be more of the same.
To stay on the positive, you can always look forward to watching 2nd Watch with Wil Wheaton. See, I knew you’d like that.
Source: TNT
TNT’s 