Falling Skies - "Worlds Apart"/"Shall We Gather at the River"

Season 2, Episodes 1-2

“Our history has yet to be written.”

When Falling Skies premiered last summer, it came with an almost-guarantee that a second season would follow. This allowed the show to sort of dick around with it’s plot – remember how long everybody stayed at that fucking school? – and also gave it permission to have a cliffhanger ending. While something like Tom boarding the alien ship would have been a bold, we-dare-you-to-cancel-us move from shows without a guaranteed renewal, in Falling Skies’ case…okay, it wasn’t all that much better. Just because the show could afford a cliffhanger doesn’t mean it necessarily knew where it was going. Even if the writers did (and that’s a pretty big “if”), that still leaves the season two premiere with the unenviable task of playing off that cliffhanger in a meaningful way, and hopefully reorienting the show along with it.

Were I to have been charged with helping the writers in reorienting the show for the second season, I would have stressed that the show move it’s focus away from post-invasion society of it all, and instead spend more time on all the alien ass-kicking. While there’s something to be said for have a human focus on shows such as this (and more importantly, for ignoring convoluted mythology), Falling Skies quickly proved that it was far more interested in being a straight-up action/adventure show, not a cerebral sci-fi thinker. And that’s okay. One of the best things a show can do is find its strengths and improve them, instead of trying to be something that it doesn’t have the skill or interest in being.

It’s in this regard that the second season premiere was quite the breath of fresh air, boiling down the show to what it’s good at and leaving most of the boring stuff behind. The first hour is split into two separate story lines, not unlike those of season one. The difference here is that while season one episodes tended to be split amongst “fighting aliens” and “humans back at the base” stories, “Worlds Apart” has us spend time with Tom in a flashback and everybody else as they seek to keep on surviving. The two stories are much closer in subject matter, and while this could have been repetitive, at least it’s better than the schizophrenic bipolarity of season one.

This isn’t to say that either of these stories were high art. Tom’s time alone hit a lot of same beats that you would expect a “man alone in a apocalyptic world” story might hit, and after while it sort of ran out of steam, just killing time until we see Tom reunite with the 2^nd Mass. Additionally, Tom’s recovery back at camp, especially the scene where Anne had to operate on him a second time while hiding from the Mechs, lack most of the tension that it was trying to generate, since it seemed very unlikely that Falling Skies would kill off it’s main character in it’s second season premiere. (Actually, if FS did become the kind of show willing to kill of main characters, that would certainly raise the stakes and make for a better show, but that’s an issue for another time.)

Yet even if the plot was nothing to write home about, it still helped to move the show along in a few key ways. For starters, Tom’s lonesome travels back to camp served as a tacit acknowledgement on the show’s part of the isolate and unilateral depiction it gave the audience of a post-apocalyptic world in season one. Seeing Tom dealing with persons of lesser morality like the bum trying to steal the young girls food (after killing her mother, natch) opens the world of the show up, and present us with a more morally complex view. It’s something that I hope the show will do more with in the future, as moral complexity would add an extra wrinkle to the shows proceedings that would spice things up a bit.

The second thing that happened was that there was a shift in the mythological focus of the show. In the first season, the main questions focused on who the aliens were and what they wanted. The reveal of the Skitters being merely another alien race converted by the Big Silvers (well, you come up with a better name) to be soldiers and workers was fairly predictable, and seeing children act morosely and speak in monotone didn’t make for exciting television, regardless of the fact that they were alien refugees. The second season, by comparison, starts with a question that’s smaller in scope, but hold much more importance. Whether or not Tom is an alien sleeper agent doesn’t hold much importance for the overall invasion (at least, not yet), but it does affect him, his family, and the entire 2^nd Mass. Since we’ve spent enough time with these people, we presumable care about them, and that makes Tom’s possible threat much more personal and much more investing than any far-flung conspiracy could ever be. (And that includes the idea of conservations camps, something which I suspect won’t be a consistent elements this season.)

The second hour took a different tact to it’s storytelling, one that was deployed by the better episodes of season one, in that all of the various bits of storytelling occurred in one place, usually focusing on one main aspect or goal. In this case, it was the 2^nd Mass.' attempts to cross the river and continue on with their journey. While something as simple crossing a rive pales in comparison with some of the adventures of last season – and lacks some of the agency of seeing this rag-tag group go out and meet the aliens on their turf – it’s still a good idea for a singular hour. By breaking down the 2^nd Mass.’ overall fight into individual goals, it gives each hour a specified beginning and end point, and allows each to move swiftly and confidently.

What’s better is that this goal-centering of the hours allows for a lot of other things to play on in the background. While in season one this mostly meant seeing how the humans were getting along in the new post-invasion world, here it seems as if the show is now more invested in keeping it’s ongoing mysteries alive and interesting. It’s move that stops the singular, goal-oriented hours from feeling too moored from one another, while also providing B- and C-plot that don’t just feel like filler.

In this case, it’s the continued look at Tom’s potential status as a sleeper agent. What we know doesn’t change all that much (though there appears to be a connection between Tom and the Two-Face Skitter that’s more than coincidental), but the episode does good work of expanding its meaning a little more. To the show’s credit, it embraces the idea of Tom being a sleeper agent quickly (perhaps a bit too quickly for believability’s sake), and had Tom get on board with the idea right away. There’ll be no feet dragging here, and I appreciate that, especially when there are only ten episodes this season.

Tom’s status as a possible sleeper allows him to align ideologically with two characters. Like Pope, he’s aware of the danger he poses to everybody else, and while he’s not ready to off himself just yet, he does question to what extent he should participate in the 2^nd Mass.’ military movement. It also provides something with which he can bond himself with Ben, seeing as they are both afraid of any possible turning of their person. However, Ben is much farther gone than Tom is at this point, given the increased coverage of scabs around his harness spikes, and the fact that he can hear the Skitters’ communications, which combined with his unbridled hate seem like prime set for a blow-down the road. These two hours provided some great stakes in the regards, something which will hopefully be a propelling forced this season.

After a predictable scene of the med-bus getting stuck on the bridge, and another death fake for Tom (seriously, they expect us to buy those back-to-back like that?) it’s time to roll on to another episode, and another adventure. But as long as the show can keep the focus on the action, as well as the alien conspiracy involving Tom and Ben, this looks to be a better season than the last.

Other Thoughts:

Apparently Anne and Lourdes’ answer for every injury is to pour rubbing alcohol on it. That’s some fancy doctorin’ right there.

We were introduced to idea of Beamers tonight, another form of alien technology/vehicular transport. (At least I think these are new, I can’t remember any from last season.) I’d say I was excited about this new element, but they didn’t really seem to add anything to the action sequences here, besides being something else for the 2^nd Mass. to shoot at.

Speaking of which, does it seem like the humans were able to take down the Skitters and Mechs much more swiftly and easily this time around? I realize that’s explained away by the new mounted gun they have, but it definitely lowers the stakes of the skirmishes they have with the aliens. I hope this means there’s a larger consistent threat coming into take its narrative place.

The idea of Tom being a sleeper agent also provides a scene where he has a parasite removed from his fucking eye, which was the sort of visceral entertainment that I think the show can afford and should take advantage every one in a while.

Among the network notes for this season, one of them must have been “increase the romance”, because these two episodes were shipping Tom & Anne and Hal & Maggie hard.

Subtle touch that I like: Tom burning the money his find for fuel. It’s a beautiful three-second visual representation of the type of world that he lives in now.

If you remember Ricky and Scott at all from the first season, they got offed by the most lethal of killers, contract negotiations.