Lower Decks

In the second episode of the V revival, we see two distinct camps open in regards to the Visitors.  On one hand is obviously the anti-Visitor crowd led by Erica and Jack, who live in fear that their friends and colleagues could be Visitor sleeper agents.  Meanwhile, the rest of the world continues to fall in love with the aliens.  Some (Chad) are attracted to their power, while others (Tyler) are attracted to just about everything about them.  For a series that’s moving right along, we’re already getting a pretty good idea of the rules and the stakes of the show.

I want to start off with a simple question – does every hero on TV need to be named Jack?  Father Jack is another in the line of heroic people named Jack, added to Jack Shephard and Jack Bauer.  And I can’t help but smile at the idea of Elizabeth Mitchell forming up another alliance with another man named Jack.

So one of the themes of this episode is paranoia, especially since so many characters are looking over their backs.  Jack and Erica are obviously at the top of the list, as they deal with the horrifying truth that Visitors are all over the place on Earth.  As Erica says, there’s simply no one that they can trust, and it’s something she’s a lot more ready to handle than Jack.

I like that Jack, despite his fear, tries to do the right thing with the photographs he was given in the Pilot.  It’s something that I believe a priest would struggle with, and I think he’d be just naive enough to think that the government is infallible.  I’m surprised that he’s not suspicious of the other priest in the church, who just seems way too accepting of the Visitors’ arrival.

Erica, however, is able to handle it a bit better.  She’s not doing a fantastic job, but you also have to understand her fears.  Working as an FBI agent, she’s trained to trust every member of her unit with her life.  Now, all of that has been thrown out the window, and she has to look at all of her colleagues with suspicious eyes.

Erica doesn’t know it yet, but she also needs to be suspicious of her son, Tyler, who is growing more and more enamored with the Visitors.  He hides his “Peace Ambassador” uniform from his mother, and he starts spending more of his time spreading the Visitors’ message of peace.

I find it odd that he’s able to completely turn on his mother so quickly.  I realize they’re trying to set up the cliched story of a son rebelling against his mother, but their relationship doesn’t seem that strained because she trusts him at his word.  But apparently there’s enough angst there, and I have a feeling she’s going to push him towards Lisa and the Visitors when she finds out how he’s been spending his time.

Also suspicious is Ryan, the Visitor who is working against his own people.  He seeks out Angelo for help with the wound he received during the Visitors’ attack on the resistance, but he finds that he can’t even trust other “traitors” when Angelo knocks him out.  He also learns that, if someone wanted to get to him, they would be able to get to him through Valerie.

Ryan’s story is pretty interesting because he’s obviously a sleeper agent (like Dale) who decided that it isn’t right to destroy the humans.  I’d like to know what his original mission was, and all that he’s done to try and usurp what the Visitors are doing on Earth.  You have to think that Anna and her Visitors are going to want to contact all their sleeper agents, and that should be a pretty nice conversation to watch.

Elsewhere, Chad decides to combat Anna’s media tricks with a lively point/counterpoint on whether or not the Visitors can be trusted.  Obviously, it upsets Anna, but he shows that the move worked for them…helping influence public opinion on the Visitors.

It’s a bold move for the journalist – one that I wouldn’t really be apt to try.  He obviously suspects that there’s more to the Visitors than simply peace and love, but he decides to try and strong-arm them with a potentially dangerous segment on his news show.  The Visitors have shown no fear in launching an attack on Earth, and they obviously have all their ducks in a row when it comes to attacks (as shown by their interception of Erica’s 911 call).  Chad’s lucky that they didn’t snatch and grab him, putting him on his own torture bed.

He was able to get some favor with them, although I don’t think he impressed them as much as he thinks he did.  I look forward to seeing what he tries to pull with the favor he believes he’s earned.

As far as the progress goes, it’s hard to believe that there have only been two episodes.  There’s already been a lot, mostly due to the fast-moving Pilot, and we already have a good feel for the characters and their motivations.

One thing that’s bothering me is Anna’s transmissions that always end in “We are of peace.  Always.”  I really can’t believe more people wouldn’t think that’s a bit suspicious, and I think it needs to stop.  When someone keeps saying that they’re peaceful, people tend to start thinking that it doesn’t mean anything.  Hopefully someone (maybe Chad) gets her to stop.

One thing I really liked was the development dealing with Tyler.  When a bunch of protesters start verbally abusing Tyler’s friend Brandon (who also became a peace ambassador), he actually punches one of them to defend his friend (and, presumably, to impress Lisa).  Lisa is horrified by it, and it seems like Tyler will get in trouble for the act.

And I thought that was pretty interesting.  We obviously know that the Visitors aren’t really peaceful, but Tyler’s act would go against everything that they’re supposed to be preaching.  It’d be a nice public display of their message if they threw Tyler out, and it would do a lot to prove that the Visitors are actually backing up what they’re saying.

It does make me wonder if there are Visitors who don’t know the treacherous plan that their leaders have for Earth.  Is there a chance that Lisa is, in fact, peaceful and was actually disturbed by Tyler’s behavior?  Hopefully we will see that not all the Visitors on the Mothership are evil, and perhaps even Lisa will join the resistance at some point.

All in all, I’m enjoying the show, and I look forward to seeing what they have coming up.  From what I’ve read, there are only going to be four episodes before an extended break (until March) so we’re already half-way to the end of this sneak peak of the show.  I’m sure there will be some kind of big development before the break – hopefully it will be enough to keep the show alive until it returns.