FALLING SKIES: 1.06 Sanctuary Part 1 – REVIEW

• Tweet
• Share
• Email

• Tweet
• Share
• Email

Seriable’s Robert L. Reviews Falling Skies 1.06 – “Sanctuary Part 1″

It’s finally happened: I’ve lost my patience for the mistakes this show has made time and again. This doesn’t happen easily for me. I’ve stayed with shows such as V until the very end, despite the numerous problems they exhibit (many of which are caused by the desire to be producing more “stand alone” episodes than serialized ones).

But as is a problem with the genre when the writers are too afraid to turn it into a full-blown serial, you kind of feel like nothing consequential has happened from week to week.

The beginning “hook” was incredibly weak. We have a man who wants out of crazy-ville, and decides to take all the antibiotics at gunpoint to trade. After all, he says, “it’s the wild west out there!” It’s almost as if the writers are using their one-liners from the original studio story proposal sometimes.  We never get the feel of the wild west, they just call it such and expect us to go along with it.

But the bigger problem with the hook is that we need more dramatic tension. That’s one thing this show is absolutely abominable at. All we need is to have a body, maybe someone who has an infected wound, and their life depends on that medicine. It could have improved this beginning scene tenfold.

And before I get too far into this review, I want to reiterate my dislike of the casting choice of our lead, Noah Wyle. It’s as if he doesn’t know how to make any other face than a frown.

Now onto the good stuff …

We’re introduced to a new character straight off. A new character whom we never quite trust, but have no explicit reason to distrust. When our heroes ask him why he’s alone and what has happened he tells them about … well, it doesn’t really matter, it’s just exposition, right?

This was where I completely lost it. I was willing to overlook the boring talkbacks (as opposed to flashbacks) in the first five episodes, but this is no longer forgivable. We have a pattern of “tell, don’t show” storytelling and it is incredibly frustrating. One could justify it with talks of budget, but a good writer would have ways around a small budget, yet still making an interesting scene. Battlestar Galactica did it all the time.

This episode simply seems quite boring in the first 45 minutes. I didn’t like Tom‘s initial resistance to sending the kids ahead, but later on when he admits it’s probably out of selfishness, I grew a little bit more of an appreciation for his character.

A character whom I will probably never appreciate is Margaret. I find myself hoping for her death every time she appears onscreen. They keep on giving us moments where she’s supposed to be likeable (like when she gives the gun to Anne), but I’m not sure that the actress is able to pull of a “tough and likeable” character. When she references Terminator later in the episode, it got me thinking — if she acted like more of a Sarah Connor, I might finally come ’round to liking her.

I also don’t like the, “it doesn’t feel right!” foreshadowing we’re being given all episode long. When you title an episode “Part I,” a cliffhanger is implicit. We know that sending these kids off ahead is a bad idea, even though it makes the most sense with our given information. Let us feel not quite right about it instead of writing in a piece of dialogue that tells us how we’re supposed to feel. (Are you noticing a pattern in my complaints about dialogue?).

The music is one thing that’s getting better, though.

When it came time for Jimmy and Parker, things started to get more interesting. I always suspected that this show wouldn’t ever be bold enough to kill Jimmy, saving him for frightening situations to up the ante. So when the mech came and shot up the bus, I was hoping they finally managed to kill Jimmy too. Nope, only Parker.

And what about the Skitter confrontation? A Skitter killed a full-grown man in about a third of the time this one had its arm around Jimmy’s neck.

Personally, I feel like they’re always going to have inferior storytelling, because they’re sticking with “safe” decisions. The kind that looks at how an audience polls when children die in other shows. But without it there’s no suspense, no tension.

The most memorable moments in TV are created by the scary decisions. And, you know, sometimes shows have taken a big narrative risk and paid for it. But I would rather have two seasons of an excellent show, than ten seasons of a mediocre one.

The tensions around “home” also seem very contrived. Mr. Angst coining the phrase “razorbacks” was an awkward scene for all the wrong reasons. We’re supposed to feel for Ben and how isolated he must be. Instead, my wife and I started laughing, because some actor somewhere probably felt like they just had their big “breakout” moment.

This episode was at its strongest, though, when they’re exploring the extent of brotherly love, even when brothers are nothing alike. It gave us a nice emotional chord that will surely be exploited next episode, hopefully in a dramatic face-off.

I’m still bitter that they haven’t explained much about the kids, and what they remember or don’t about what they were doing. They’ve just kind of glossed over it, because they either want to keep it a mystery for whatever reason, or they don’t have an answer.

It’s probably a little of both, come to think of it.

Anne holding Tom’s hand, with the shoulder kiss was a little weird. Not because they’re not a couple … we knew the second they interacted in the first episode that they would eventually become an item, but I expected some form of character development to accompany it.

Lastly, I would like to mention that I hope next week has a cooler reveal than seeing Pope. The kid-trading deal’s a little unclear at this point, and perhaps they’ll throw us some pleasant surprises. Oh, and I missed Lourdes! Imagine that!

Final rating: 6/10 Seriable Stars:

What are your thoughts on this episode?

Follow @Seriable

Tagged as: falling skies, reviews, sanctuary part 1