Back when V premiered last fall I wrote that ABC’s scheduling strategy of breaking the show up into small clusters of episodes broadcast months apart was ill-advised. In its first four episodes V showed a lot of promise but it seemed to stop just as its momentum was beginning to build leading me to wonder if it had done enough to draw back its audience after such a long break.
The show returned after its lengthy hiatus and the good news is that the fifth episode is the tightest, most interesting installment to date. Each character’s storyline is picked up and all were given something significant to do, moving them forward. No small feat given the number of ongoing storylines. More impressive still was that the episode even found time to introduce a brand new character, gun-for-hire Kyle Hobbes.
Although he is only in two scenes, Hobbes already seems more interesting than several of the show’s more established characters. This is a man who is not motivated by any sense of personal responsibility but rather by the money he can make. Even when it is made clear to him that he has a lot personally at stake in what happens he sticks to his demand for payment in exchange for his help. This outlook sets him apart from the other main characters and will hopefully add to the tensions within the group.
Returning to the ongoing storylines, the most pressing at the start of the episode is that of Father Jack who had been stabbed by a rogue Visitor. Those injuries are quickly healed in this episode as he is taken to a Visitor health clinic to be treated. However in doing so, the physicians inject him with a dose of the R6 drug. Later in the episode we learn what this actually is and it becomes clear that there will be problems ahead for Jack. Unfortunately Joel Gretsch doesn’t get much to do beyond lying on a stretcher and looking terrified for most of the episode.
Perhaps the most exciting story element that the previous episode had set up was Valerie’s discovery that she is pregnant with Ryan’s baby. Of course she remains oblivious to the fact that her fiancé is an alien and it quickly becomes clear that something is going very, very wrong with her pregnancy. Not only does she develop an insatiable appetite but she starts to get some very strange cravings. This culminates in a scene that is not only a delightful nod to the original mini-series but that builds anticipation for what is to come.
I also enjoyed Erica’s storyline in which she tried to persuade her son Tyler to leave the Visitor compound and return home, although I cannot seem to shake off the feeling that Tyler remains the most bland and uninteresting character in the series. I think the root of the problem is that while other characters have conflicted emotions or are in challenging situations, Tyler seems utterly straightforward which makes him harder to sympathize with. This episode does go some way towards giving us a clearer sense of the character’s background in the brief flashback scenes we see when he is aboard the Visitor mothership and hopefully future episodes will use some of these details to show us more sides of the character.
Of his scenes in this episode, the best comes towards the end when he returns home to talk to his mother about his involvement with the Visitors. What works so beautifully in this scene is that it is played on two different levels in which Tyler is attempting to have a heart-to-heart conversation with his mother whilst she chooses her words carefully, aware that the Visitors will be able to hear and see everything she says to Tyler.
Elsewhere journalist Chad Decker is still trying to come to terms with a diagnosis he received from Visitor doctors that said he would develop an aneurysm that human medicine would be unable to cure. This leads to him having to make a difficult decision whether to make another deal with Anna to secure treatment or to dismiss the Visitor reports and not take them seriously.
Chad’s decision ends up being fairly predictable given what we already know of the character but I still enjoyed the build up in which Anna attempts to manipulate him into trading a positive story about the Visitor health centers for his medical treatment.
Scenes between the two characters become battles of will in which each attempts to manipulate the other, each believing that they understand the other better than they actually do. Whereas it was clear that the Visitors had the upper hand in the original mini-series in their dealings with the journalist they brought on board as their spokesperson, here Chad holds his own and is capable of getting his own way. It makes for an interesting dynamic and the source of some significant tension.
I did feel somewhat disappointed in the episode’s closing scene however in which Anna mates with one of her male underlings. The set-up for this seems really quite interesting as she picks out her favored partner from a line-up. Like her conversation with Chad, we already know where this is headed the minute we see the expression on his face but whereas that scene contained some fun dialog and banter, the mating sequence that follows seems awkward and forced culminating in a pretty horrible effects shot that undercut any sense of horror that scene might otherwise have generated.
For the most part though the episode is certainly one of the strongest entries to date and sets things up nicely for this latest run of episodes. I am intrigued to see what happens with the pregnancy and also how the introduction of Hobbes will affect the dynamics within the rebel group.
One thing I am certain of though is that the gap between episodes of V has been far too long and I, for one, am glad to see it return.
– Aidan Brack
