'Falling Skies' on TNT HD - Page 13

They aren't there in what I have access to

...and he'll say, "what the heck?! The poison in the bread didn't work?! Must have interacted badly with the yeast..."

LOL...fair enough.

I was looking for the preview on their site but couldn't find it.

Here's a crappier quality version (preview for 1.05 for spoiler-phobes): http://youtu.be/QfjN7P1zU44

NetworkTV, my hat's off to you for the response I likely deserved. Although I generally just get tired of too much nitpicking on these shows (really ANY shows, unless they just continually get more and more ridiculous with it), I'm forced to agree with essentially everything you said in your reply to me. I, too, expect MORE from anything with Spielberg's name attached to it (one reason I was sorely disappointed Tom Cruise starred in "War of the Worlds," lol -- AND that Dakota Fanning's character seemed to be WAY over-acting in the scenes in the car on the freeway, when she kept screaming hysterically -- and I was a DF fan from the FIRST MOMENT I saw her in Spielberg's "Taken," still one of the best Sci-Fi TV Miniseries I think there's ever been, largely due to her, and her acting in it).

And I just a few days ago, on the "A" review of Entertainment Weekly's Lisa Schwarzbaum (she doesn't give MANY "A" reviews), Spielberg & Abrams' "Super 8," and YES, it really WAS "everything we EXPECT" from talent such as Spielberg, Abarams, and yet another Fanning, this time, younger sister Elle, among others.

I'm still letting that stuff "slide," but it DOES cause me to rank "Falling Skies" as a "B," rather than an "A" at this point, and I wholeheartedly agree with you that the majority of the stupid things that are annoying many of us could have/should have EASILY been changed to produce a better, more satisfying show. At least they haven't butchered any REAL history yet... I still remember EXACTLY WHERE I was sitting in a theater in July of 1996, enjoying "Independence Day," when the Judd Hirsch character ramble off a line about the Roswell crash happening "sometime in the 1950s." Whether whatever happened near Roswell, NM, was an "alien incident" or a "weather balloon," everyone who knows anything about science fiction, science fact, history and conspiracy theories knows it happened in July, 1947 (July 11, 1947, to be precise, if I'm not wrong). At any rate, the whole movie soured for me at that point. I sat there fuming for the rest of the film, so I can sort of RELATE to where you're coming from, NetworkTV (I had a similar reaction in yet ANOTHER Will Smith film, "The Wild Wild West," when at the end they had President Grant FOUNDING "the Secret Service" and making him and his partner Agents 1 and 2. My guess is a good percentage of folks who saw that film STILL believe THAT fake history. WHY put DELIBERATELY WRONG, easily verifiable FACTS in a movie or TV show???

If "Falling Skies" does ANY of that, I'm out, lol.
Jeff

Oh, I forgot to add... I didn't see the preview, either... In my case I was watching it a bit "DVR-delayed," and my with My Sunday nights being pretty full, my DVR goes right from one show to another, so it gets cut off just about at... "Next week on--" No issue for me, and I still don't consider someone posting something from a preview a spoiler, since it WAS aired and available to everyone (I didn't even bother to look at the link posted above -- I'll wait until it airs).

I at least spoilered my post... but while there are lots of things to nitpick and get mad about, I didn't want people getting riled up over something that probably didn't happen

Meanwhile...

This is far from the best show I've ever watched... BUT it is also far from the worst.

Admittedly, it gets a little pass because I don't have anything else to watch on Sunday nights during the summer except Leverage and In Plain Sight... so I'm perhaps more open to it than if I had more things worth watching.

If I were to truly express frustration... it would be that so many of these shows (I include "V" for the purposes of this discussion too) have potential, and nuggets of great ideas... and then either veer off into something or have poor execution.

While I grant you that every show can be picked apart... when there are more people spending more time picking it apart than enjoying it... it tends to say people aren't being caught up in the story enough.

As example... there were lots of things wrong about the Battlestar Galactica remake series... and you can pick it apart on reviewings... but as I watched the shows when they were new... and even my re-watching on Blu-ray when I bought the complete set... I was captivated enough by the story, that the flaws didn't leap out and take me out of the show most of the time.

Falling Skies isn't striking me as a show that I will want to buy when it comes out and watch over and over again... so it already is lower on the list by virtue of that alone.

Look, as silly as this show can be at times, you just know that Terra Nova will be 10x worse.

It does look that way, but I'll at least give it a shot.

I've liked several shows over the years that seemed awful based on the previews (The Mentalist being one I can think of off hand). I've also hated some that seemed promising. The same goes for movies.

Well, I had some time to think about the previous episode and I think I have my breakdown pretty much together. Here's the good and the bad (starting with the bad):

The Bad:

- Letting Pope go on the mission: Raise your hand if you thought that was at all a good idea? *crickets chirping* Seriously, the excuse was that he knows the layout of the place? A motorcycle shop? They aren't raiding the White House here. No inside knowledge is needed: Bikes in the showroom, parts in the back. They knew the place existed, so they certainly didn't need him to guide them. He wasn't going to be armed, so he wasn't going to be able to have their back during an assault. Oh, let's let him carry all the gas, too. But wait, there's more: as previously noted, let's leave him only half-heartedly guarded.

- Hey Dad, I ditched school!: Seriously, what kid would go to his father and admit he ditched school? It's one thing to be gullible enough to think Dad would let him go, but did he really think he would score points with history professor by saying he ditched class to do it? It's a little thing, but annoying in that they could have addressed the school issue by simply having Wyle ask him, "aren't you supposed to be in class?" instead of having the kid come chirping out the door like their going for ice cream.

- Mmmm...bread made by the flaky, crusty prisoner who just escaped...: OK, I can cut a little slack in that Pope didn't know he was actually going to be able to escape, but he obviously intended to. I'm sure he had a backup plan in case he couldn't and if he had poisoned the bread, it would likely involve escaping while everyone who ate the bread was dead.

- The aliens now have magic RADAR: The explosion Pope set off appeared to be at least a mile or two away, yet the Skitter with his band of wind up children find the guys at the shop? How did anyone know they were there? Further, in the wide shot, you could clearly see fighter aircraft leaving the big base over the city. Why not just just do a quick strafing run with one of them. You hopefully kill the humans and destroy another source of supplies. I guess I'd have an easier time with it if the bridge was right down the road and the crew had to retreat back to the shop when Pope did his thing, but the kids suddenly being there just seemed to be right out of the blue. It's not like they were double-timing it to the scene, either. Heck, it would have at least been nice for them to have spotted them nearby to establish them being there. Finally, wouldn't it be better to have a fail safe system in place where if the skitter gets killed, the leashed kids carry out their last orders - or even turn on each other? Why leave them standing there with dead batteries to be potentially scooped up and taken back by the fighters? Even if they couldn't at that moment, the aliens surely wouldn't know when the fighters might have a truck on hand to do so at any given point.

I should also say, if they're going to send the kids in, if I were the skitter controlling them and realized that the humans weren't going to fire on them and might try to escape, I'd compel them to stop firing and point their weapons at each other. Since we found out later the skitters can talk through them, have a kid order their surrender or they'll all open fire on each other.

Blowing up the bat-skitters: I have to tell you, I've seen people barely able to lob a grenade far enough to avoid blowing themselves up (and that was with a hollow practice one) - much less throw a couple of them attached to a gallon fuel container up high enough to reach the underside of a bridge overpass and having it blow up right when it gets near the aliens. Further, why more than one grenade anyway?

The Good:

- Fueling up the bikes: Despite their reasoning, I was glad to see they didn't have a magic can of gas that allowed them to fuel up both 2 Cycle motorcycles and a mid to large size cruiser that would have taken 91 octane that wasn't mixed with oil. In this case, though, I have to think the practicality of needing off road bikes saved the writers here. I have no doubt they considered having Pope zoom off with that cruiser he was sitting on.

- The doctor reaching in with the bowl of water: Some complained about that, but I blame the cage that doesn't have a proper slot to put stuff in there without doing exactly what she did. I don't blame her for that and she's not a police officer or a part of any military operations. She's a doctor who spends all day with civilians and is under orders to try to communicate with the thing. From her perspective, until the other doctor started screwing with it, the alien seemed pretty docile. Now, if she had reached in to shake hands, I'd have a problem with that.

- The kid still being under the control of the aliens: If they use that right, that gives something compelling to have to deal with should Wyle get his other son back. Will he be the same? Will he be a threat? Will Wyle himself have to maybe kill him?

- Radio free Boston: I like the whole radio wave communication thing they are developing into the story. That has the potential to work both for and against them in the future. Perhaps the radio communication might work to get them into the big ship over the city. Hey, as long as they're rehashing, they might as well do Independence Day, too.

We already know the aliens key in on heat. There was an explosion which produced a lot of heat.

We don't know that Pope intended to escape. For all we know, he decided to escape because he saw the skitter nest and wanted to make sure it was destroyed. Which, so far is all we've seen him do since escaping.

Also Pope has had alot of practice killing the Skitters in the past. Lobbing the gasloine can with grenades on it is probaly something he has already done before. So it's really no surprise. We already know he and the people he was with were becoming proficient in killing the skitters.

At least a mile away if you go straight through the woods. It was nowhere near the group at the time. The aliens should have keyed in on that, not the guys creeping around the bike shop. Instead, we have the kids there like some sort of zombie SWAT team with no sign anyone was going after Pope - no shots, no nothing after the explosion.

Let's check facts:
- He's been a prisoner and doesn't like it.
- He's been begging to get out of the cell.
- He specifically volunteers to go out on a mission and agrees to do so without a gun as a condition?

As far as blowing up the skitters, remember he has a grudge to settle with them just as much as he has with the humans that took him captive. The aliens killed his crew and the newest member of the "good guys" killed his brother.

He may not have intended to escape when he woke up that morning (hence baking the bread), but I darned sure he fully intended that when he heard about the mission. Otherwise, what was his motivation go volunterring? He's a nice guy?

I might buy in if it were a food run. He might want to be sure he gets what he needs to cook properly. But motorcycles?

Think about it: they have to get him back to the base on a motorcycle, either on the back or by riding one. Either way, he can get control of one.

"Gee whiz, Pope, why you wearing all that protective riding gear?"
"No reason..." grabs rider from behind, stomps on the rear brake and causes a high side...

His great technique is to cut off limbs to immobilize them, then put a bullet in them. If he had grenades, don't you think he would have used them to defend the large machine gun on the car he stole?

Further, you assume he's done what he did before without any background to support it, yet 1) they clearly were surprised to find the skitters like that when they usually see them alone accompanied by mechs and 2) you can't also assume he's had escape on his mind this whole time? You make one leap but not the other more obvious one? We clearly saw him take off at the first opportunity. We've never seen him blow up a skitter prior to handing him a gas can and a siphon and put him alone in a room with a guy who apparently had grenades.

Besides, it still defies physics and logic to do it the way he did. I doubt even someone fit could make that toss (and he hasn't been eating balanced meals or working out) and time it that well to have it go off right on target. Grenades have a fuse in them, not a timer.



Here's how I would have played it, assuming I have Pope along on the mission. We'll say he's one of only a couple of people that can ride, so we'll figure if he doesn't run off, we get another bike. If he runs off, we lose the cook who didn't want to be there anyway.

Anywho...

Pope parks the bike in the brush at the far end of the bridge. After waiting for the mechs to be occupied by something, he lowers the gas over the side with a rope to the skitters clinging to the underside, close to the guard rail. After tying it off, he pulls a string attached to the grenade pin and runs like Hell.

Under the bridge, we see a skitter wake up. A closeup reveals the skitter's iris contract (a nice nod to Jurassic Park) as he realizes what is dangling in front of him. The blast is reflected briefly in his eye before it consumes them all. Pope gets to the brush, starts the bike and takes off as the mechs fire at him unsuccessfully.

The explosion is seen from the distance by the rest of the crew. One of them turns to Wyle and says, "raise your hand if you didn't see that one coming"...

At that moment, the zombie kids (who we saw established as being down the road from the shop on the way there) show up, having been alerted by by Pope taking off with the motorcycle.

I thought Sunday's episode was very slow paced, lacked action, and had some silliness to some of the plot. Most of it was predictable.

Oh, I'll give one more thing to the show....

They avoided making the religious girl crazy, unlike with every Stephen King story. It was a little bit over the top with how pronounced it was (especially the whole breaking bread thing), but it's a huge pet peeve of mine that everyone in TV shows or movies has to either be a complete atheist or a crazy bible thumper. No one can be normal and have religion. She did her thing and explained herself when asked. She wasn't running about yelling "repent for your sins! This is punishment from God! Judgement day is at hand!..."

I can only assume - should her character have any further role in the show - her faith will be tested at some point down the road. Otherwise, the sermon at the end was wasted.

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/201...everage/97279/

I agree with your post, and while I agree that it was really stupid to allow Pope to take on the mission, I thought it was a no win situation they faced - he was the only one who knew where the bike shop was, and he wasn't telling unless they took him with him. No Pope, no bikes. I have already erased the episode from my dvr, so I can't go back and check, but I could swear that's how the discussion went about taking him on the trip (maybe not explicitly spelled out as such, but implied through what was said). If I'm wrong, I'm wrong. Still a stupid decision.

Nope - though I'll record the episode again to be sure if I don't spot it online first. The next airing isn't until 1AM early Sunday.

They knew about the shop. Pope claimed he knew "the layout" of the shop and the area around there, but they certainly would have managed.

Regarding the Pope and eating the bread...

They crossed that bridge already once they first decided to let him cook.

Yeah, you might wonder about the bread after he left... but in truth, he shouldn't have been allowed to cook unsupervised anyway... because that mistrust should have been there all along.

So... I'm willing to believe that they had a guard on him while he cooked... so he couldn't poison things. Though, he could have perhaps made the food taste bad or make people sick or something... but he hadn't done that before.

Trusting him unsupervised on the motorcycle run... I can't defend that... but the bread thing makes sense to me if they already were allowing him to cook full meals.

I just reviewed that section of the episode.

Sorry, but they did not know that the bike shop existed. Pope said that he knew the layout of the area, the streets, etc. It didn't come across that he knew the layout of the shop itself.

He also said that he couldn't draw, but we all know that he said that so they would take him. He could easily have provided directions.

I still can't get past how the series is based centrally out of the Boston area and none of it even remotely looks like Boston suburbs. At least they're not trying to do MA accents...

I have little doubt he did nothing to the bread.

The bread was completely and totally for the benefit of the prayer scene at the end - that whole "breaking bread" together thing. They had to use actual bread since it's important to hit everyone over the head with stuff these days. Now, if they had some wine with it and all sat on one side of the table, then I'd be more worried about their safety...

It just felt sloppy that they were so eager to eat if after he escaped. They didn't even consider the idea.

This episode was marginally better but as previously stated in several posts, the writers are really stretching any semblance of credibility.

I find that part of the show fairly amusing since I worked in the Acton area for 10 years.

At least Fringe does location shots every once in a while. Other than the big mothership over Boston, there's been absolutely 0 location shots of the Boston area so far. This is pretty sad considering it's such a historical region of the country, and it has such a colonial appearance, unique to New England.

Unfortunately it looks like Canada. I didn't even know the show was shot in Canada beforehand and was able to call it straight off just by watching.

My only problem with the doctor sticking her hands in the cage was that no one else was there to back her up in case the skidder tried something.

I imagine that scene going something like: "hey should we give it some water?....ummm you place it in there, I got your back" lol She did it cautiously like she was sort of nervous/scared--so if she was scared, why not have someone there with a gun pointed at it's head? It just seemed silly.

I look at her like one of those missionaries that goes off into the jungle somewhere to bring "civilization" to some tribe, only to disappear having been eaten by headhunters. She means well, but is not always 100% aware she might be in danger.

She seems to have more optimism than most (certainly compared to the other doctor), but has just enough reality in her to at least think about the possibility the alien might eat her.

Maybe she figured (rightly so) the others working around her don't share the same desire for researching a living specimen.

Maybe they should have eaten the bread before it had risen.

With regard to Pope leading the mission to the bike shop because he was the only who knew it's whereabouts; I realize MapQuest and Google-Maps are offline but couldn't the resistance grab a phonebook and a city map from any of 1000 gas stations in the greater Boston Metropolitan region?

And fleshing that out a bit, shouldn't the resistance have a war-room setup in the principals office of the highschool. Every time Weaver debriefs Tom it's in some random empty classroom. At minimum there needs to be a dedicated room with a couple of RandMcnally road atlas' with circles indicating potential food stores, fuel and ammo depots, vehicles, safehouse, etc. All good command centers have a war-room. And does Captain Weaver ever go out on missions? For a grizzled old vet he doesn't actually do much.

Upon further reflection I think it's time for the show to get some parallel story lines going. Tom needs to start using some of that university learnin' to employ actual tactics during their missions. How about a pincer movement against a mech or some basic flanking tactics?

I'm finding the show watchable if I conpletely shut down my brain but it could be so much better if they actually stepped back and asked themselves if what we're doing makes sense. Simple (cheap) tweaks coulfd fix a lot of this.

TNT Renews 'Falling Skies' for a Second Season


http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/201...-season/97472/

Great News!! Thanks!

Do you still have phone booths and phone books in Boston?

I was out, maybe 3-4 years ago driving and looking for a Best Buy store that I thought I knew where it was... turns out I was close but not quite there and I couldn't find it. I didn't have a GPS with me and I didn't have my iPhone yet...

I could not find a single phone booth anywhere... and of course not a phone book to be seen... I had to call and ask my father to look it up on the internet to give me a gist of the directions since I was unable to find where I was looking.

At least around where I live in NC... the phone booths and phone books have been long gone... so when the aliens attack and the GPS satellites go down... it will be hard to find places that you don't already know where they are.

Did you stop at a gas station though? Just last week I had to stop at a gas station to get a map of an unfamiliar place. And they still drop phone books at my door every few months from some reason (they usually go straight into the recycle bin). But I hear you on the phone booth. I saw one in downtown LA not too long ago and couldn't believe it...they're rare as hell.


Nah. Like I said, I'm done. I'll still visit the thread to see if things get better like they did with SGU's latter half of season 2, but I won't be watching anymore.