V, 1.7 - "John May"
WRITER: Gregg Hurwitz[SPOILERS] The good news is there's more happening and a keener sense of urgency, but the bad news is V's making a hash of its more interesting ideas. "John May", an episode that existed to explain the eponymous figurehead of the Fifth Column rebellion, gave us some incredibly weak background information on John May via stupid and tedious flashbacks, and that's frankly unforgiveable...
DIRECTOR: Jonathan Frakes
GUEST CAST: Michael Trucco, Mark Hildreth, Jessica Parker Kennedy, Nicholas Lea, Charles Mesure, David Richmond-Peck & Christopher Shyer
Now that Georgie (David Richmond-Peck) has been captured by the V's and is being tortured for information, using nasty "scourers" (nanobots that crawl through your body; face to genitals), the rebellion decide the only way to rescue their friend is to contact Joshua (Mark Hildreth) aboard the mothership and have him assist. But to contact the Fifth Column without being detected, Ryan (Morris Chestnut) suggests they travel to the home of the first V to ever rebel against Anna's (Morena Baccarin) regime, John May (Michael Trucco), whose teenage stepson James still owns an alien communicator.Meanwhile, Tyler (Logan Huffman) is still staying with his father Joe (Nicholas Lea) out in the country, and his dad's a little perturbed that his girlfriend Lisa's (Laura Vandervoort) decided to join them. Later, Lisa overhears Joe on the phone to Erica (Elizabeth Mitchell), where during the conversation it becomes clear Joe's not Tyler's biological father, so she decides to tell Tyler to put his relationship with his father under strain. Clearly it's Lisa's intention to sever Tyler's bonds to his human family and join the V's, but the reason remains vague.
There were some poor flashbacks to 10 years ago, too -- all badly timed, confusing, and disappointing. They showed us that Ryan was once just as callous as the other V's, back when he was charged with capturing the rebellious John May, a V who had grown to appreciate pleasures of the human flesh without Anna's brainwashing "Bliss". Strangely, when we first saw Ryan trying to capture May in a field outside his home, May easily avoided capture by simply running away, and the next flashback jumped forward in time by a year to show Ryan simply turning up at May's same house pretending to be an old friend. There was no sense that May has been on the run for a year, and I'm not sure why it was so hard for Ryan to trace him to where he lived! Maybe I just missed something, but the flashbacks didn't do a very effective job.
The biggest problem was seeing that the legendary John May appears to have been just one dissenting voice, with no plan to preach his word or mount coup, who had faked a suicide note for his human family and had been murdered by Ryan (off-screen, annoyingly.) I was expecting John May to be V's version of John Connor from the Terminator saga (the usual Jesus analogue in sci-fi), but despite the solid casting of Trucco from Battlestar Galactica, there was very little here to get you excited by his character or interested in how he inspired the Fifth Column. Maybe there's more that's not being revealed yet, but by far the biggest irritation of "John May" was discovering the titular hero was a solo renegade who was dealt with years ago. The "John May Lives" slogan of the Fifth Column is just a factually-incorrect taunt to Anna now, but a part of me can't believe V would cast Michael Trucco and only use him for some tepid flashbacks, so maybe Ryan only thinks he killed May and he'll return soon?
In the V mothership, Anna's pregnancy is tarnishing her beauty, making her look tired and blemished (I was half-expecting a projectile vomit), although she appears able to control her outward appearance through sheer will power. Is that a trick all the V's can do? While keen to get the names of the other rebels from Georgie, by torturing him with the memories of the V who murdered his family, Anna's also trying to push the V's new Live Aboard program -- where selected humans can come to stay amongst V's in their ships. Here, journo Chad (Scott Wolf) realized that everyone passing the interview stage are seemingly unremarkable people who come from extraordinary families, and finally shows some pluck by blackmailing Anna over his findings. He'll keep quiet about whatever nefarious plan Anna has for these "broken toys", but it's quid pro quo. I like to think Chad's maneuvering himself into a position of power and confidence with the V's, so he can leak bigger secrets to Father Jack (Joel Gretsch) and the rebellion, but we'll have to see.Finally, pregnant Val (Lourdes Benedicto) discovered Ryan's secret safe in the back of their closet, and after gaining access discovered paraphernalia that makes it look like he's faking his identity. She must be particularly confused about why he has a sonograph of a baby with a tail! I'm quite surprised this storyline is moving as fast as it is, but that's a good thing. It will probably be more interesting if Val learns the truth about Ryan and her baby earlier than expected, and best to surprise audiences by refusing a slow-burn.
Overall, when you stop to think about it, I was at least happy such a lot was happening in this episode. It certainly wasn't boring or annoyingly slow, and there were a few good seeds planted for the future, but I still find that V's doing a messy job. The John May back-story was a particular disappointment that soured a promising storyline in my mind (although I hope we're just not seeing the bigger picture yet), and Tyler's storyline still isn't working for me. Everything else boiled down to a few decent scenes and some information dumps done in the lamest way possible (saying not showing).
Asides
- This episode was directed by Jonathan Frakes (Riker in Star Trek The Next Generation), who also directed a few Trek films, Thunderbirds and Clockstoppers. He did a very choppy job here and the final montage was particularly bad, but maybe the editor was more culpable.
- My pet peeve has been V's greenscreen work, but it actually wasn't too bad here. I'm not sure why. The camera work didn't draw too much attention to its falseness, perhaps.
- So if the first rebel came about 10 years ago, just what have the Fifth Column being doing for a decade, and why has it taken the V's so long to announce their existence to mankind?
- I was pleased to see this episode didn't gloss over the fact everyone in the world saw the phrase "JOHN MAY LIVES" beamed down from every V mothership, and Anna's excuse wasn't too bad (a system glitch, broadcasting part of their language learning program.) It may have been better to broadcast "THE ALIENS ARE EVIL - DON'T TRUST THEM" though, eh?
- Last week, it dawned on me that Scott Wolf is a dead ringer for Michael J. Fox (even his name reminds me of Fox's character Scott Howard in Teen Wolf, geddit?) This week, Joe's essentially a Michael Keaten/Christian Bale hybrid, right?
- I quite like the threat that certain characters might be V's in disguise, ready to sprout green claws and attack.
- The episode ended with Anna spawning a gigantic birthing pool with thousands of eggs. Well, they couldn’t let Morena Baccarin get fat and snappy as a pregnant women for very long, could they. Are we to assume that all female V's give birth this way, so Val's hybrid baby is even more unusual? Or is this particular to Anna, as a "queen"? Will the eggs become "alien tadpoles", growing into "alien frogs" now?
