‘Falling Skies’ Prisoner of War – Recap

Posted Tuesday, June 28th, 2011 08:01 am GMT -4 by 0

Falling Skies MechEpisode 3: Prisoner of War. After last week’s much hyped premiere episode I was hoping there wouldn’t be a let down in the second outing for Falling Skies on TNT. I am happy to say the quality of this episode may have surpassed the premiere.

Tonight’s episode was all about the kids. The kids trapped in the Skitter harnesses, not just Ben Mason, but the other kids too. The 2nd Mass has new orders involving these kids. They need to rescue some of the harnessed little sweeties so Dr. Michael Harris (played by the infamous Steven Weber) can test a procedure to remove the harness safely.

This episode had a couple of great moments. On the comedic side we learned Pope is a former chef, who may or may not have been responsible for cooking for an entire prison ward. The highlights also include such comedic gems as:

“Nobody puts paprika on chicken” and “what is this Skitter ala King?”… followed by a very funny diatribe about poaching chicken. It was pretty insightful into the many layers left yet undiscovered with Pope. It is nice to see he is more than just a Skitter claw/leather wearing villainous human scumbag.

Another great moment in this episode is a heartfelt reunion between Tom and Hal Mason after Hal and Karen were left behind on a rescue mission. When Hal and Karen were left behind as an unconscious person was loaded into the escape truck, it was heartbreaking to think of Tom losing another son. Especially when Hal and Karen were cornered by a Mech. Back to the reunion, I can understand Hal’s initial hurt feelings, but then realizing his Dad came back for him alone showed Hal just how much his Dad loves him.

If anyone doubted Noah Wyle as an action hero (then you obviously didn’t watch him in the Librarian movies), this episode should put those doubts to rest. In ‘Prisoner of War’ Tom Mason survives an explosion, risks life and limb to save his son and most importantly… he takes down a Skitter all on his own! It was pretty cool watching him take Pope’s advice from last week’s premiere about taking out the legs first. I also imagine he felt a good deal of satisfaction defeating the Skitter.

The episode closed out with a heart-wrenching interaction with Dr. Harris and Tom Mason as the fate of  Tom’s wife was finally revealed. Needless to say, Harris is a bit of a creepy worm. Harris also had the focus of removing the harness from 2nd Mass’ Mike’s son. While the surgery was a success… that’s where it all went wrong.

When it comes to Dr. Michael Harris, I’m reminded of one Dr. Gaius Baltar from everyone’s favorite, ‘Battlestar Galactica’. I can’t wait to see where they take this character as it will be a nice foil to Tom Mason.

Make sure to tune in next Sunday night at 10:00 PM. From the preview it looks like we are going to have some one-on-one interaction with Tom Mason’s imprisoned Skitter.

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  • Darwinianzen

    Falling Skies is on par and could be better than the Sarah Connor Chronicles, another largely under appreciated series spiked by Fox, a couple of years ago.
    Good Post -Apocalyptic series.

    Falling Skies isn’t  Firefly, nor was it intended to  be. Firefly was a cowboy space opera: the son of Han Solo and the Hole in the Wall Gang at the Last Chance Saloon at the End of the Universe.
    The gun slinger guerilla leader with a mind and a keen sense of history is irresistible icon for sci fi geeks.
    Nice concept.

    FS is tight, cool, and high on the plausibility chart for Sci Fi.  I miss V, somewhat, but that’s because I have a crush on Elizabeth Mitchell. And I thought the Sarah Connor Chronicles, had one more good season in its story arch.

    The Skitter model, is a good choice for alien species – very alien – but their lack of fine digits – fingers for manipulating the billions of teeny screws and memory chips for building nanotech toys bothers a serious sci fi student. Plus the mech boss monsters look like every other mech heavy in FPS video games.

    Also the fact that the wretched band of survivors, own the countryside while, the Aliens are hunkered down in the cities is another big lapse in plausibility.
    We’re talking an uber-super-extra terrestrial species capable of inter stellar flight, and they can’t catch a few million frantically running human roaches?  It’s a stretch for me.

    But its brain food for the bored and gratefully accepted.

    The POW twist was cool. Capture and study the enemy. Smart gimmick.

    And that makes me think someone is going to come up with a Bug Spray, an insecticide for the invaders?
    The exoskeleton spiders must have an anatomical Achilles heel.
    Can’t wait to find out.. 

    Noah Wyle is well cast, so is the rest of the ensemble. Too bad the writers-producers killed off the Pope gang of nasties in episode 2. I would have played that secondary conflict along. A protracted struggle between the resistance and the banditti would have added more tension and increased the stakes for Noah Wyle’s band of brothers and sisters…
    No matter – Well done, TNT.

    But it ain’t Walking Dead, one of the darkest apocalypse series, ever.
    Still FS definitely a fine addition to the Sci Fi collection of seriously good series.

  • paprikachips

    this show sucks so much , i cant believ this is from the hand of steven spielberg.

    thank god only 2 episodes to go.

    lets hope that terra nova is beter