Continuing our Alien Invasion day takes the genre from the cinema, where it’s exhausted (Super 8, Battle LA, Transformers, Cowboys and Aliens) to TV, where it’s just getting started. Last night saw the ending of the first season of TNT’s Falling Skies, which stands out on the network by being one of only two shows that don’t center around quirky cops–wait, they cancelled Men of a Certain Age? I guess this is the only show then.
Falling Skies hopes to do for alien invasions what The Walking Dead did for zombies last year, but doesn’t really succeed. As to where The Walking Dead hopes to hide its mediocre actors and brain dead characters (the zombies and the humans share the same intelligence level) behind excessive gore, Falling Skies goes almost in the opposite direction. You feel for MOST of its characters even though they’re one dimensional but the show is relatively wholesome and probably too afraid of violence. This is family friendly programming that for some reason comes on at 10 p.m. on a Sunday time slot dominated by edgy cable shows like True Blood and Breaking Bad.
The alien invasion genre has always been lighter on gore than zombie films, so in a way it just feels like both shows are more trapped inside their genres than redefining them. Falling Skies shyness in terms of gore or scare moments can make some episodes feel inert and predictable, while most “twists” are telegraphed from a mile away. The show can’t break new ground for its genre (it has the usual power struggles among the human resistance, superior technology of the aliens, and mind control of some humans) but it does make it all go smoothly enough.
It has…something that you can’t quite put your finger on that makes you want to keep watching it, and waiting for the show to step up and surprise you. This first season’s cliffhanger of an ending is a good start.
Supporting Scene Stealer: There really isn’t one but Moon Bloodgood–as a doctor that has the hots for Noah Wyle’s widowed resistance leader–does the best job with an underwritten role. Her sympathetic eyes smolder just enough to make you hope the resistance is successful.
Nice review
I like Falling Skies. Too bad I have to wait NEXT SUMMER for another couple of episodes!