Falling Skies

[Arthur_Parker]

Falling Skies - 5 minute sneak peek

Falling Skies tells the story of the aftermath of an alien invasion that not only neutralizes the world's power grid and technology, but also destroys the combined militaries of all the world's countries in a short amount of time. It is alluded that over 90% of the human population is killed within a few days. The story picks up six months after the invasion, and follows a group of survivors who must band together in order to fight back. The group, known as the Second Massachusetts (an allusion to a Boston militia in the American Revolutionary War), is led by Boston University history professor Tom Mason who, while in search of his son Ben, must put his extensive knowledge of military history into practice as one of the leaders of the resistance movement.

Anyone else watch this?  The pilot double episode had some problems, it repeated the history professor background too much, the female characters all seem too attractive and the human baddies seemed unbelievably dim.  But it has potential with the post apocalyptic, alien/zombie invasion plot.

Oh there's a webcomic preview too http://www.tnt.tv/series/fallingskies/webcomic/

[SurfD]

As long as it doesn't go all Battlefield Earth on us, it might be worth a watch.

[HaemishM]

I finished watching the two-parter intro episode last night. I liked it. The only real hitch I see is that I like the human villain characters (Pope and Maggie) more than any of the other sympathetic characters. But it didn't suck.

[Mrbloodworth]

Streaming somewhere?

[Draegan]

It wasn't bad at all.  The scene with the kid and the dog was a bit...

Other than that, it could be cool.  The bad guy leader seems to trend towards a future leader type where he turns from a way of a gang leader to a redeemable character.

[Zetleft]

Thought it was pretty boring for an invasion show.  Hated ALL the character (cept for the villian) and would rather the aliens win for once.  Prob won't watch again.

[Draegan]

I thought all the characters were pretty cool except for the older son and the kid with a rifle.

[luckton]

Good to see that Steve Jobs' look-a-like can still get work.

Hopefully the sci-fi part of this show ramps up somewhat quick.  I understand not wanting to go all-out on the pilot episode so maybe you'll attract a general audience, but if all this is going to be is "Which devastated town are we gonna see this week?", I think we're done with syndicated sci-fi on cable television, and Fringe S4 can't get here quick enough.

[Threash]

When the only difference between "civilian" and "military" seems to be the willingness to pick up a gun the civilian bitching is going to get old extremely fast.  If a history professor, a little kid and a cheerleader type can fight then so can you whiny bitches.

[Mrbloodworth]

The Librarian in a Si-fi show.

It was OK, seemed to try to be in the vein of the walking dead, but came off more of a family time show. Still, I enjoyed science fiction being on air. Ill let it have a few more episodes.

[Ard]

Those people were far too happy for an Earth that had the majority of it's population wiped out. 

Also the skateboard product placement was beyond painful.

[Margalis]

Turned it on, saw a little kid complaining about a birthday party, turned it off.

[Tannhauser]

Well, I rushed a crap in order to keep watching so I think it held my interest.  If it stays more family than sci-fi I might bail though.  It comes on a bit late too (dvr broke).  Noah Wylie does a good job and I like the Pope character like too.  He's the Sawyer of Wylie's Jack.  I don't know, it could go south but I'm interested for now.

[Threash]

It's not bad but it would be a million times better without that damn kid.

[Slyfeind]

Well, I rushed a crap in order to keep watching so I think it held my interest.

That is an awesome metric!

[Surlyboi]

I like it so far. I don't think it'll last, but I like it.

[Threash]

They really need to send some of the unkillable main characters and disposeable black men to rescue the hot scout or this show is gonna get a lot less interesting.

[HaemishM]

Watched this past week's episode last night. I must say, I'm becoming mellow with Noah Wylie, Action Geek. I dug the whole "Yeah, I beat this fucker myself. What about it?" vibe. Pope is still my favorite character. The kids, though... yeah, the kids are getting really fucking annoying.

[luckton]

Pope seems to be the only one trying to make this thing believable, but then I guess that's just how his character rolls.

We need to get through this 'save the kids' plot quick and move onto some decent matter.  If they made harnessed kids so expendable by being harnessed in the first place, what's the point of spending resources to save them?

[Numtini]

It's Battlestar Galactica, except there's no fancy schmancy spaceships, they gotta walk! Uphill! Both ways! And it's not the good Galactica so we're stuck with Boxy and his Daggit.

[luckton]

It's Battlestar Galactica, except there's no fancy schmancy spaceships, they gotta walk! Uphill! Both ways! And it's not the good Galactica so we're stuck with Boxy and his Daggit.

Agreed, except the main cast is lacking in numbers and talent.  If they expanded it a bit, maybe show us some stuff happening around the world...would give it some depth or something.

[luckton]

Last night showed the typical inevitability we been expecting...

- Pope escaped
- Pope indirectly screwed over Steve Jobs' stand-in and crew
- Crazy dad of harnessed kid goes ape-shit
- Aliens are (still) assholes.
- Douche doctor is (still) a douche

[Arthur_Parker]

This would have worked much better if they went the predator II route and the aliens deliberately kept people alive to allow them the chance to earn respect as warriors or some shit.  It's pretty stupid but they seem to stuck in a plot line that ultimately leads to the aliens retreating due to a virus (War of the Worlds) or, as SurfD said, monkeys learning to fly spaceships (Battlefield Earth).  This thought has rather put me off watching and I haven't viewed the latest episode yet.

Kids are ok in these things as long as they don't make it to being considered as part of the cast.  Once they are always there, I suffer from the Wesley Crusher death wish.

Edit typo

[DLRiley]

I like the show better if it could juggle more than 2 plotlines, or better yet write better dialogue. As it stands, its a ok show when I'm not watching shit else. I really don't see how the aliens beat all of us, the mechs can be blown up by c4, and skitters can be hurt by small arm fire, and run around naked at that. There ships seem to go boom if hit directly by a rocket. I mean shit, the fing taliban would wreck there shit night and day.

[K9]

I think that is a general issue with the 'alien apocalypse' trope; finding a compelling explanation for how the aliens can wipe out all the armies of the world, but fail to take out a few stragglers, seems to have been elusive. I do not think I have ever seen a show or film which resolves this in a particularly satisfying way.

[Threash]

They used giant EMPs or some shit, shut down all our shit. Seems like we still should've been able to take them though. Almost done with this, too much retarded family drama. Unless religious chick goes all The Mist on us this is just one predictable cliche after another.  If they are setting this up for a "god did it" BSG ending I rather not stick around.

[DLRiley]

Sane openly christian character has to go bugged eyed anti science cult leader to make this show interesting? lolz. I say world of the worlds was believable, apparently space faring race comes down to earth wrecks our shit but forgets the antibiotics. But lets be honest, if we were capable of space flight, traveled to a breathable world, and that world just happened to have "equivalents" of food and water, we would not think twice about running around in shorts and jeans before we catch alien herpies.

The drama is well....errr i wouldn't even call it drama. The little kids a brat whose sole purpose is to show that our warrior poet isn't 100% infallible. Our older son is tolerable because he isn't busy saying "fuck you dad for not being there FUCK YOU!!!" in fact as far as family drama is concerned, if it was just the dad and the older son we would have a decent show. Its the little kid that derp derps the show into oblivion. I think some soccer mom finds him adorable or something.

[Threash]

It's what happens when you attach Spielberg to something, there has to be a god damn little kid.

[Numtini]

I think that is a general issue with the 'alien apocalypse' trope; finding a compelling explanation for how the aliens can wipe out all the armies of the world, but fail to take out a few stragglers, seems to have been elusive. I do not think I have ever seen a show or film which resolves this in a particularly satisfying way.

It's not quite the same genre, but I thought WW-Z had a fairly good treatment of the entire issue of how you could suffer complete collapse of the military and society while still allowing people to fight back.

[DLRiley]

I think that is a general issue with the 'alien apocalypse' trope; finding a compelling explanation for how the aliens can wipe out all the armies of the world, but fail to take out a few stragglers, seems to have been elusive. I do not think I have ever seen a show or film which resolves this in a particularly satisfying way.

It's not quite the same genre, but I thought WW-Z had a fairly good treatment of the entire issue of how you could suffer complete collapse of the military and society while still allowing people to fight back.

WW-Z solution was elegant, the "plague" happened in the WORST POSSIBLE COUNTRY for it to happen, China, who in their to zeal censor the existence of the plague basically driving the families of plague victims underground sending hundreds if not thousands of biobombs to every country on the planet.

[Arthur_Parker]

There's the original V plot line as well, aliens have a resistance movement within them (also features in the Space Battleship Yamato movie) but in V they went one step further and had a half breed alien/human Messiah born.  I hate both of those.

I tried watching Dr Who and it's not for me but one episode had the aliens taking control of humans of one blood type, was an interesting idea, one blood type resistant to an alien created virus would work for me for a human survivor resistance plot.

[Tannhauser]

I think they are going to make Noah Wylie's character the next G. Washington.  Lots of patriotic themes in the background.

Pretty enjoyable show overall.

[Mrbloodworth]

Shows dam preachy. They spend way to much time on that crap.

Really enjoyed how the army guy is all "Your optimism is getting annoying" yet he lets faith girl slide.

NVM aliens shatter the myth, but surely she is either just crazy at this point, or just broken.

[HaemishM]

Why would the mere presence of aliens shatter the myth of religion and faith? It should certainly ALTER it, but it doesn't totally invalidate centuries of religious thought or faith in a higher being.

[Threash]

I love how the aliens have technology advanced enough to travel across the galaxy and easily defeat us but fight hand to hand.