Recap
All of Charleston is on high alert after their victory against the nuclear power plant. Matt is running supplies to the various outposts of fighters hiding in the badlands outside the city. Shortly after arriving at Pope’s group, everyone comes under fire from unknown snipers hidden throughout the rubble. Pope runs over to Crazy Lee to make sure she is okay, and finds that she fell on to a piece of rebar and its gone clean through her skull. She cannot see and cannot move. Pope has Matt go find a hack saw so they can cut the rebar.
Word of the shots make it back to Charleston where Tom and Weaver head out to the badlands to find out who is attacking. They meet up with Denny and Ben and manage to kill one of the shooters who turns out to be a human, in military fatigues.
Meanwhile in Charleston we see Anne try to take a blood sample from Lexi only to have the baby reply “Don’t”. Next we see the baby standing up and say in a very creepy manner “Mommy”. This results in Anne knocking over the microscope and destroying the blood sample she had taken. Lourdes hears the noise and comes in to find out whats wrong. Anne explains some of the things going on with the baby, but Lourdes doesn’t seem to believe Anne.
Crazy Lee starts talking about her dog and how she doesn’t want to ever be stuck unable to function and if it comes down to it, Pope needs to do what needs to be done. Lourdes goes to Tom about what Anne’s been up to. Lourdes thinks that Anne is suffering from PPD.
Hal is packing his things when Maggie walks in. Hal reveals that the dreams he was having were not dreams and that he was in fact going into the woods to see Karen. Hal thinks he might be leaking information to Karen without knowing it. Maggie does not believe that is possible, regardless of what Hal thinks.
Tom goes to Anne to discuss what has been happening. Anne gets angry at Tom, because she feels he has no idea whats going on. Anne reveals that she doesn’t feel that the baby is human. Tom doesn’t believe Anne, and after spending time with Lexi, cannot find anything wrong with her.
Matt sits at Crazy Lees side as she sits in the infirmary. Pope gets the bad news from Lourdes that the rebar caused damage to Crazy Lees brain and that if they remove the rebar, she will bleed out. Pope knows that her time is limited.
The prisoner (sniper) won’t talk to Bressler and isn’t keen on Ben being a spiked kid and had a few choice words for Ben. Tom breaks it down for her, and thinks the issue is that these humans look at Charleston as an alien co-op and that the humans were collaborating with the aliens. She reveals that she works for the real president of the United States, Benjamin Hathaway. He is the person who sent her group to Charleston to take out the ‘alien sympathizers’.
Lourdes goes to see Anne, at Tom’s instruction, showing Anne that nobody trusts her. Weaver and his daughter talk and she doesn’t think they will survive this war, despite her fathers optimism. Pope says goodbye to Crazy Lee and for the first time, we see Pope cry. He takes her dog tags and gives them to Matt.
Maggie continues to convince Hal that he isn’t the mole. He doesn’t remember giving Karen any information and doesn’t remember killing the vice president (Manchester). Maggie cautions Hal from making a stupid move, because if he tells anyone he thinks he’s the mole, they will hang him without question.
Tom has a speech on the 2 year anniversary of the alien invasion. As everything is gathered, he talks about the tree that Jeanne setup for everyone to mark someone they lost. In the middle of his speech he puts it away. The war hasn’t stopped and they are still losing loved ones daily. Tom remembers Crazy Lee and all those everyone has lost. Tom puts a leaf for his wife, Anne for her son. Matt remembers Lee and Ben puts up a leaf for his mom.
Just as Hal is walking over to Tom to tell him he thinks he is the mole, the Espheni attack. Lexi looks up at the sky and gives us a creepy smile as the Espheni beamers begin flying over head.
Review
Tonight’s episode was all about the price we pay for winning. No matter how well things were going, there were still lives being lost. Anne continues to believe that something is wrong with Lexi no matter what Lourdes or Tom think. The ‘alienation’ of Anne is nice for a change. We get the opportunity for Anne’s character to get angry and start to do things that make her look crazy or dangerous. But I think we can all agree that the baby is creepy, right?
Tonight we also revisit a dynamic that was touched on a bit in season 1 and season 2 which is the human v human dynamic. We had humans trading kids to skitters and humans who thought they could turn a blind eye to what was going on in the world. Now we have humans who, under the orders of the original president, have been ordered to take out others they feel are working with the enemy. This was also used to continue forward something that started in season 2, and while subtle is placed well: interspecies distrust.
No matter how much the rebel skitters have done to help Charleston, people do not trust them or the ‘razorbacks’ they speak through. Ben, Denny and the other deharnessed kids are still looked at as not equal and not human. Even the human groups outside of Charleston feel as though they are not to be trusted. Ben comments about a few choice words the prisoner had for his spikes. I personally would have liked to see that scene play out on screen. Overall the subtle hints of distrust and anger towards the rebels, the razorbacks and the Volm appear to be leading to a boiling point later in the season that may not end well for everyone.
The death of Crazy Lee is a hard one. First introduced to us in season 2, Crazy Lee quickly became a fan favorite with her quick one liners and unflinching loyalty. Her death brought out the first time we have seen Pope cry and visibly upset over the loss of someone. Even when Pope’s brother was killed in season 1, he didn’t give much thought to that.
It will be interesting to see what becomes of their prisoner and just what is up with Lexi. The Espheni have begun their attack and now we may get to see just how good the Volm’s protection net is over the city.
From an alien/CGI perspective, this episode was rather light. Some may be unhappy about that, but personally after such an alien heavy season opening the purely human drama was nice and helped setup important story arcs for the season. This also means that the episode was an under budget episode. As you will recall each year there is always an episode used to help keep the overall budget in check. Almost all shows do this and especially a show like Falling Skies which has prosthetics and CGI involved. The fact that we get it done early this year, means there will be much more action as we push into the season.
Quotes
“If I wanted to go to school, I would have stayed home” Matt
“That’s the 64 million dollar question” Weaver
“So much for talkin” Weaver
“I can’t go to disney land Craze, they won’t let me in. I got into a fight with Goofy” Pope
Mole Poll
We don’t learn much about the mole in episode 3, but Hal is convinced its him and he tells Maggie about his meetings with Karen and the fact that he has an alien probe inside him. She does everything in her power to stop him from being stupid and claiming he is the mole. Based on last weeks voting, an overwhelming number of you think it’s either a 2nd mass member or someone in high authority within Charleston. Vote below and comment on why you voted the way you did.
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Photos
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