Earth: Final Conflict - 1st time watch thread

[The Habs Fan]

Redemption

Beckett goes into hiding as her CVI breaks down, allowing her to think freely for the first time in years. As the Companions order her to be killed, Liam desperately goes in search of her, hoping to finally get a chance to know his mother.

Earlier in this thread I was warned by The Wormhole about a clip show coming up. So with dread I started each episode wondering if this was going to be the aforementioned clip show. Well, now I have finally reached it...

And I kind of liked it... for a clip show.

How could you hate a clip show centered around the character of Beckett? The more screen time she gets the better, even if it's clips I have already seen.

And now she's dead

I didn't really like the fake trial happening inside her head as trials have been a common clip show plot in many other shows. I did like finding out why Sandoval is acting the way he is despite his CVI. (It's because the part of the CVI that makes the user serve the Taelons has broken down).

RATING: 2/5

 

[Sakrysta]

This is the episode that banished my last hope in EFC. I watched a few more episodes, but when they killed Beckett off, I was pretty much done.

 

[hyzmarca]

I didn't really like the fake trial happening inside her head as trials have been a common clip show plot in many other shows. I did like finding out why Sandoval is acting the way he is despite his CVI. (It's because the part of the CVI that makes the user serve the Taelons has broken down).

RATING: 2/5

And he still thinks that Boone killed his wife.

 

[The Wormhole]

Clip shows are often failures, very rarely is one worth watching. Redemption is standard fare for a slip show. Yeah, it does offer some decent character work for Beckett, and despite she gets killed, it's pretty much one you can skip without missing out on much.

 

[The Habs Fan]

I didn't really like the fake trial happening inside her head as trials have been a common clip show plot in many other shows. I did like finding out why Sandoval is acting the way he is despite his CVI. (It's because the part of the CVI that makes the user serve the Taelons has broken down).

RATING: 2/5

And he still thinks that Boone killed his wife.

Holy cow yeah, I forgot that.

 

[swaaye]

Hey guys I'm watching the show for the first time too. I'm into season 3 now and yea this is one turbulent show that feels like there were too many brains working on it. Identity crisis. The actors keep it entertaining for me though.

BTW there are some blooper reels on YouTube. The actor who plays Sandoval is clearly insane. Scifi productions always seem to have extreme craziness behind the scenes. Gotta love it.

 

[swaaye]

Hey what happened to the party?

Watching S3 Time Bomb right now. Seems like one of the better episodes.

I like seeing various Andromeda actors show up on the series. I cant remember if that went the other way too.

 

[The Wormhole]

Without going into too many spoilers, I'll agree with you, Time Bomb is one of the best episodes of the series.

 

[swaaye]

It felt like it was written by somebody who isn't writing most of the episodes. lol. The episode right after that, with the out of the blue human harvest fields is a nice example of the series' issues, maybe the most annoying of which is how they've totally warped Da'an at this point.

 

[swaaye]

Oh look Lexa Doig, Andromeda herself, has made an appearance in "Abduction".

Season 3 has some decent episodes in the latter half. It's interesting to see that ambiguously evil and maniacally ambitious Sandoval has Taelon insta-freeze kryptonite.

 

[The Habs Fan]

Isabel

After Maiya begins to experience a form of seizure, Augur discovers that only one 'Maiya' can exist in her universe and eventually the seizures will kill either Maiya or her dimensional double, Isabel. The only way to make them stop is for Isabel and Maiya to merge. But the task becomes more difficult when Sandoval raids the Flat Planet, taking Maiya captive.

I enjoyed this episode, but this is another example of liking the subplot more than the main plot.

The main plot is what is summarized in the brief paragraph above. Maiya and Isabel are going out of phase because there shouldn't be two of them in one universe so Augur figures out they have to merge. Obviously the science doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but we haven't encountered a parallel universe yet in real life, so who knows what would happen? Isabel is even more hot than Maiya because of the glasses, but Isabel is the one who ends up dying during the merge leaving Maiya still alive with a part of Isabel inside of her. (Speaking of hot, how about Lisa Howard's leather miniskirt this episode). Anyway, we finally get confirmation that Lili is Maiya/Isabel's sister and they shared a couple of good scenes together. Also interesting was Sandoval sharing memories with his counterpart in the other dimension, thus remembering his counterpart's time with Maiya. And because they faked Maiya's death, he may now blame Liam for Maiya's death, similar to Sandoval thinking Boone killed his first wife.

The subplot dealt with Jonathan Doors running for President. Although I don't understand how the leader of the Liberation, a terrorist group, can get immunity in order to run for president, it was still an interesting plot development. An awesome scene was Doors' meeting with Zo'or. There was a moment when Zo'or was laying out his plan to support Doors that I was sure Doors was going to accept. Instead, he stayed true to his beliefs and shot Zo'or down in a pretty epic scene. And then at the end of the episode he's on a talk show laying out the Taelons' bribe to him and has somehow turned it into a popularity boost. I'm interested to see where this plot goes in future episodes.

RATING: 4/5

 

[swaaye]

That was one of the better episodes. I agree with your comments. I'd love to say more but no spoiling. S3 does some more reinventing but has good stuff too.

 

[The Habs Fan]

Between Heaven and Hell

When Dr. Belman's daughter Joyce injects herself with Jaridian genetics, she evolves into a unique alien life form...something beyond the Taelons. Discovering Liam's identity, she comes up with a plan to destroy all life in the universe so she and Liam can repopulate it with a perfect species.

It turns out that I should have watched this episode before "Isabel" since this episode obviously takes place before. Not a big deal, but now some things make a bit more sense.

For example, I didn't remember when Joshua Doors leaked that Jonathan Doors would be running for President, as stated in Isabel. I just assumed it was in an earlier episode this season and I forgot, but nope it's in this one. Also nice to see some continuation of Lili and Joshua's relationship which I also completely forgot about until seeing it again.

The main plot dealt with more Taelon experimentation and it was a pretty interesting story. It was a nice surprise seeing Majel Barrett again. Also, was that a Jaridian I saw in those flashes when the doctors were removing the DNA? I guess I'll find out soon.

RATING: 3.5/5

 

[The Wormhole]

Ah, you've reached the Presidential election. Once you look past the shall we say unusual situation of the world's most wanted criminal getting a pardon so that he can run for President, this turns out to be a very compelling story arc.

 

[Broccoli]

Ah, you've reached the Presidential election. Once you look past the shall we say unusual situation of the world's most wanted criminal getting a pardon so that he can run for President, this turns out to be a very compelling story arc.

I have to agree. That was pretty top notch.

Spoiler: For the OP to remain super spoiler free.

The payoff was such a left-turn out of nowhere (yet making complete sense), it was spectacular, I felt.

 

[swaaye]

This show has a way of making its various bizarre left turns make total sense in most cases, if not right away. Sometimes I think they've just lost their minds but then a few episodes later they expand on the event and it ends up making sense and coming together. From what I gather though, that ends at Season 5 lol.

BTW I love watching these actors. I don't have complaints with any of them. The Taelons are interesting aliens for a change and they are well played. I think they were best in Season 1 because they were most alien at that point and we saw the language and culture exploration. Apparently the language was developed by a linguist. The alien-ness seemed to get toned down a bit after S1, unfortunately.

 

[The Habs Fan]

Ah, you've reached the Presidential election. Once you look past the shall we say unusual situation of the world's most wanted criminal getting a pardon so that he can run for President, this turns out to be a very compelling story arc.

Yeah, I found that kind of unbelievable when watching "Isabel". "Oh... you're running for President? Here's immunity for you." Why doesn't every terrorist run for President?

 

[The Habs Fan]

Gauntlet

When a Jaridian prisoner escapes from the Mothership, he takes Lili as a hostage and forces her to pilot him home. However, when they encounter an ancient alien repository left behind by the Kimera to teach the developing races. Liam follows the trail and soon discovers that the repository might just hold the key to his very existence.

This episode felt like a Stargate episode (which is a good thing since I like Stargate). We have an Indiana Jones-like trek through challenges to a repository of knowledge. Of course, in the end no one receives the knowledge and the repository is destroyed, but that's par for the course with this kind of episode.

So it turns out it was a Jaridian that was briefly seen on the mothership in the previous episode. Now he escapes and he takes Lili hostage. It was interesting finally learning about the Jaridians. They are not nearly as evil as the Taelons are portraying them, but obviously the Taelons have an agenda. I also liked the ending when Liam let the Jaridian go back, even though he'd be giving the Jaridians inter-dimensional technology. I guess the Jaridian army will be reaching Earth shortly.

I also liked the subplot dealing with Da'an and Zo'or. Because Zo'or allowed the Jaridian to escape, Da'an chooses this time to challenge Zo'or's leadership. And the Synod rejects him.

This episode even features a classic Kirk-like logical argument with a computer. This is my favourite episode of season 2 so far.

RATING: 4.5/5

 

[Broccoli]

Ah, you've reached the Presidential election. Once you look past the shall we say unusual situation of the world's most wanted criminal getting a pardon so that he can run for President, this turns out to be a very compelling story arc.

Yeah, I found that kind of unbelievable when watching "Isabel". "Oh... you're running for President? Here's immunity for you." Why doesn't every terrorist run for President?

While my memory might be hazy, outside of saying bad things about the Taelons, did the Resistance really do anything that illegal or "terrorist-like" (I mean in terms of what the world at large knows; not what the viewer knows)? I can't recall of anything big enough that would cause people to be aghast with him running for president.

Maybe stealing the shuttle to Mars...but was that ever officially connected to the Resistance or just blamed on one pissed off astronaut?

 

[The Wormhole]

Ah, Gauntlet. An interesting change of pace for the show, being essentially a space opera, and the first hint of the interstellar community that exists in the EFC universe. Unfortunately, details about the interstellar community are vague and sparse, but when they do address this it's an interesting insight all the same.

While my memory might be hazy, outside of saying bad things about the Taelons, did the Resistance really do anything that illegal or "terrorist-like" (I mean in terms of what the world at large knows; not what the viewer knows)? I can't recall of anything big enough that would cause people to be aghast with him running for president.

Maybe stealing the shuttle to Mars...but was that ever officially connected to the Resistance or just blamed on one pissed off astronaut?

My memories are actually rather vague of season 1, but I do remember Jonathan Doors was supposed to be at the top of the most wanted list.