I Felt the Earth Move Under My Feet, Journey to Xilbalba Review.

Once again Beth rides to the review rescue (alliteration is fun!) with a review of last night’s topsy turvy episode. I thought for the most part this was a decent episode. Several times the mood was ruined by sappy moments. There were some awesome Matt and Ben moments that were interspersed with sappy dialogue from Hal and Maggie.

 Onto Beth’s thoughts:

Goodbye, Charlesboring, and my, my, wasn’t it a glorious explosion!

Another solid, entertaining episode that made me glad I’ve been able to watch the last half of the season. I won’t bore you by detailing how much better the series is without She Who Shall Not Be Named (HEY! Who yelled “Too late!”?); you can pretty much copy and paste from my other reviews for that. I’ll start by saying that “Journey to Xilbalba” worked so well for the same reason that the others I’ve liked do: because it balanced action with honest character drama.

We saw some very significant shifts in relationships this week. Tom and Pope got closer to picking out china patterns. Okay, so technically Pope simply didn’t shoot Tom, but that seems to be his way of cementing a friendship. “So, I had the opportunity to put one in your brain today and didn’t. Wanna grab a beer sometime?” Even Tom seemed amazed that Pope didn’t do away with him. Pope’s explanation—that he was hoping Tom had some kind of connection to Karen—made sense on the surface, but did Pope really reason that in the split-second he could have gotten rid of Tom for good? Pope being the complex and not entirely trustworthy critter that he is, we don’t know what he’s really thinking, but it seemed to me that the change in their relationship that started when they were on their own a few weeks ago is slowly evolving. I believe Pope would still kill Tom if he had to, but they’ve come a long way since Pope ranted and raved about wanting to kill Tom when he came back at the beginning of last season.

How cool was Matt? On a scale of one to ten I give him a solid fifty. My favorite scenes in the series have always been between Ben and Matt and I’d like to write an entire article about just this short scene. Not only did Matt save Hal and Maggie, but he proved that he’s far smarter and more emotionally mature than any of the adults. He’s faced and accepted that this is a losing battle and they’re all going to die. Realistically, we know that the Mason sons are safe for the long term if not permanently, but from Matt’s perspective his talk with Ben made all the sense in the world. For his part, Ben never tried to talk down to his little brother with BS platitudes and reassurances like he would have in the first two seasons. He’s come to accept Matt as an equal deserving of the truth.

Evil Lourdes. Yes, please. After three seasons of doing absolutely nothing to forward the story she’s finally become interesting. Evil looks good on her, like she finally strutted into the party wearing a little black dress after three seasons of sweatpants. Evil is the new black. For the first time, I actually want to know where she’s going. She’s infected, she killed the president, blew up a whole city, and is clearly Karen’s mouthpiece, so what do they do with her now? It doesn’t seem likely that any of the de-buggers survived the explosions, the group is back on the road, so do they keep her tied up and just hope she doesn’t escape and do them more dirt? Doesn’t seem smart and frankly these people cannot afford any more screw-ups. The smart thing to do is kill her, but I doubt that anyone has the stones for that. If they do debug her and she survives the finale, I just hope we finally see Lourdes change as a character like she started to do after Jamil died. I can’t imagine her continuing to practice medicine; after all, who would want Dr. Cootie McEyeworm operating on them?

Okay, I admit it: I was wrong about Marina being evil. At least, I think I was wrong. It seems like Lourdes should have been more of a surprise and the writers tipped their hands early. I think we may be in for another surprise in the finale. Keep me guessing, writers!

For the first time, I actually bought the relationship between Maggie and Hal as something more than fanfic service. Although I’ve always liked both characters individually, I’ve always cringed when they appeared together because it was nothing more than “Oh, I am sooooo dark and complicated” (no you’re not, Mags, get over yourself) and “Dayyyum you’re hot and I want you” (as well you should, Hal, now get over yourself). I was actually hoping Maggie would die this season so that Hal could grow, but it looks like that’s not necessary. The scenes with them together this time were devoid of the fanfiction and totally made up of two mature adults dealing with a serious situation in a reasonable manner. Contrast that with last season where they were actually making out during every alien attack and you see real growth. I especially loved that Maggie called Hal out on leaving her behind. That never sat well with me because Maggie has always been a more capable soldier than Hal and able to take care of herself from a much earlier age. For his part, Hal realized that he has no business making decisions for her no matter what his good intentions.

Is it too much to hope for that Mary Sue Denny was buried upside down in the rubble and we’ll never see her again? It can happen. Remember that one chick who was pregnant in the first season? Neither do I. See?

So next week is the season finale. According to official episode synopsis the Mason family is reunited with those who were lost. While we can hope it’s Elvis and Bigfoot, I’m sure they’re talking about Dr. Chewtoy and the spawn. While this seems like horrible, poke-my-eyes-out-with-a-fork news and the worst possible thing for the series, I still have a glimmer of hope. This official synopsis has been available for weeks. Why would they release that extreme spoiler, knowing the majority of us would read it and the surprise would be ruined? Unless…are they going to give me an early Christmas gift and really get rid of the albatross around the neck of the show? Probably not, but these last few episodes have been so wonderful without Dr. Chewtoy that I guess I’m just hoping to be able to watch next season. Besides, I’m afraid my eyes might commit suicide if I had to endure the “I thought you were dead! <sob sob> Never leave me again!” that I’m sure is coming.

The blurb in this week’s “Entertainment Weekly” tells us that the Volm reveal their true intentions of putting humanity in relocation camps in Brazil. The Volm apparently failed to Google “humans and forced relocation” before invading and don’t realize that the concept of “relocation camps” make us arch our backs and hiss. The group will hit the road by the end of the episode, leaving politics and

Do we finally get a horrible, painful death for Karen next episode? I’m torn on this. While it would be really satisfying to watch a hand-to-hand fight to the death with Ben, she’s also a great villain and part of me wants her to stick around. She’s a constant, creepy reminder that even the good guys can be used for the aliens’ purposes at any time.

I really enjoyed the last Anne-free episode. Let’s see how it goes next week.

~ by The Falling Skies Blog on July 29, 2013.