Episode Report Card LuluBates: A+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Welcome to the War
By LuluBates | Season 1 | Episode 5 | Aired on 03.30.2010
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.After a hiatus as long as this, thank your lucky stars that there are a heck of a lot of "previously ons," because I for one have the attention span of a circus flea and there was, like, an entire season of Kell on Earth occupying the "intense plot" part of my brain. So anyway, the priest got stabbed by a V security guard and was helpfully rushed to the V emergency room. Meanwhile the same security guard invades Agent Erica's home and tries to shiv her, too. But being a trained federal agent, she ices him in her living room with nothing more than some kitchen utensils and a Crate & Barrel picture frame. She also knows that her teenage idiot son Tyler is onboard the V ship. She goes to find him, but the Vs only give her a hologram to argue with and are keeping Tyler in some sort of stasis on board. But, hey, silver lining! She doesn't have to live with Tyler. Ryan assures her that the death of the V security guard will be unnoticed, because he was just trying to clean up his own mess before Anna and her love of skinning things caught wind of his big fuck-up. You know, the one where he let Ryan, Father Jack and Agent Erica into the warehouse where they blew up the R6 and flu vaccine.
Chad Decker is reporting on the warehouse that Father Jack, Ryan and Agent Erica exploded last week. The news is unsettling for Anna and the Vs, but Anna promises to make an army and crush the resistance. Meanwhile, Father Jack's gaping hole of a stab wound gets fixed up by the V doctors, but then he gets a dose of the R6 flu vaccine. Speaking of R6, Anna wants to use Chad Decker to encourage people to use the V healing centers and get their free shot of R6. But Chad's not feeling the V love, despite his private lunch with Anna. It must be all her veiled threats giving him indigestion. Chad crumbles under the pressure and airs his report on the Visitors' healing centers. He is also going to get his Future Self cured of that nasty brain aneurysm. Anna is pleased.
Over at the FBI, Agent Erica is not thrilled to be working with Anna's Number 2 and his fancy CSI technology that would totally tick off Gil Grissom on the warehouse explosion. Not only because he is holding her son hostage, but because she was the one who blew up the damn warehouse and doesn't want to get outed in front of her colleagues. Luckily the Vs are determined to pin the crime on someone else: A guy named Hobbes who is a gun for hire, and not at all a philosopher. Erica and Ryan want to get to him first to see if he will help with their revolution. Ryan and Erica can be rather convincing, and Hobbes knows they mean bizness. Meanwhile, Tyler is still getting scanned by his V girlfriend. She and her bad mommy Anna are looking for something that will allow Tyler to loosen the familial bonds between him and Erica. It's called college, ladies, look it up. Eventually, Tyler comes back down to earth and then home and recites the lines that Anna fed him and then admits that he joined the Peace Ambassadors. Erica hugs her idiotic son tightly.
Father Jack and Georgie join Erica in trying to convince Hobbes to join their fight, but it is Ryan's Big Reveal with a revolving reptilian eyeball that convinces Hobbes to pick up arms and fight the Vs.
In other V news, Ryan knocked up his bride-to-be, and the pregnancy is advancing completely abnormally. She's only six weeks along but starving and can feel the baby move and has a desire to eat dead rodents. All you Twilight fans can guess how this ends, right? Ryan finds a friendly doctor who is stunned by the news that aliens can procreate with humans. The doctor reports that the R6 is basically a means of tagging humans for tracking purposes. Onboard the ship we see that the tagging is just the first step to a bigger scheme. Then we see Father Jack pop up in their filing system.
The Vs framed Hobbes because his mad terrorism skillz could be a threat to them. When he eludes capture, Anna decides to start an Army of One with a hulking hunk of a V man in a hot tub scene that would make any Harlequin romance proud. And would make any praying mantis proud, too.
Watch the episode here, discuss it in our forums, then refresh your V-knowledge with our guide to the A to Z of V. And check back soon for the full recap!
Get the inside scoop on V's behind-the-scenes turmoil from star Joel Gretsch (who happens to be William Shatner's son-in-law).
Lulu Bates a.k.a. Melissa Locker is glad that we now sort of have universal health care and, thus, will be less vulnerable to a V takeover. You can follow her on Twitter @woolyknickers.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Oh my god, SO much happened since the last episode but you would not remember because the last episode aired approximately six years ago in television time. Burn Notice and Kell on Earth had ENTIRE SEASONS during this show's "brief" hiatus. I've never been clear whether the hiatus was some sort of build-the-hype break a la Glee (who took a two month break after airing the pilot episode) or whether they just didn't quite get around to finishing all the other episodes and had to scamper and film some additional episodes. Anyhoo, so the aliens arrived. I think we all remember that much. But they didn't JUST arrive, because actually they were here before and left some of their more annoying society members just lying around causing problems and getting elected to office. Sometimes both at the same time. There are also these other aliens who are part of a rebel alliance, The Fifth Column, named after the 1970s soul group. Agent Erica, Father Jack, Georgie, and Ryan the Rebel V have banded together to fight the Visitor invasion, because the world does not know that the Vs are really reptiles intent on destroying the human race or something. No one seems to know exactly what the Vs are up to, but because their first move was to set up universal free health care clinics, then it is obvious their end goal is Communism and the end of the American Way. The rebel alliance's first big team outing culminated in blowing up a warehouse full of a flu vaccine the Vs were using to spread their R6 serum, even though no one really knew what R6 was. But, who cares! Blow shit up! Whee! The security guard from the warehouse wasn't too pleased by their fireworks display, though. He followed Father Jack to his church and stuck him with an icicle looking knife thingy, which just served to remind me of that time that Cristina Yang got icicled on Grey's Anatomy, which was one of the best things ever on television because it exposed icicles as TRUE EVIL. On another note, who knew "icicled" was a word? Huh. Anyway. You can read the recaps of the previous episodes here if something confuses you. Although since I wrote them I'm not sure they will actually clear anything up for you, but you know, read them anyway or the Vs will eat all the kitties.
Father Jack is being rushed to the Emergency Room, but unfortunately for him, his Senior Padre has decided to take him to the V Healing Center instead of a nice human hospital. Father Jack curses a lot for a priest. Meanwhile, Erica is frantically calling her son's friends, because Tyler has not been answering her calls and she knows he is up on that V ship and she wants him downstairs RIGHT NOW. She goes to stare at a picture of her and Tyler back when they liked each other and then in the reflection she sees the evil security guard from the warehouse coming at her with a...well, I have no idea what that thing is, but it looks sharp and ouchy and undoubtedly you don't want it swinging at you. Erica quickly taps into the Intersect and kung fus his pasty white ass with a cast iron skillet (they watch a lot of Merry Melody cartoons at Quantico) and a steak knife to the heart. But, oops! His reptilian anatomy means he's not dead yet. So she stakes him again with the picture frame he ruined and you know that shit was from Pottery Barn and was probably expensive, but Erica is willing to make sacrifices. Meanwhile, Rebel Ryan's fiancée Val is starving! She is eating for ten despite the fact that she is only six weeks pregnant. Ryan pats her on the shoulder encouragingly and reminds her that she has a heart condition and needs to take it easy with the omelets. He does not mention that she is carrying a baby who is half-human, half-crocodile and prime for a starring role in the next Wes Craven film remake. She takes a deep breath and a seat and hopes that the ob/gyn can explain it all. Ryan looks a little anxious about a human examining his lil tadpole, but any further thought is cut off when his phone rings. It's Erica calling to report that she has been attacked and that the Vs have her son. Ryan rushes to her house to examine the crime scene. The good news about the attack is that that they don't need to worry about anyone else coming after them. Ryan is sure that the security guard was trying to clean up his own mess before Anna found out about the fuck up. Everyone is so scared of Anna and her love of skinning, taxidermy, and Brazilian waxing, that they wouldn't want her to know about their errors. Erica spends about twenty minutes loading her weapon to show that she is just as scary as Anna, except, you know, blonde. Erica is going to go get her son, and no one is going to stop her. She tells Ryan to lose the body, because she is a busy working woman with no time to clean up her own mess. She is going to go get Tyler. Speaking of Tyler, he is in a holding tank on board the V ship. He seems to be watching a Pink Floyd laser light show and spinning in slow circles. Anna and her daughter Lisa are watching him. Maybe he's the Vs' version of a goldfish. Lisa shows Anna that Tyler's annoying mom keeps calling him over and over again. Anna shrugs, because Tyler can only have one family. I'm sorry, but are these people fighting over who gets TYLER? Do they not realize he is an extremely annoying teenager with very little to offer in the way of conversation or even chores? I mean I totally get that Erica doesn't want her son to become V food, but really a few hours away from him can't be all bad. Seriously, Erica: Draw yourself a bath, watch some back episodes of Lost, practice your acting, whatever! Take some you time. But, no. Erica has stormed the barricade of the Visitors' visitor center and demanded to see her son. She raises enough a stink that Anna's No. 2 comes down and takes her to Tyler. He explains that he is safe and sound and doesn't want to come down from the ship. Under the watchful eye of Anna and the other Vs, Erica knows better than to do anything but pretend to be a dutiful mother. She yells at Tyler for staying out all night and not calling. She's worried! He swears he is fine and will be home for dinner. Erica goes in for a hug, but IT'S A HOLOGRAM! No. 2 explains that Tyler didn't want to come down so they arranged for this little show. Erica is teary eyed in horror and perhaps frustration. I am pretty sure that even a mom who didn't know that the Vs were reptiles would be really REALLY unhappy about that little game, but Erica is pretty calm about it and doesn't scream, "DON'T EAT MY BABY!!!!" or anything, which under the circumstances is pretty impressive. But, she's an FBI agent, so why doesn't she report this to someone? I mean, Tyler's only 17, so he's still a minor. He can't just disappear onboard the V ship without parental permission. Erica could easily make this a BIG problem for the Visitors. But maybe she is too embarrassed about her crappy parenting skills and won't report it at all.
Oh, I totally forgot that Chad Decker existed. Sorry, Scott Wolf, but this is what happens with a twelve-year hiatus. Chad Decker is reporting on the warehouse explosion that decimated New York City's flu vaccine supplies. I think that when the first few episodes of this series originally aired, the nation was in the grip of swine flu fears and that whole flu vaccine thing resonated with viewers. They probably could have really used those fears to the show's advantage EXCEPT FOR THE YEARS LONG HIATUS WHICH HAS RENDERED IT MOOT. I'm just saying. On the mothership, Anna is watching the report and she is risking wrinkles by frowning. Her No. 2 reports that the footage of the attack was erased right after The Fifth Column sent their message of destruction. Anna tells him to find the, or rather, A perpetrator and deliver him to the FBI. She doesn't really care who he chooses so long as they look like the good guys when they hand him over. No. 2 is worried that the resistance is growing and Anna agrees that they need to crush it before it grows any stronger. No. 2 points out that they w