Episode Report Card LuluBates: A+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Accidents Will Happen
By LuluBates | Season 1 | Episode 10 | Aired on 05.04.2010
Erica is on the job when Ryan calls to confirm that they wiped the security footage and there is no trace of their illicit activities. Erica quickly hangs up as her potentially alien boss approaches. She asks him how his outing to gather evidence went. He explains that since the attackers seemed like pros (oh was it the blowing the shuttle out of the sky with a missile that tipped you off? Or the breaking into a secure facility and wiping a hard drive that did it?) he figured they cased the joint and traced a route before the actual event. So he went back and reviewed the tape from earlier that day. Erica uses her ability to look completely blank at all times to great advantage and asks if he has any suspects. He replies that one name "rang the cherries". Is that a saying? I have never heard that in my life. Is that supposed to a folksy aphorism indicative of a long career in law enforcement? Because it's just kind of jarring in that NO ONE SAYS IT. Anyway. He explains that the suspect isn't your typical terrorist. He opens the door to the holding cell to reveal: Father Jack. Obviously, Erica's face is blank. Erica's boss sits across from Father Jack and explains the evidence they have placing him at the scene: a tire track from the crime scene and a picture of him going through a tollbooth in a van hours earlier. Wait...what? They hauled a PRIEST into FBI HQ based on THAT? I call bullshit. You don't go bringing priests in for questioning based on such flimsy evidence. I've watched seven years of Law & Order, I know things. There would be a serious public outcry to collaring priests. The Bossman tells Jack that he has sat across from a lot of remorseless criminals, but he can read the guilt in Father Jack's eyes. He knows he wants to make a full confession. Erica is blank, but almost twitchy watching Jack struggle. Yes, Erica, that's called ACTING. Make a note of it, maybe try it sometime. Just as Jack is about to say something possibly incriminating, Erica springs to life slamming the table with her fist and demanding that he answer, because this is not a game! She then asks her boss to go fetch some crime scene photos to really show the priest the horror of his actions. The second the boss is gone Erica leans over to Jack and quickly explains that the Vs loaded the shuttle with dead bodies and they didn't kill anyone. She then yells some more to make it seems like she does not lack the cojones to threaten a priest. The boss comes back with Agent Malik and a sheaf of photos while Erica goes on hollering at the priest. She demands an explanation for the tire track. Father Jack prays a moment and then starts hollering back: It's a freaking tire track. The tire tread is not unique. His own church bought a dozen tires (yes, your tithing goes to tires) and there are probably hundreds of other vehicles with the same tires. As for why he was on the parkway, IT'S A STATE PARKWAY. He was visiting a parishioner. The boss stupidly asks for confirmation of that and Jack replies, um, duh, I'm a priest, it's confidential. Then Jack gets downright uppity and demands to know if they really dragged him away from his parish because of a common tire tread and a picture of him on a public road? He demands that they charge him or let him go. They let him go and Erica tries really hard not to giggle.
Up on the Mothership, Lisa stages a one-woman alien interpretation of Alice in Wonderland. She sees a door, opens it, and falls down a rabbit hole of horror. She walks down a tunnel lit by glowing red lights and follows as V doctors cart a human "guest" towards a lab. The guest is a woman, who is naked, but strapped to a table with metal modesty guards covering the important bits. I know this show is on primetime network television, but I have a hard time thinking the Vs care at all about human modesty. Anyway. Lisa follows the doctors down the dark tunnel and she hears the voice of the scared woman she comforted earlier recounting her "nightmare" of being led down a tunnel of red arrows by doctors and being pierced with needles. Lisa goes into the laboratory and watches as an ominous machine appears over the strapped woman. It is a Machine of a Thousand Needles, all of which are headed for every inch of the bound woman who is screaming and screaming. The contraption would make both Edgar Allen Poe and that guy from Saw really proud. As she sees the frightened woman Lisa struggles not to let her Feelings show, but the woman's fear and pain is palpable. Lisa turns away from the awful scene to study a list of all the participants in the Live Aboard Program, knowing that they are all next for The Treatment. Then she sees Tyler's face pop up. Obviously she has to take action. She beams down to the suburbs in a hurry. Tyler happily lets her into his house and thanks her for helping him come pack his Abercrombie tees for the Live Aboard Program. But Lisa's not here to help him pack. She doesn't think he should come live on the ship. In fact she doesn't think he should come within 500 yards of her. She hands him her restraining order signed by both a U.S. judge and an intergalactic court and Judge Judy, just in case. Tyler doesn't get it, but Lisa reminds him that he is pretty much a total teenage douche and she is an advanced alien lifeform. Tyler sputters, but but what about what happened on the shuttle? That was real, man. Lisa rolls her eyes and explains that she just wanted to see what it felt like, but now that she has her name up in the bathroom of the local Mickey D's, she really doesn't need him. Tyler looks crushed as Lisa leaves. Probably because it is going to be really hard to blame his mom for this.
While Lisa is saving Tyler by breaking his heart, Anna is practicing pretending to have Feelings at her press conference. She is emoting all over the place telling the Good People of Earth how much she is hurt by this tragedy. Every life is sacred, you know? They were attacked by the Fifth Column only because they were from somewhere else; just because they were different. And they weren't even in Arizona! Her full and brittle alien heart could not possibly tolerate another senseless loss of humans. Due to the threats of the Fifth Column, she is considering leaving earth entirely. The reporters at the press conference all gasp in unison, except for Chad Decker who is standing stoically in the front row. Anna looks sorrowful for the cameras and then turns to leave, pausing momentarily to smirk fleetingly at No. 2. Stupid people.
At FBI HQ, Erica's office watches the press conference en masse. As Anna makes herself look pitiful for the camera, Erica's Bossman orders Agent Malik up to the ship. He wants her to impress upon Anna that the FBI is doing everything they can to find the Fifth Column. Erica watches him suspiciously. Later, Erica has settled back at her desk and seems to be trying to trace the lost photos of the smooth bones, when someone interrupts. Kendrick (a.k.a. Bossman) wants to see Erica about her involvement with the Fifth Column, pronto. Erica gulps, but, you know, her face is blank as she heads into the war room full expecting the worst. She walks in slow motion so we know she is nervous. Erica walks into a room full of suits. Kendrick stands at attention and informs Erica that he won't let anything else harm the Visitors. She gulps. He has authority from the highest levels to form a Fifth Column taskforce. They want her to head it up. Erica almost smiles in relief. Then she glances over and sees Kyle's face as the Prime Suspect. Almost. Kendrick explains that she will be heading it up with Agent Malik. Speaking of Malik, she has finally made it up to the Mothership. She walks into Anna's office, bows, and calls Anna her queen. Um, either Malik has some weird ass manners or she's a Visitor. IF YOU PLAN ON WATCHING BATTLESTAR GALACTICA DO NOT READ THIS NEXT SENTENCE: I wonder if Rekha Sharma likes getting typecast as a traitor to humanity? But I guess she owns that particular character niche. YO