Falling Skies "Drawing Straws" Review: Use the Force, Lexie!

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http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/73_tfFly1aIY_GxGCb_V_g--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTg2O3E9NzU7dz0xMzA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en-US/homerun/cbstv.cbs.com/67770336c8ed127324b09edc94876d3c (http://news.yahoo.com/falling-skies-drawing-straws-review-160800491.html)Falling Skies S04E10: "Drawing Straws" The 2nd Mass now has the Millennium Falcon and a Jedi on its side, and the Espheni are so screwed—even if the upper management of the 2nd Mass is barely functional on a good day. Mommy and Daddy spent most of "Drawing Straws" fighting about the need to actually, physically draw straws to decide who gets to be Han Solo. Meanwhile, Hal and Ben were still doing their creepy thing with Maggie and the Espheni's would-be Lady Vader turned on her Sith master and we still have two episodes to go before it's time to bid adieu to Falling Skies until next summer. All things considered, the humans are in a surprisingly good place—not a great place, since the Espheni went all Order 66 on the humans and those who remain are encouraging the survivors to do their best Obi-Wan on the nearest twin-sunned desert planet—but still, it's a better place than I expected them to be in. For those who don't speak Star Wars, I have nothing to say to you except shame, SHAME upon your children and your children's children, but the parallels between Falling Skles' current state and Skywalker family history à la A New Hope and the abominable prequels are kind of hard to ignore. Pope even joked about it, and when Lexie's Espheni sperm ----- was teaching her how to blow shit up with her mind, I was actually startled when he didn't tell her to feel the force flow through her. I'm not sure what this means for the rest of the season—or the Falling Skies story as a whole. I had freaking Han and Leia action figures on top of my wedding cake, so I think my feelings on anything that can even vaguely be construed as a Star Wars reference are pretty obvious. Whether or not the allusions are intentional is debatable, however. After all, for as mind-blowing and original and game-changing as Star Wars was, it still drew heavy influences (and in some places totally ripped off) epics that preceded it. That's how storytelling evolves over time. We couldn't have had Falling Skies without Star Wars (and Star Trek and War of the Worlds, if we want to go way old-school), and in time, there will be new shows that can trace their lineage to Falling Skies. For every idea that appeared in some earlier work, Falling Skies presents its own twist and its own bits of originality. The moon mission to shut down the Espheni power generator continued as the gang figured out how to hotwire a space ship and then bickered over who got to drive. Tom wasn't particularly thrilled about letting someone else go where 12 men have gone before, and reluctantly agreed to dropping everyone's name into the Goblet of Fire, but when Ben was chosen—right after he half-assedly tried to explain the spike thing to a jealous Hal—Tom threw the competition and named himself Chewbacca. He admitted as much to Annie, but since Pope had already removed Tom and Weaver's names from the running, arguing that people like them would be needed to rebuild society once all is said and done, methinks this mission is far from ready to blast off. Pope could barely keep his mouth shut when Tom made his initial announcement. You just know he's coming up with some kind of plan. Now for the less-awesome events of "Drawing Straws": Despite kicking ass at Hitler Youth Camp, Matt Mason is back to being a sour teenager following the betrayal of his alien-mindwiped ladyfriend. I don't think we can really fault him, and if anything, his apparent regression into bratty rebellious teen is indicative of the level of thought the writers are giving every character this season. For all of his progress toward becoming the perfect child solder, Matt Mason is still a child, and eventually those hormones are gonna kick in. He had his heart broken, which sucks even when you aren't fighting off hordes of evil aliens at the end of the world. It's too bad he doesn't have a room he could just slam the door to and sulk in for the next few episodes, though. The Espheni cell phone to hell also returned, and inexplicably had the overlords chatting it up en inglés to each other, which is still a touch better than the awkward half-subtitled/half-English mess from the last time we saw those two touch base. That Lexie was revealed to also have access to the hellophone will probably come in handy later. And after deus-ex-Cochising all over this season, Cochise was deemed unable to pilot the Millennium Falcon with Tom, resulting in the need to draw names. How convenient. Finally, this crap: CAN MAGGIE PLZ GO BACK TO BEING BADASS NOW? THANKS. In the grand scope of things, these are really minor complaints (except for Hal-Maggie-Ben; OMG STOP IT) that are largely overshadowed by the ridiculous fun of the Masons' moon mission and Darth Lexie's return to the light side. I love it, I love it. Whodathunk that god-awful alien baby storyline would have turned out to be so awesome after all? NOTES – 1776 mhz. Cute. – "You have to be 15 to pilot an enemy spaceship and you don't even have your learner's permit yet." —Tom to Matt, who probably stomped off and screamed, "It's not fair, you just don't get me!" before blasting My Chemical Romance on the alien intercom system or whatever angsty teenagers today listen to. – Lexie is so stylin' despite the apocalypse. So jealous. – Got any predictions for the end of the season? Only two episodes to go!



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