TV Review: TERRA NOVA 1.12 Season Finale, 'Ocupation' & 'Resistance'
The season finale was a rehash of Avatar, though admittedly with less battlemechs and Stephen Lang on a different side.
rating: 2.5
WARNING: Significant plot spoilers follow! If you havent see the episode, dont read this! Stop me when this sounds familiar: theres a strange world full of natural resources that has an existing population of sentient beings. An Evil Corporation has decided they want to pillage that planet for everything it has, so they go in, guns blazing, with a mercenary force theyve hired to basically take over. Starring Stephen Lang. Yes, boys and girls, we have, for the season finale of Terra Nova (and possibly series finale as it hasnt been renewed), a rehash of Avatar, though admittedly with less battlemechs and Stephen Lang on a different side. We begin with a shot of 2149 (a shot which includes the deserts of Chicago, cause that totally makes sense, and domes with smokestacks inside, cause that also totally makes sense, dont say it doesnt!), where we catch up with Lucas (Ashley Zuckerman), practically twirling his non-existent moustache while talking with a corporate stooge all about going back to the past and resolving his daddy issues. Said dad, Commander Taylor (Stephen Lang), hasnt been lollygagging about. He knows trouble is coming, and likely to come along with the 11th pilgrimage, which is just about to happen. He has his people surround the portal with weapons and gets ready for trouble, while Jim (Jason OMara), gets ready for Joshs (Landon Liboiron), girlfriend to come through. She does, then a suicide bomber does, and by the time the dust settles (three days later), the colony has been taken over, the girlfriend is dead (thus clearing the deck for a Josh/Skye romance arc), Taylor is on the run, and we see that the bad guys have a flag thats basically Nazi Germanys flag. Subtlety, thy name is Terra Nova. From there we go to people dealing with the occupation, which is mostly overseen by the corporate stooge with Lucas helping from time to time. We also learn explicitly that the bad guy army are mercenaries, so theres no chance of confusing them with marines. You know, just like how the mercenaries in Avatar were mercs and not to be confused with marines. Anyhow, we learn that the unnamed corporation (Weyland-Yutani?), is very interested in something in whats called The Badlands, and sends Mira (Christine Adams), to look for it. This pays off later toward the very end of the episode. Eventually theres much wailing and gnashing of teeth, as well as a considerable amount of explosions as our heroes fight an evil corporation to keep their new homeland and lose contact with the future. Meantime theres much head nodding on this end as I try hard, so very hard, not to fall asleep. There are some good things in this episode, but they are very carefully hidden. There was a lovely moment with Taylor and Zoe that worked really well, and I did like seeing Josh mature just a little bit. Also, smuggling a dinosaur back to the future was really inspired and the item that was found in the Badlands wasinteresting , to say the least. As for the bad? Oh, so much. First off, for people who are from/live in a police state, none of these people are especially good with security. Why didnt anyone notice the suicide bomber on the Chicago side? Why wasnt Jims house bugged? Why wasnt he guarded while at the hospital? Also, why would the corporation blow up all the foliage? Why not export it to a world where wood is probably more valuable than gold? Why not send back seeds, and replant forests, thus generating a: more trees to cut down in the future, and b: some excellent PR? Why was Skye left alone with Lucas? Why was Lucas so stupid as to believe she actually wanted him? Why, oh, why, did anyone think setting up a faux incest storyline between the two was a good idea? Why did Taylor give in to Lucas hug, when anyone who has seen a movie knows exactly what was going to happen next? And speaking of, why is Lucas now a horror movie villain? Really, this episode encapsulated everything about the series, both good and bad, with the good stuff being little, unimpressive and way too late to make any real difference. It showed a lot of potential but suffered from poor execution. The villains were extremely one-dimensional (especially Lucas, who isnt nearly as interesting as the writers think he is), the heroes werent quite at the same total idiot level theyve been in previous episodes, but they were still pretty stupid, and really the entire thing left me with a vague feeling of meh, followed by I have The Old Republic, and Im watching this instead of leveling my Jedi Sentinel? I will say that the final cliffhanger revelation of what was in the Badlands was indeed interesting, and if the show gets a second season, Id love to see them deal with that. Id also love to see their level of tech start to drop off as they have to cope without any supplies from the future. Id love to see a level of desperation start to set in. But given that Brannon I produced Star Trek: Voyager Braga is behind the show, Im not holding my breath.