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This Friday on 'Dark Skies' ep 19: 'Strangers In the Night'

posted 11 years ago by madp
11 replies | jump to latest

AIRED: 5/24/97

Following a disturbing message from the Soviet Union's counterpart to Majestic, Bach assembles a team that includes Loengard, Juliet and Army Major Colin Powell to investigate. (A situation so disturbing, I'm just too disturbed to mention what they find out.) Back in the US, Bach enlists astronomer Carl Sagan in a special mission.

STARRING

Eric Close ... John Loengard
Megan Ward ... Kimberly Sayers (archive footage)
J.T. Walsh ... Capt. Frank Bach
Jeri Ryan ... Juliet Stewart (as Jeri Lynn Ryan)
Simon Billig ... 'Ballerina'
Wolfgang Bodison ... Major Colin Powell
Charley Lang ... Dr. Halligan
Conor O'Farrell ... Lt. Commander Phil Albano
Beata Pozniak ... Ludmila
John Saint Ryan ... Colonel Dimitri Mironov
Joe Urla ... Carl Sagan
Silas Weir Mitchell ... Convict
Kirk B.R. Woller ... Pavel Antonovich
Grant Mathis ... Pyne
Wiley M. Pickett ... Lead MP

[–] madp 11 years ago

AS I've learned on Community, this would be classified as a "bottle episode" (the characters are trapped in the same set, making it a cheap episode to produce). And it was quite underwhelming.

The whole "who is Hive and who isn't" scenario is an old story we're already too familiar about. If this had been the 5th episode, then the concept that anyone could've been implanted would be fresher and more meaningful. But at this point, it didn't add anything new.

In the final conflict, Bach was obviously right: they had to be maintained in quarantine, and the Russian guy was clearly infected, only Juliet was too stubborn to see and tried to create some drama where it didn't have any real reason to exist.

I'm not sure what to make of Colin Powell's participation. He just seemed alarmed all the time, and it's not like that event shaped his resolve into what he is today or something, so it could just have been any other unknown military.

Carl Sagan might prove to be an asset after all, but again I don't see how that interferes with what we know of him in later years, since before knowing Majestic he was postulating life in other planets, and he continued to do so until his final days, so no change there.

Our poor Grey friend was just there in a hyperbaric chamber, just chilling. Poor guy didn't seem to have much to do. If only he had an ice cream machine...

Oh, and we lost Dr. Halligan... I never cared much for him so that had little impact. they could have dedicated an episode to him so we'd know why he joined Majestic and what he expected to accomplish. RIP, doc, we barely knew you.

It seems the revamp at this point needed another revamp already. I give this one 4 Russian ballerinas.

[–] dtmuller 11 years ago

This one is just a straight action episode, not especially interesting, but it had a couple of unexpected twists. But then, it also had (1) Juliet on a mission that involved a very important person in her life, and (2) Juliet giving John a lecture about giving up on Kim. From that point, the rest of the episode was filler while we waited for the inevitable.

It was interesting that they found a new tool against the Hive, but with one episode left, we'll probably never see it put to use.

Aura-7 headquarters is in Chernobyl. Guess what they were setting us up for when the series progressed to the '80s?

Colin Powell was there just for a name-drop, like Schwartzkopf a few weeks ago, and maybe to rehabilitate him. He now seems to have a promising military career in the Army after he was dishonorably discharged from the Marines. (OK, if that made no sense, see A Few Good Men.)

Carl Sagan makes an appearance, which is to be expected. From the moment he showed up, I was waiting to see how they'd drop "billions and billions" into the conversation, and was not disappointed. (Trivia question: In the series Cosmos, how many times did Sagan utter that famous phrase? Trivia hint: It's the same as the number of times Captain Kirk said, "Beam me up, Scotty".)

One more to go, and we know we're going to be left hanging. But we knew that 19 weeks ago. At this point, I'm not sure I really care.

[–] wlcebtg 11 years ago

This Friday on 'Dark Skies' ep 19: 'Strangers In the Night'

Hit rock bottom this week worst one so far for me. I don’t know about jumping the shark I think Dark Skies might have tried to swim under it. How could the Americans get into to the cold war era Soviet Union undetected on a mission? I find this highly unlikely that we could go into the Russian MJ12 without a war breaking out. This was the first episode without Kim in it I guess her character has run its course. Carl what can I say about Carl billions and billions of people and they have to roll him in. So now he’s part of the conspiracy working to locate which planet they are coming from. I thought he was an astronomer but yet he figures out the aliens can’t tolerate an oxygen rich atmosphere good job Carl maybe if we had just one more season to plow through he could of solved all of our problems.
One more to go and were off to another show.

For those interested the Invaders a “Quinn Martin Production” season one and two are on youtube in “Color” miss those days when they had to rub it in about the show being in color while we watched it on a black and white tv.

Well my week of vacation is now over back to work on Monday must say I was beginning to miss the place.

[–] dtmuller 11 years ago

You know, I never watched The Invaders back in its original run. I don't know why not. I may check out a couple of episodes. Thanks!

"In color!" and once everyone had color sets, they switched to "Filmed before a live audience!" (as opposed to a dead audience, I suppose), and then it was "In stereo!", and then "Closed captioned!", and then "High Definition!". My response to all of them was, "Who gives a royal rip?", as I watched on my B&W, mono, no CC, SDTV. I'm glad we appear to be past that.

Forget about where the Grays come from; I'd still like to know why the Hive is invading. Unfortunately, I think the answer is "they're aliens...it's what aliens do".

At the Detroit airport, there's an oxygen bar I frequently pass and always thought the patrons were a littly kooky. But maybe that's the best way to prove you're not Hive.

[–] charmedwon666 11 years ago

Late again....lots of family and business to attend to.......

Anyway, What the hell was that? Man this thing was awful this week. The one redeeming quality about this one, and mind you I had to look super hard, was when the body fell in front of Juliet and she just sort of went hmmm. Thought that was very good to not have her flinch one bit. As for the rest of it, very predictable in every sense of the word....

Man and woman hostage hiding being alien....check
Juliet's Russian buddy infected...check

Rambus, I mean our gray makes a triumphant return sort of, oh well, at least we know where the hell he is. Why wouldn't they let Sagan Talk to him with the disk thingy. Why do they have to figure out where he comes from when they can just ask him or her or whatever. It seemed eager enough to communicate once the baddy was out of his head.

This thing was so bad even Kim didn't show up for the party nor Steele and it was their job, they got paid to be there and didn't show. and speaking of Steele, how come one shot kills everyone infected with an alien in the galaxy but Steele? WTF

ughh just brutal. Took me a while but I finally figured out our guy Powell was the dude in Men of Honor....that drove me crazy the whole episode until the end when it clicked.
All in all not very watchable a super poor mans TV version of The Thing...yuk.
I give this one 3 hyperbolic grays....just terrible

http://codenamestone.blogspot.com/

[–] madp 11 years ago

by charmedwon666 » Mon Jul 8 2013 15:08
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why wouldn't they let Sagan Talk to him with the disk thingy. Why do they have to figure out where he comes from when they can just ask him or her or whatever. It seemed eager enough to communicate once the baddy was out of his head.

Interesting idea, but not quite... I would've asked just in case, but probably the Gray would know the location of the Greys' planet, but not necessarily the Hive's planet, as much as an ex-Hive earthling knows the location of Earth but not the Hive's planet.

I give this one 3 hyperbolic grays..

Do you mean grays that use a lot of hyperbole, so they tend to exaggerate and overstate things? (har, har, har...)

[–] charmedwon666 11 years ago

I thought that bach ask sagen to figure out where the gray came from. I thought he said we are not alone now figure out where this one came from. I'm almost sure of it but I deleted the episode so fast there is no going back for me.

http://codenamestone.blogspot.com/

[–] dtmuller 11 years ago

You're right, charmed.

Bach: "Somewhere out there is the planet that thing came from. I need you to search the stars, doctor, and find that planet."

I think madp was saying that he should have asked where the Hive came from. Actually, I think he should have asked the Gray both questions.

[–] madp 11 years ago

Yes, you're right, charmed, but I think that was a slip of the writers, like they don't even care which planet they are talking about anymore. As you said, all they needed to do was ask the Gray where he came from. The good question should be about the Hive planet. Not that Majestic would have the technology to reach any planet at all. Anyway, I guess I was just trying to find sense where there's none.

[–] charmedwon666 11 years ago

Ah yes Thanks DT and MadP. I almost dl'd the program again just to check....yeah the whole sagen thing was absurd, the friggin Gray had been yappen away, just give him some ice cream and grab a note book. Yes I agree with both of you they should have definitely asked about the hive as well. Maybe the Gray they had was like a stoner or bi polar on his planet, something like that, just a general spaced out idiot or maybe an abductee that no one else on his world believed just thought he was a kook. couldn't find his own planet in the solar system type guy or girl....failed the no gray left behind project........hmmmm the mind does wander sometimes.......

http://codenamestone.blogspot.com/

[–] dtmuller 11 years ago

...when the body fell in front of Juliet and she just sort of went hmmm. Thought that was very good to not have her flinch one bit. As for the rest of it, very predictable in every sense of the word.

Yes, very good that she didn't do the usual TV/movie woman bit of screaming and panicking. But there is one thing here I predicted dead (sorry) wrong. When she turned and walked away, the camera shot was of her back framed by the arms and head of the corpse. I was sure it was going to move. But no. I guess I've watched too many cheap horror flicks.

We didn't get a Steele sighting this week, but I did, in a sense. On July 4, one of the stations did the annual broadcast of Independence Day. (Getting to be as much of a tradition as The Ten Commandments at Easter. Or is it Passover?) My wife was watching it, and I caught just the final climactic battle. In the shots of the command center, there's our buddy Steele manning the console. Must be an infiltrator.