Falling Skies: Season Five, Episode Eight – “Stalag 14th Virginia”

First Aired August 16th, 2015.

The episode opens with Tom (played by Noah Wyle) and his sons being lined up for execution by firing squad. The narrative than flashes back seven hours earlier to Weaver (played by Will Patton) trying to convince his old army flame, Katie (played by Melora Hardin), to spare the Masons.

Katie refuses but Weaver notices that something about her is off and stows away in her truck when she drives out into the woods. He witnesses her meeting with an Overlord and once she leaves kills the Overlord with his bare hands. Some of the soldiers under Katie’s command don’t agree with her methods and Weaver shows Lt. Wolf (played by Daren Herbert) the Overlord’s body and reveals Katie met with it. Wolf brings the Overlord’s body back to camp but Katie refuses to put out patrols which makes the soldiers more suspicious. Hal (played by Drew Roy) and Ben (played by Connor Jessup) finally make up. Hal no longer has feelings for Maggie (played by Sarah Carter) and is smitten with Isabella (played by Catalina Sandino Moreno). Maggie and Isabella attempt to free them but Weaver finds them and convinces them to escape and find the others. Anne (played by Moon Bloodgood) is kept working in the infirmary under guard and talks with one of the patients. Anne is locked up when she mentions her half-Espheni daughter, Alexis “Lexi” (played by Scarlett Byrne).

Katie working with the Overlord wasn’t exactly a surprise, but Weaver being able to kill the Overlord with his bare hands was. They were always portrayed as strong and menacing aliens and he took one out like it was nothing. Maybe it was an adrenaline rush. It’s unlikely that Katie was first taken over by the Overlord during Tom’s trial. She must have been under its control for a while. This must be a new tactic where Overlords have human militias tear themselves apart from the inside, but Katie had too many tells that tipped off her actions. The ill-fated love triangle/rectangle is finally over. Ben and Hal each have their own woman and everyone’s happy. Of course Isabella and Maggie don’t know about their choices and could disagree and keep this awful storyline in motion through the finale. Anne should have known better than to go on about her half-alien daughter when people are being rounded up left and right for collaborating with the aliens.

Weaver has managed to convince several soldiers that Katie is compromised and they are all eager to take the fight to DC. He becomes more unhinged when he sees Katie has executed dozens of “traitors” within the last month. Tom talks with Lt. Shelton (played by Bob Fraser) and convinces him that the entire situation is a witch hunt and he releases Tom, Anne, Hal and Ben. While escaping Wolf is injured and everyone is captured but Tom, when Shelton attempts to remove Katie from command he’s killed by Sgt. Zak Kagel (played by Matt Bellefleur). The next morning, during the execution, Anne gives an emotional speech and, when the times come, the soldiers refuse Zak’s order to fire. Tom leads reinforcements into the base and frees everyone while Isabella kills Zak when he tries to shoot Tom. Tom gives an impassioned speech of his own during which Weaver stabs Katie and she bleeds black blood. The real Katie was killed long ago and an Espheni created duplicate put in her place.

Weaver is building his own sub-army within the 14^th but I’m shocked nobody stood up to Katie long before this. Katie has been one busy woman. I wonder what kind of trumped up charges she made stick for all those people to be executed with nobody batting an eye. People have been making grand speeches on the show since season one, but who knew they could be this effective. Tom and Anne managed to use their words to bring together an entire army, well, minus Zak, but he was a genuinely evil person who needed to die anyway. Katie turning out to be a Stepford alien creation and not just a traitor or being brainwashed was a great twist. It leaves you wondering how many others like her there are but that likely won’t be brought up again since there are only two episodes left, which is a shame because it would have created a great sense of conflict within the narrative.

Ben uses the Espheni communication device to spy on the Overlords’ meetings, thinking he can understand them with his spikes. Ben tells everyone that the Overlords were chanting to summon a higher being, something that unnerves Cochise (played by Doug Jones). The man Anne spoke with at the hospital fled the camp and winds up in the clutches of Pope (played by Colin Cunningham), revealing that Tom is alive. The Overlords’ big plan is to summon a new bigger bad guy. What is this, a video game? Is this the final boss? There’s still the Dornia lurking out there. The show does not need some other alien species clogging things up. Pope, however, has been sorely missed and he will do what he does best and stir things up in the finale.

Quotes & Thoughts

“My best friend was shot as a traitor! It’s not a dog’s fault if it gets rabies, but you still got to put it down.”

It’s ironic that, with Katie gone, people probably won’t be so concerned with moles even though now they know anyone could be an Espheni-made human.

“I hope when this war is over, that each one of you finds your humanity again. It’s not only what we’ve been fighting for, but it’s what makes us fight.”

Pope is the only person who could arrange a fight club in the middle of all this chaos and that’s why he’s awesome.

If you enjoyed Manny’s skyfall, you can find the rest of his work right HERE on Sci-Fi Bloggers. You can also follow him on Twitter @KN_Manny.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Friday Fiction: Snowfall In The Living Room
• “It Came From The Archives” Doctor Who Special Reviews: The Church on Ruby Road
• Review: Lucky Girl, How I Became A Horror Writer by M. Rickert
• Friday Fiction: Frozen Army
• Foundations: The 5 Best Artifact Cards