V episode 12 review: season finale

12. Red Sky

Surprisingly, V got renewed between last episode and this episode. I figured it was returning, since FlashForward was not returning, and no network wants to wipe out twice on new sci-fi-ish dramas in one season.

So, yeah, V is coming back, but in order for me to come back, I wanted to see a really flash-bang finale, where all the stops were pulled out. While they didn’t pull them all out (no Anna eating a rodent, no full lizardy face), they pulled out enough of them to give me an enthusiasm and gusto for the show that I haven’t had since the pilot.

In other words, “Flash-bang, this is us leaving you wanting more!”

Gregg Hurwitz just might have saved this show. Three really good episodes in a row, and all three of them feature his name prominently as writer. I think if I ran into this guy in real life somewhere, I’d probably have to hug him for showing that network TV science fiction can actually be really good television, too. It’s not just for cable, and it’s definitely not all Fox.

I’ve read a lot of comments from fellow watchers, especially here. I know a lot of folk gave up on the show after the stumble and the Olympics break, but if you would? Watch episodes 10, 11 (you’ll find review links below), and 12, because I really think you could be won over again, or at least deserve to see that, yes, the show has greatly improved. I’d love to see a full season with this current crew, and that means we need viewers like you to come back.

The Fifth Column knows that there’s a mole, and they know the mole is named Chad Decker. So, that means they’re going to do a little mole hunting. Of course, since the Fifth Column is fairly inept at the whole terrorism thing (save Hobbes, of course), the plan backfires.

However, thanks to the V wing of the Fifth, the plan still succeeds. Shockingly, Erica is able to somehow use a blue grenade to eliminate Anna’s Olympic-sized pool of lizard caviar, in what was actually a couple of decent special effects sequences.

Actually, the whole show looks like they’ve put in more work on the special effects (at least this week). There were several legitimately good shots of the ship’s interiors, and a pretty cool V-gunfight involving the exposed Joshua and V security forces that ends in a fairly depressing way.

However, the show had too many people on board as it is, so some characters had to be written off. Goodbye Joshua, goodbye associate medical V who was also Fifth Column, and goodbye Valerie.

Val’s pregnant personage was stolen during last week’s episode, and now she’s on the V ship. Most importantly, Lexa Doig makes sure Ryan knows that Valerie’s been babymama-napped. So, Ryan does the dumb, human thing and rushes straight to the ship to get her back/see her, where he plays right into Anna’s hands. Unfortunately for Anna, those human emotions she wants to study in Ryan are a double-edged sword.

Emotions are a funny thing. Too many bad events can turn a person from a human into something less, like Ryan, once he finds out his girlfriend has gone onto her great reward, or when Anna discovers her scrambled eggs and presses the ‘oh shit’ button.

However, those very same emotions can also inspire, from Joshua’s heroic sacrifice galvanizing Lisa into aiding the Fifth Column efforts, to Father Jack Action Priest’s rousing anti-V sermon delivered from the pulpit of the church (that gets overheard by Chad Decker and that just might have caused the Fifth Column to reveal their primary membership).

The show resolved a lot of dangling subplots, thanks to the death of Val and the events surrounding Ryan, Hobbes’ second meeting with Marcus, and (possibly) Chad Decker revealing his true allegiance. However, the show also added some great-looking stuff for next season.

When Anna hit the big button, the Fifth Column went from talking about resistance to actually having something tangible to resist against.

There’s also a very intriguing possibly that Father Jack Action Priest and Ryan might have turned traitor, to counterbalance Lisa and Chad Decker possibly having turned Fifth Column. All four characters could still go either way, which is one of the great things the show has done since it returned.

The second episode of V was all about paranoia, and now the paranoia has spread beyond the characters and back into the mind of the viewer.

That’s not good news, that’s great news. Not only do you have some dangling threads for next season, you tied up a lot of stuff from this season, pruned some characters down, and you’ve proven, at least to me, that the show deserves that second season to play out what’s been put in motion by this great season finale.

Read our review of episode 11 here and 10 here.

US correspondent Ron Hogan never thought he’d turn against V; he never thought he’d also turn back towards the show a few episodes later. Amazing what a few good writers can do, isn’t it? Find more by Ron at his blog, Subtle Bluntness, and daily at PopFi and Shaktronics.