Tuesday 20 December 2011

Terra Nova: Resistance/Occupation

What Happened, Yo!:

-Lucas converses with Weaver, leader of the mercenary group they're sending in to take the colony. They have the best army money can buy and they are ready to move.
-Taylor prepares the colony for the arrival of either new colonists or an army bent on destroying them. With Washington guarding the camp, Jim and Taylor brace themselves for new arrivals.
-The first few people to come through are colonists, including Kara (Josh's girlfriend), who Jim goes to take care of. When all of a sudden...
-A guy with a bomb strapped to his chest comes through the portal, explodes, and everything gets crazy!
-Jim is knocked to the ground and comes to 3 days later. He learns that when the portal on this side exploded, it re-opened much closer to the colony allowing the Phoenix Group to come through unimpeded. 26 Colonists died before Washington surrendered and Taylor is M.I.A. Kara died at some point in the struggle.
-Jim visits a despondent Washington and assures her she did the only thing she could do. She tells him that the Terminus (the device that makes the portal go both ways) was broken by Carno's and Malcolm has been put to work fixing it.
-Malcolm is fixing the device, because they killed his assistant when he refused, but he is working as slow as he can. When the soldiers come to question Jim, they pretend he was rendered deaf and brain damaged in the explosion.
-When dead Phoenix soldiers start showing up, Jim and Elizabeth realize that Taylor has etched co-ordinates to his location on the bullets.
-Lucas forgives Skye for warning Taylor, and claims she is his sister (figuratively).
-Jim sneaks out of the colony and sees Weaver, Lucas, and company planning to blow up an area full of greenery, so they can strip mine for all it's worth.
-Jim meets up with Taylor, Reynolds, and other soliders and they proceed to deactivate one of these bombs
-Taylor gives Jim a special communicator, and Jim begins alerting Taylor's rebels to roving groups of Phoenix soldiers who get attacked and killed over the process of several days.
-Later at the bar, Lucas begins making creepy advances on Skye. So Josh (Who's been working there again to get information) punches him out.
-Lucas freaks out and prepares to make an example out of Josh, but Jim has been tipped off by Skye and comes to the rescue. Unfortunately, this means giving up his shell-shocked act and getting arrested.
-In the brig, Josh forgives his father for punching out the population control officer so long ago,
-Skye gets Josh released but Jim must stay behind to get tortured.
-Lucas reveals that the reason he hates his father is that in Somalia, when the rebels took the city, they lined up all the innocents to be executed and forced each soldier to choose one to save. Taylor picked Lucas and has supposedly blamed him for it ever since.
-Elizabeth injects Weaver with what she says is a lethal dose of a dangerous paradise, and won't cure him until he frees Jim.

-He helps get Jim out, but Elizabeth reveals that she was bluffing, that he's a hypochondriac, and that the "cure" she's injected into him is a sedative.
-The Shannons meet up with Washington, who is going to give them a chance to get out of the colony and meet up with Taylor's troops. She gives Jim a message for Taylor and then causes havoc.
-As Taylor and company rescue the Shannon family, Taylor watches Wash get executed by Lucas for not telling where Taylor is (Her last words are a comment on how Lucas has his mothers eyes).
-At the camp, Washington's death is mourned. Jim passes along her message, which turns out to be advice to blow up Hope Plaza. It means cutting them off from a future, but it'll give them more of a chance against the Phoenix Group, than they'd have if more soldiers were able to come through the portal.
-As Jim knows Hope Plaza best, he is elected to go back to the future, smuggled in through a Phoenix shipment, and blow up a bomb.
-Skye distracts Lucas, giving the rebels their chance to sneak Jim and something else through the portal.
-I forget when this happened, but at some point, Weaver sent Mira to the Badlands where they found something interesting.
-After Jim goes to the future, Malcolm (whose fixed the Terminus at this point) secretly breaks it again, so nothing else can come through the future.
-Lucas gets away from Skye and sets off to warn the Phoenix Group. Taylor heads after him.
-In the future, Weaver talks with his superiors, as Jim sneaks out of his crate. Weaver opens the crate of what they found in the badlands, but instead of what's supposed to be in there, they find an angry Carnosaurus!
-While the Carno is killing people, Jim plants the bomb and prepares his escape
-Jim confronts Lucas, who claims he only wants his father's forgiveness and breaks down. Then, when Taylor embraces him, Lucas stabs him in the back. He prepares to stab him again, when Skye shows up and shoots Lucas twice.
-Weaver attempts to prevent Jim's escape only to get eaten by the Carno because he wasn't paying attention.
-Jim outruns the Carno on an exploding bridge and jumps through the portal! That part was awesome.
-Skye is so busy helping Taylor, she doesn't notice that a seemingly dead Lucas has disappeared until it's too late.
-Jim returns triumphantly and Taylor gets word that the Phoenix Group has all left and are heading towards the badlands.
-They open the crate from the badlands that was supposed to go to the future and discover a prow from an 18th century ship. Mysterious!
-Everyone returns home to Terra Nova. At night the Shannons all gather to watch a meteor shower.
-The End! For now.

I Liked This: Oh, man. Before I talk about anything else, I just have to bring it up again: Jim running away from a Carnosaur on an exploding bridge! Holy crap, that was awesome! I liked everything involving the Carnosaur in the future, but that was the best part. Anways, this was a great, action-packed finale and a good way to close the season. I liked the introduction of the Phoenix Group, who proved to be formidable threatening antagonists and should continue to do so if the show is renewed for a second season. I also liked Jim getting taking out of commission for a few days, so we could jump right ahead to a Phoenix-controlled Terra Nova. Josh was actually a likeable character this week, and I liked him finally forgiving his dad for punching out the population control guy way back when. I also liked that his girlfriend comes through the portal only to die, like almost immediately, even though it renders that whole storyline with him stealing medicine somewhat pointless. It's effective.

Speaking of effective death's, Washington's was a sad one, but I liked how it was handled and how her sacrifice ultimately leads to the destruction of Hope Plaza and Terra Nova getting cut off from the future (A cool development by the way). I already mentioned the Phoenix Group, but I really liked Weaver as the central antagonist of the finale. I was almost sad to see him get munched on by a dinosaur. I am glad that Lucas is apparently still alive, though. He's a fantastic character, and just as I was getting disappointed that his conflict with Taylor seemed to be resolved so fast, he goes and stabs the old man in the back. I also enjoyed his creepy fascination with Skye, and her character made up for being underused for much of the season. I also liked the introduction of the prow from the badlands, which brings up brand new issues, mysteries, and ideas for a potential season 2 to work with.

With all this stuff, and probably even more that I'm forgetting to mention, this was an incredibly effective Finale and probably the highlight of the season.

But...: Mira was really underused in the finale. We didn't get to see her menace any of our main characters at all, though she'll probably be back with a vengeance if season 2 happens, now that she's forever cut off from the future. And as well done as it was, I found some things in this episode predictable, which is a bit unfortunate. I called the portal being destroyed the moment they introduced the idea that that could happen last week.

The Bottom Line: Great Finale! Here's hoping for a season 2!

Grade: Totally Awesome! (Great)

Memorable Moments

-Dinosaur Scene Count: 3, but the last two scenes were Carnosaur scenes and those were awesome!
-Best Dinosaur Moment: I've already mentioned this but I'll mention it again. Carnotaur chasing Jim across an exploding bridge!!!
-This Week in Adorableness: Zoe's whole scene with Taylor.
-Well, That Was Stupid: Weaver, how did you forget that you had to be on the lookout for a freaking Dinosaur that just killed all the guys you work for?!
-Oh, and I liked the fake-out with it looking like Maddy and Reynolds were about to get attacked, only for Jim to walk in on them instead.

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