Grrr. Is there anything worse than an episode where the audience is deliberately misled into thinking there’s real peril going on, only to find out that it’s all just a training exercise? Really, it’s just the worst bait-and-switch available.

Before we begin, I just want to point out that "Retrospeculative TV" is now a once-a-week feature, and not a Tuesday/Thursday thing like it has been. In fact, it was always intended as a once-a-weeker, but since we started it in the winter doldrums, when none of our shows were cranking out new episodes, we figured 'why not double up until the season gets rolling again?'  Now that the season *is* rolling again, we're cutting out the Thursday Retrospeculative.

PLAY BY PLAY

Ben has a cold. While attempting to cure it with a Bitteroot and Ecanasia smoothie, Tetrax the diamond guy shows up, and forces Ben to change into Diamondhead, then pounds him until his body shatters and releases Chromastone. Tetrax gives him a red jem, and Chromastone flies away.

Alien Force’s streak of good episodes continues tonight with a fun little romp that kept getting bigger and bigger to the point where I felt it had to be a two-parter, yet it managed to resolve itself in a way that never felt particularly rushed or forced.

PLAY BY PLAY

Vilgax is talking to his advisor, who’s baiting him to do something rash (“Speak carefully. Your advice is valuable, not irreplaceable”), and he reveals that he got info from Ghostfreak four episodes back that’ll allow him to get the Omnitrix and kill Tennyson once and for all. And it will, too!

I missed this one somehow when it first aired, so let’s catch up now, shall we?

PLAY BY PLAY

Kevin has tracked Mike Morningstar to his lair, and busts in on him. They duke it out with superpowers, and Kevin looses. Mike explains that he *wanted* Kevin to track him, and that they need to work together to overcome their super powered deformities - Kevin wants to be human, and Mike wants to stop being an energy vampire.

Kevin: “This is like one of those dreams where everyone you know is in it, and they’re all trying to hurt you.”
Gwen: “I don’t have dreams like that.”
Kevin: “Uh…no, neither do I.”

And on that note, we find yet another episode in fine form, possibly the best, and certainly the funniest episode of the year.

OBSERVATIONS

By my count, this is the penultimate episode of Alien Force, both the season and the series. The show was conceived of as a two-season arc-driven series about fighting an alien invasion, and that story concluded in a three-part series finale that, alas, ended up *not* being a series finale because it got super-high ratings.