EPISODE REVIEW: V – It’s Only the Beginning (Season 1, Episode 4)

So here we are at the fourth and final (possibly) episode of this new and re-jiggered version of “V”. As you may or may not know after tonight’s show, the series is going on an extended hiatus with a scheduled return date sometime in the late spring. A lot of the final decision on whether or not it will actually return is probably tightly tied up in how well the viewership has held up on the show over its short run. So chances are probably not very good.

Having said that, tonight’s show was another incremental improvement over the previous episode. If it keeps improving at this rate the show should be completely average by mid-next season.

The Comcast show guide synopsis states quite boldly, “with the help of her allies, Erica uncovers a biological threat that may be linked to the Visitors; Anna supervises the murder probe of a V while meeting with a special guest on the mother ship; Chad reports on the Visitors’ healing centers”.

The show kicks off right away with the main players in the human resistance teaming up for an ominous and boring meeting. When the drunk human guy who has lost his family to the V secret agents starts talking about skinning the Vs, our stalwart secret agent V, Ryan, gets upset. Not so sexy this week, Erica is becoming suspicious of Ryan’s motives.

Back on the mother ship, V boss Anna is informed that Firefly guy was murdered as he was recuperating. She goes into slow burn mode and demands that the whole staff be investigated.

Back on earth, Erica’s lame-o son tries to talk to her and connect with her, but Erica is busy illegally accessing the FBI DB trying to get some background info on Ryan to see what his thing is. So, he naturally goes off and pouts. I really hate this kid. If there is anything I hate more than mopey teenagers, it is clichéd mopey teenagers.

Ryan’s girlfriend, the human, is feeling sick. Luckily at the very same time on TV Anna is announcing the go live of their Universal Healthcare plan with a vitamin injection that should help strengthen human immune systems a bit. I find myself hoping that it is made out of MSG.

We jump back to lame-o son and Erica again, but they get interrupted by an urgent call from Ryan – he saw the free vitamin injection report on TV and he knows that it is really meat tenderizer. Lame-o gets even more pouty if that is possible and storms off, Erica feels bad but the fate of the world is in her hands, so what can she do. Manufactured familial drama never gets old does it?

Ryan reveals a former V plan to create a human virus or something like that and then starts reeling off names of former undercover V. They finally get a hit on one and track him down at a big medical manufacturer or something – my notes are a little vague here because it was really boring.

We smash cut to lame-o teen son who is confessing his lame-o teen problems to his shrink. At first we don’t get to see the shrink's face which is suspicious until, surprise!! It turns out to be Ryan’s human girlfriend. She is all sniffly and lame-o offers to