Falling Skies Season One Recap & Comparison w/ V

Since the reboot of V does not seem to be coming back, it's a good thing that we have Falling Skies to watch now. It shares many similarities to both the original V and the reboot. Falling Skies also seems like yet another retelling, in modified form, of the American Revolution. For one thing, the series and the Resistance starts in Boston - the first reference to the Backbay neighborhood and the second to South Boston. 

The Resistance
The initial invasion of Falling Skies is dramatically overt, and more similar to what happens in Independence Day than in V  - Motherships arrive and launch attacks, then leave garrisons as they go somewhere else. Interestingly, the alien garrisons left behind are protected by large, odd-shaped structures. The initial attack is devastating and destroys all major cities and military forces. This attack uses a bright light, EMP-type weapon which bears some similarity to the "Blue Light" in V 2010.

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Resistance Leaders

Like in the mulitple V miniseries and series, the Resistance is largely lead by “moms and dads” – regular people in extraordinary circumstances. In V, the military is co-opted by the governmental collaborators who are their masters. In Falling Skies, the  military is essentially annihilated (as mentioned before).

 

One of primary adult characters and leaders is a female doctor, Anne, like Juliet in the original V. Another leading protagonist adult character is a history/military history professor named Tom Mason, as opposed to a journalist. Tom's PhD in the American Revolution lends more credence to the idea that the entire series is one entire retelling of the Revolution (similar to Star Wars). This is something we as Americans like to do in our storytelling.
 

In the original V, The Resistance teams up w/ mercenaries and counter-revolutionaries (whom would be called terrorists now) to help fight the invading aliens. In Falling Skies, the resistance teams up with a band of well-armed criminals. This merger of forces is bumpy and not at all smooth, but in the end it succeeds, partly because "Being the leader of a band of post-apocalyptic outlaws has been exhausting," according to Pope, the outlaw leader.

 

In Falling Skies/Original V, it is the outlaw criminals and mercenaries, respectively, who are the ones that develop alien armor piercing bullets. In the case of V, it was the lizard skin that the new ammunition penetrated. In Falling Skies it was the “Mech” armor that the new ammo could penetrate (made from destroyed Mechs, and inspired by a comment from one of Tom Mason's children). 

 

Alien Hierarchies & Evolution

The Aliens in Falling Skies seem to operate in a strict, racial/mechanical hierarchy, as opposed to the Visitors in V, who operate according to a military hierarchy. In Falling Skies, Skitters and Mechanical warriors (Mechs) comprise the lower caste helping the Grey alien-inspired "Overlords." One of the principal jobs of the skitters is to catch kids and attach biological harnesses to them. These harnesses turn kids into compliant servants of Skitters, and then eventually into Skitters
Ben, the son of primary adult character/leader is abducted (like in V) and harnessed to ensure his loyalty – in V, Donovan’s son is abducted and put into cold storage until putting him a conversion process to ensure his loyalty to the Visitors.

 

Episode 5 reveals a symbiotic relationship between alien Skitters and harnessed children – Aliens care for them, and according to one formerly harnessed child, “It’s like they care about us – part of a family – they know what we need before we do”  

Human Collaborators
The human collaborators in Falling Skies are much more nefarious than in V. In V, the collaborators are essentially upper crust society members seeking higher status by working with what appear to be alien "friends."After all, the aliens in V have a much more insidious, and less overtly violent agenda. They merely want to feed on "excess" humans. The collaborators in Falling Skies know that the skitters do horrible things to children, including turning them into harnessed slaves. However, they still try to deal children for peace to the skitters. The beginning of the collaboration to send children to aliens is revealed in Episode 5, which seems to be pivotal in revealing the connections between harnessed children and skitters.

V: 1983 & 2009 Part Two: 1983 Summary & Memes

The protagonist in the 1983 version is Donovan, a a foreign affairs correspondent whom we first encounter covering anonymous, admirable revolutionaries against a Central American dictatorship (Contras anyone?). He later shares the stage with Ham Tyler in V: The Final Battle. Ham is an American guerilla/ arms dealer he runs across in his work. In the 2009 version, the protagonist seems to be a synthesis of Donovan and Tyler. The pains of the reporter's divorce and conflict with his ex over his seeming upper hand in the competition for his child’s affection reflects the then-prominent "Divorce is Hard on Families Meme" in the 1983 version which seems absent from the new series, largely because as a society I think we're over divorce as a social issue.

Another meme prevalent through the first few hours of the miniseries is the conflict in the black community between “the streets” and “selling out,” epitomized by the conflict between ne'er do well Elias Taylor and his brother Dr. Ben Taylor over life and their father’s affection. The show resolves this conflict by having Ben die, which ultimately leads Elias to declare that it should be him not Ben because Ben had made something with himself. However it is Elias's skills and contacts from “the streets” that help the Resistance obtain shelter, useful intelligence and necessary supplies. This may reflect the inability of the writer to resolve the issue satisfactorily for himself or us.

V is also one of the first sources for the meme of illegal immigration in California in the mid-80’s, and the issue of “visitors” taking Californian jobs is even addressed explicitly within the first 45 minutes of the show. In fact, during that scene, Caleb explicitly complains about job competition from “honkeys” and Mexicans since this was produced before political correctness craziness became the norm.

The meme of environmental catastrophe, in this case on the Visitors planet, began to emerge into political and pop culture around this time, and the environmental "disaster" on the Visitor's home planet (their cover story for coveting our water) is mentioned in the first 30 minutes. The meme is not referenced explicitly again, and may explain why the show has emerged now: we have a major environmental bill working its way through Congress, which many on the left who tend to include television writers support. In fact the New America Foundation recently hosted a briefing in Washington, DC titled "Go West Young Policy Wonk" focusing on whether those interested in policy making should head to Hollywood instead.

The Nazi allusions are right in your face right from the name of the Jewish Resistance Fighter (Abraham) down to the brown shirts and youth brigades, though at the time, many Americans also associated youth brigades and secret police (brown shirts) with the Soviets. Only this time instead of “The Jews” it's “The Scientists” with the evil conspiracy against the powers that be. The Visitors use a false flag conspiracy to justify rounding up scientists, and then eventually stage “Reichstag bombing” attacks around the world, using means similar to those in Wag the Dog. In the 2009 version, the Hitler allusions are less pronounced. Perhaps this is because the newer generation doesn’t identify as much with this epochal event 25 years later than the original and 65 years after the event was revealed to the world. Additionally, in the 2009 series, the Visitors seem to be setting up the foundations for a religion as a means of Social Control. This fits into the "All Religions Are Shams" meme that has emerged forcefully in the past decade.

The "Abortion is Completely Acceptable" meme appears early on V: The Final Battle,when the Catholic Priest's moral objections are dismissed out of hand, and represents a different cultural era. 1982's Fast Times at Ridgemont High and The Last American Virgin both showed the really problem with getting an abortion was having the guy pay for it. This is before the deluge of shows in the 1990s and 2000s, including Friends, in which the potentially pregnant character ends up not having to make a decision /resolve the conflict because the test was wrong or their was a miscarriage, "getting them off the hook" for having to make a decision. I expect that in the new series, this will be replaced with teh "Abortion is a Serious Issue" meme and there will be a more weighty debate about the potential abortion of the hybrid fetus. If I'm correct on this, it will reflect the ascendancy of the Christian Right during the past 25 years. Whether they are now on the decline is a debatable point.