Falling Skies 3.10 Brazil **** SPOILERS ****

Episode Summary from Falling Skies Wiki:

[i]The finale episode begins with Pope , Weaver and some other fighters on a train to Chicago. They talk about needing the Volm weapon to work and apparently, the weapon has already been dug out because we see Dr. Kadar trying to make it work. Tom and Cochise are talking and they comment on the fact that more Volm are on the way. Then Cochise urges Tom to “have faith, my friend.” Back on the train, we see that Lourdes is there and she’s chained up and Weaver comments that she is “bait” to lure out the Espheni overlord, Karen.

The train encounters a couple Espheni mechs and we see Pope and Weaver begin to attack. But, the train is just a decoy. The Volm weapon is not going to Chicago, it is headed to Boston on a boat. Tom, Cochise, Mattfro, Hal and Maggie watch as Cadar shoots the weapon at the Boston tower and it hits. It takes a minute, but the tower collapses into rubble. Tom and the others celebrate as they see the defense grid begin to crumble. Moments later, a huge Volm ship arrives on the scene.

It is the night after the Volm have arrived and the humans are celebrating, playing drums and dancing around while Tom is in a tent preparing for his meeting with the Volm leaders. Outside, there is a cheer as Weaver and Pope arrive at the camp. They were rescued from their battle with the Espheni by a Volm brigade. Cochise says his people are happy to help the humans. He tells Tom that he will get to meet the Volm leader tomorrow morning, which is faster than Tom wanted.

At the meeting, the Volm commander begins by shaking hands and acting quite nice. It turns out that he is Cochise’s father. Tom wants to talk about military plans but the Volm say that will not be necessary. The Volm say they don’t need any input or help from the humans. They know how to fight the Espheni and the humans “would just get in the way.” Tom and Weaver are not happy. Tom wants to know what the Volm plan to do with the humans. The Volm leader says they will all be relocated to the south to Brazil.

Tom says there is no way he will let that happen. The Volm leader seems to not care what Tom and Weaver think and says human relocation will begin today. Tom says they want to keep on fighting and then the Volm leader turns to walk away and Tom grabs his shoulder to continue talking, this causes the Volm to fling Tom aside and leaves the room.

Weaver comes back to camp. He orders everyone to get their stuff together and move out. He says they will leave in one hour so they can’t be rounded up by the Volm. Someone asks about Tom and Weaver says Tom is being held captive by the Volm. Weaver goes into a tent and seems to suffer a mild heart attack. His daughter comes in and he tells her that he has been taking pills to keep his heart from acting up. He asks her to keep his condition secret. Before the humans can pack up and leave, Cochise and a Volm military party arrive and order everyone to prepare for transport. Pope wants to fight them, but Weaver realizes they are badly outgunned. Weaver orders everyone to hand over their weapons. Pope sneers at Weaver as he says, “The Volm have just done what the Espheni never could. They’ve brought us to our knees.”

Meanwhile Tom and the Volm Commander are talking. Tom is angry that Cochise lied to him about the Volm plans. The Volm leader says Cochise was operating under strict orders. The Volm leader explains that every other planet they have liberated has contained people who were glad to be relocated and leave the fight to the Volm. Tom explains that humans are different. “Allow us to fight for our freedom,” he pleads. The Volm leader admits that he has never contemplated doing anything but what he always does. He has never had to really consider other options. He tells Tom he will think about it. It is clear that the Volm are not evil, they simply do not understand humanity.

Hal is chatting with the captive Lourdes. She looks terrible and is desperate for the bugs to be out of her brain. Hal vows to help her get better. Maggie says they may have to “put her out of her misery.”

Cochise arrives and tells Weaver it is time for the humans to go to Brazil and they join with Tom. Cochise leads them away and takes them over to their weapons and says the humans are free to go, though he asks them to leave the Boston area. Tom says, “we are going to continue to fight.” Then Cochise says he hopes they will see each other again and he hands Tom a Volm rifle and the humans leave. The Volm commander and father of Cochise thinks the humans will die if they fight, then Cochise says humans are stronger than the Volm think they are.

The humans are on the road out of town and Ben senses something nearby and Lourdes begins freaking out. An Espheni ship is inbound. Karen comes out with some of her forces. She is carrying a white flag and says she can see that the Volm alliance with the humans has gone sour. She says there will be more unpleasant discoveries about the Volm. She tells them that there may be a day when the two sides need each other. She tells Tom she brought a gift for him. Tom says he has a gift for her too. He puts a bullet in Karen’s chest.

The Espheni forces attack but the humans defeat them. Karen is lying on the ground almost dead. She tells Hal she only wanted to be with him and her final words; “I’m sorry”. Maggie pulls out a gun and puts two bullets in Karen.

Tom hears Anne in the woods and rushes to her side and Alexis is there too, but she has aged quite a bit because of her alien DNA.

Tom talks to Dr. Kadar about Alexis. The doctor does not know if Alexis will continue aging at a rapid pace. The humans are moving out, then Pope comments that being back on the road feels like old times, to which Weaver agrees. After that, Alexis goes up to Lourdes and touches her face. Suddenly dozens of Eye Worms from inside Lourdes come pouring out of her, and they all gather in Alexi’s hands and she crushes them. She is witnessed by Tom and Weaver.[/i]

Please use this thread to discuss the series’ thirtieth overall and third season tenth and final episode Brazil. Rule: Please keep spoilers limited to those revealed during the series up to this episode only.

I enjoyed this entire season (though I wish people would stop dying!) and the set up for next season is filled with questions.

What’s in all this for the Volm?

Where is the rest of the “real” remnants of the former US government?

My surprise prediction just for giggles and kicks- humans invited one of the alien races to our planet and the whole deal went south.

I finally caught up with Falling Skies this weekend and my full comments will be in a later post but I wanted to respond here first.

This season was very well done. As I stated in my post on the first episode for the season this show is finally becoming what I thought it was going to be when it first aired in 2011. I do agree with you on the number of individuals dying though. There’s not many humans left. They need to conserve the available pool of characters.

As malicious as the Volm might seem attempting to force the relocation, I truly think that they didn’t give it a second thought that the humans might not want to relocate. In my opinion it is a classic case of “We’ve always done it this way.” I think the overall war is that way too for them. Humans are bringing a unique perspective to the Espheni and Volm. That, of course, is our value to the universe, is it not?

Hathaway mentioned that there were many pockets of civilization left. Originally that surprised me since I had the opinion that the Espheni were practicing a scorched Earth policy. But then I remembered that fuel was a limited commodity. So at a certain point they had to stop the mass destruction and conserve for a possible Volm invasion. So that allowed pockets of humanity to survive. Where are they? I don’t know. But with the Esheni on the run to the north and the Volm distracted in engaging the Espheni I predict that Tom Mason and company will have the opportunity to run into more of these pockets of human existence that remain.

That’s my 2 cents at least.

The series finale had all the markings of a phenominal episode, but with the almost exclusive setup only episode the previous week this one felt rushed and flat. I suspect they could have combined the final two episodes of the season together for a much better season 3 ending effect.

The fake frontal assault on Chicago with Lourdes as bait was as epic of a Tom Mason strategy as there ever was. The absence of Marina Peralta and General Porter in this episode was not lost on me, though. Marina should have been the mastermind of the comprehensive strategy and she was not there to negotiate with the supreme Volm expeditionary commander. And General Porter should have been there to direct the final strategy.

The actual battle was very anti-climatic. It was very short in the episode. Maybe they were short on special effect budget but I wish they would have shown more of the assault on Chicago and Cochise’s rescue of Weaver’s forces. That would have been a grand visual and emotional win.

Boy oh boy is that is big ass Volm ship or what? Heck, it’s the size of BOSTON. I would think with one of those that the “war” would end very quickly indeed.

Poor Lourdes. She was reduced to a groveling pain filled animal almost. A lot like Gollum, actually. I was very pleased at the end when Lexie was able to gather her infection and destroy the bugs. I hated to see Lourdes in so much pain.

The Return Of The Jedi Ewok victory celebration was a nice visual.

So the rebel skitters ran from the Volm and Karen was begging for an alliance against the Volm. I understand that the Volm aren’t exactly the Calvary that the humans wished for, but I’m not seeing the evil intent yet. Here’s what I said in response to Dawn on the subject:

So Weaver’s heart is failing him. I see this ending in one of two ways. Either Weaver dies of a heart attack on the road with the newly reconstituted 2nd Mass or he is miraculously cured by either the remaining Espheni or the Volm. The show will certainly not be the same without him.

Anne Glass does not look or act like herself anymore. Karen did something to her, but what?

As for Karen, she got what was coming to her. As useful as she could have been she would have double crossed the humans at her first opportunity. Tom was right to shoot her and Maggie was right to finish the job. I have no regrets on that at all.

However, Maggie sure didn’t want to settle down with Hal. Especially after she saw Hal cozy up to Karen at the end. I just don’t see their relationship ever being the same again.

Why exactly was Jeanne on the assault to Boston? She simply should have not been there. At best she should have been assaulting Chicago with Dan Weaver or left in Charleston. Just my thoughts anyway.

I’m looking forward to next summer!