This penultimate episode of the episode. Most of this one it taken up with the Wild Cards doing some commando mission on some planet and being spotted by a non-combatant Chig and they have to figure out what they’re going to do about it. They’ve never seen a Chig out of its armour before, so they aren’t even sure if this alien is one of their enemies or some other innocent kind of life. They spend the episode chasing it down and trying to decide if they need to kill it so it doesn’t compromise the mission. Then, at the end of the episode, after they’ve decided not to kill it, the Saratoga is approached by a Chig vessel containing a lone Chig who communicates in Morse code that it wants to bring peace.
So we finally see the Chigs unmasked in this one!
As ever, I am very interested in alien design. We already knew the Chigs had a basic humanoid form, albeit with fewer digits on their hands, but I think I’d built up what might be under their helmets too much and so I was disappointed at first. The general facial layout looks too human for me. But I think I am over that disappointment. These are decent aliens. Right off the bat they’re better than the average Trek alien, right? And the performance sells it. They seem to breathe through those gills, which is cool. And we also are shown that Chigs (or at least the soldiers) seem to be grown in little pods (that resident In-Vitro Hawkes found familiar) and placed in armour at birth and never leave it until they die. All that stuff is suitably alien. Genuinely it made me think of Enemy Mine again, as I did last episode, and I think this design may look more alien than the aliens in that (though I admit it’s been a while since I’ve seen it) and they’re probably about on part with the Terrians from Earth 2 (though sub-Grendler). I do like that the Chigs look rather droopy, not like some fang monsters.
Some other thoughts of note:
-Hawkes uses the pictures of a comic called G.I. Geequed to aid communication with the alien, it’s a war comic that includes Chigs as enemies, making it like the comics published during WWII that had the heroes fighting the Nazis and Japanese. If “Geequed” is a pun or something, I don’t get it, but it’s neat to see the prop comic made for the show.
-Vansen also mentions that she got to see the last living panda at a zoo when she was a kid.
-The episode starts with Vansen narrating a history from the Big Bang to life rising on Earth and such. This, combined with her making a comment about feeling that the Chig comes from the same place as the humans. I’m uncertain what they’re going for here, but I’m still hoping we’re getting a big religious turn before the show ends.
-Perhaps the most important thing: We know from previous episodes than when a Chig’s armour is removed it dissolves into green goo. Apparently the humans have taken to calling this “spooging” and that’s just great.
I’ve covered the stutter, but that isn’t the only affectation of nerdiness that has been grafted onto Bob Farrell over the years. He’s also had glasses in some of his more prominent appearances since the year 2000 (of which, God knows there have not been many). He wore the glasses in the Supervillain Team-Up book that brought us the stutter, but unlike that, Van Lente did not originate the glasses. Bob was first seen wearing glasses in the story in which he was in prison and was first seen alongside the Hypno-Hustler. I may not care for that story, but it has given me several things I like, apparently.
And I do like the glasses. Like the stutter, I think it is unfortunate that glasses are considered symbolic of “nerdy” people, but it does work for Bob as a tech guy. Also like the stutter, we’ve got decades of evidence that Bob did not always have glasses. Photos of him as a child show him not wearing them, and most of his adult life he’s been without as well. But still, you can need glasses without having them, especially if you’re from a low-income family. It could be that he didn’t realize he needed them until he was doing crimes and could afford to get some. It’s also very likely that he wears contacts on occasion. Bob has currently only made one appearance without his eyewear since they were introduced, attending a funeral, so maybe he just felt like contacts when he was dressing up that day?)
And, it is important to note that every iteration of the Rocket Racer’s outfit has included eyewear. Before and after his civilian eyewear came into play, he’s had visors and goggles as a part of his equipment. He has only occasionally had a helmet, but always something to protect his eyes. It would be perfectly believable to me that the Tinkerer or someone could make sure those things work with his prescription. I’ve also always kind of assumed the visor has some sort of HUD going on, but vision correction could be involved too.
I thought this one was pretty good. The big attack that they set up last time happens and it goes poorly. Turns out that even with all the scheming, the Chigs were still wise to the human attack on whatever strategic planet, and they prepared an ambush. While a bunch of soldiers (including the Wild Cards) are on the planet, the leadership aboard the Saratoga realize that the Chigs have brought these forces from a different, even more strategically-located planet, so they should pull human forces over there to get that planet. But that means abandoning like 25,000 soldiers on the planet. Ross is against it, because he cares about those in his command. McQueen is for it, though he wants to volunteer himself to go down and help the stranded soldiers (though Ross forbids that). Of course, the deciding vote goes to the Supreme Commander of Earth Forces, whom I believe we are meeting for the first time here, so the Saratoga and ALL of the human forces go to Other Planet to wage a months-long battle while the Wild Cards are trapped back on first planet (eventually it all turns out fine). The big theme in here is about how hard it is to be in command in the military, with the Supreme Commander, Ross, and McQueen all fretting over the lives under their command, all the way down to Vansen being responsible for the other Wild Cards.
The Wild Cards really do suffer in this one. Their time spent on the planet isn’t all about them sneaking around and killing Chigs and looking badass. Mostly they just wander around desperately trying to find food (the episode title comes from when they find some sugar that got spilled and mixed with dirt and they eat it, which definitely sounds like some real war story they heard and put in the show). I mean, they’re still the only survivors we see (though at the end we’re told there’s about 2000 altogether), so they do look badass in the end thanks to Main Character Powers, but it isn’t all about how good they are at killing.
One thing that we get in this episode that I like is a look at some of the non-American space armies that have been suggested to exist, but who never do anything we get to see. We see Generals (or whatever) from China and India and there’s mention of “West African” forces. It’s nice that the rest of Earth gets to play. Also, there’s a neat bit where they see some Chigs at a distance and the Chigs are using some kind of speakers to blare out things in English that they think will enrage the humans, including “Abe Lincoln’s dead” because they are aliens, so they don’t quite get it (it also reminds me of the “Your Mickey Mouse is a big stupid dope” line from Enemy Mine, though the context is different there). I like aliens, is my thing.
Only Two Episodes Left!
It takes a while for them to get around to it, but this episode is about the team doing a large-scale spaceship version of Operation: Mincemeat. Seriously, most of the episode is just political intrigue thriller stuff about the higher-ups being afraid of traitors so they have to keep the Wild Cards (and everyone else) in the dark about it. But all that is unimportant, because what matters that happens here is that the Wild Cards escort a ship full of dead people designed to look like they were on an important mission. The Cards lose the ship on purpose when attacked by the Chigs, but when the Chigs check the wreckage, the information they find on the ship will be false.
Some of the stuff at the beginning of the episode goes on a little too long, and the end fight scene is faked anyway, but at least it gives us a little more space plane combat. I don’t know what it was, but there was something about the dialogue during that last fight that really made me think they were doing an episode while simultaneously recording the barks that would be used in a Space: Above And Beyond video game if such a game were to exist.
The most important thing in this episode is that we learn that Commodore Ross has named his guitar Rosalind. I approve.
