V: Then and Now

I don't know how many of you watched the "Five" pilot last night, or the re-runs of V, V: The Final Battle and V: The Series on the Sci-Fi Channel (I refuse to call it by that new name), but I enjoyed the pilot episode of V.

It was a nice set-up for what could be a long-running sci-fi show on network TV. At least it won't be killed early by Fox like Brimstone, Firefly, Millennium, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, et al. I think that without the success of shows in the sci-fi genre like Lost and Heroes, as well as arc-driven shows like 24 and Buffy, this new crop of shows including Flash Forward and V would never get made.

I also wonder how Battlestar Galactica would have fared if it had been given a bigger budget and been broadcast on NBC instead of Sci-Fi.

Anyway, back to V.

There were several plot lines that were nicely set in motion, but at heart, I wonder why the Visitors didn't simply conquer the planet. After all, they have demonstratably superior technology, so why not just take over. This was the basic failing of the 80s series: the aliens needed water and humans (both for food and as slaves to serve as soldiers).

Now, what do they really need?

Water is one of the most abundant compounds in the universe. Why come to earth to get it?

Humans as food? It's not practical to use a top-line predator as a food source. There is too much necessary to raise humans to maturity as opposed to using non-sentient domesticated animals like cows or chickens.

They need a rare element to power their ships? So just wipe out the population of the planet and mine all they need.

And why would they spend decades infiltrating human society. The time and resources necessary to pull all this off would be better spent by simply showing up, demanding the planet's unconditional surrender and then threatening to drop a fusion device into the sun causing it to go super-nova.

Until this basic premise is plausibly explained, the series will seem a little contrived. At least to me.

Still, there were many things to like. We saw that there are a few humans who are aware of the Visitor's reptilian origins, as well as some that are placed highly in the social structure of our planet.

However, this makes me wonder a couple of things:

First, if there are humans who know that certain "people" are aliens in disguise, why not expose them? Just show up one day with a Visitor, rip off his/her "skin" on TV and when they finally show up, we'd be ready.

Second, if there are Visitors who have been here for a while and they know their bretheran are coming, why not expose themselves so we'd be ready? Sure, we might make guinea pigs out of them, but 1) we'd know that there are other species out there, and 2) we'd know that they were coming to take over the planet. That way, we'd either be ready to fight back or have some sort of Torchwood like contingency that would destroy the planet rather than let it fall to an invading alien species.

Anyway, despite this nitpicking, I enjoyed the show last night, and will be tuning in.

Just show me more hot alien babes. And get Inara her hair back.