Tuesday, May 06, 2014

The Visitors are Coming: V: The Series: "Visitors' Choice" (November 23, 1984)



In “Visitors' Choice,” the Resistance learns of an upcoming Visitor conclave in Playa Del Mar. 

There, Diana (Jane Badler) and other prominent officers in the fleet will be privy to a demonstration of a new freeze-drying process, one that will allow the processing of human food at a rate of 100,000 people a week. 

If the prototype goes into production, a new holocaust is in the offing…

Julie (Faye Grant), Mike (Marc Singer) and Ham (Michael Ironside) head to Playa Del Mar, and join up with a small resistance cell there.  The plan is to use explosives to destroy the conclave, the prototype, and the Visitor scientist, Mary Kruger (Sybil Dannig) who created the device.

But a complication arises when the L.A. resistance heroes learn that humans are also being held -- in a kitchen freezer -- at the gathering.

Meanwhile, back in Los Angeles, Nathan Bates establishes a dusk-to-dawn curfew in an attempt to squash the Resistance.  He also captures his son, Kyle, and orders him “disciplined” by his sadistic major domo, Mr. Chiang (Aki Aleong).



“Visitors' Choice” has some good, solid moments in it, even though, at times, the episode suffers from a feeling that it was slapped together at literally the last minute.

Beloved genre icon Sybil Danning makes an appearance here alongside Jane Badler’s Diana as Mary Kruger, a brilliant Visitor scientist.  It is a mystery, however, when Visitors began going by two names instead of generics like “Diana,” “Willie,” “Lydia” and so forth.  Mary Kruger?


Danning doesn’t get much screen-time in “Visitor’s Choice,” but she is perfectly cast as a villain who can physically stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Diana, and thus a welcome presence. 

Similarly, I enjoyed this episode because it represents the first occasion in a long while that Mike and Julie have gone out on a dangerous mission together.  They are ostensibly still a couple, and I like that their resistance code-names are “Romeo and Juliet.” This fact is announced on Radio Free America at an opportune point in the action, and there is even a mention of the literary couple’s tragic fate. 

One has to wonder if Mike and Julie were also headed, eventually, for such heart-break.  Apparently, after the end of the first season, the producers had a plan to kill off Julie…

“Visitors' Choice” also works well in terms of its depiction of Nathan Bates (Lane Smith).  Here, he issues a curfew and makes it “punishable by death” for any person in his city to possess fire-arms. 

Although, ostensibly he is neutral in the War for Earth, it is clear that Bates is more interested in preserving his own power than in helping the Resistance win.  He seems to consider the Resistance fighters criminals in the city, while he treats Diana like a visiting Head of State.

The scene in which Kyle (Jeff Yagher) confronts Nathan about his behavior and actions is well-written and well-performed, and it gets at the core conflict between father and son.  Kyle is rebelling against an authoritarian Dad, it’s true, but he’s also staking out a position based on morality, whereas Nathan stakes out a position based on his own personal gain.

The scene in which Julie fights a huge, cleaver-bearing Visitor chef in close quarters is also surprisingly effective, and is evidence of what I pointed out a few weeks ago.  V: The Series was not afraid to let Julie be a fighter and a leader, engaged in out-and-out physical combat.  It’s refreshing to see her fully integrated into the action.  And it’s cool that Julie does well against the fat chef, but then Donovan leaps in and promptly gets tossed across a counter-top. Maybe he should have left the fighting to Julie…



Finally, “Visitors' Choice” treads into some creepy imagery.  It’s weird and unsettling to see half-dressed humans frozen in walk-in kitchen freezers, and the moment when the processor is activated is left to the (dreadful…) imagination.  The machine goes on, and we cut away as horrible human screams are heard.

Still, one has to wonder, did Mary Kruger leave notes regarding the freeze-drying process?  If so, then this Resistance win in Playa Del Mar is really just a brief setback for the Visitors…

In two weeks: “The Overlord.”

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