First Wave: 'Book of Shadows'

Cade visits a small town where a young woman is being put on trial for her admission of being a witch after she manages to kill several people. Could Diana be an alien?

First things first: I wonder if using the name Diana was an attempt to make the viewers think she is an alien by using the name of the lead alien in V? Just a thought.

This episode is the first to feature no nudity whatsoever. There is a concession to the past in the way that the witch coven wear see-through dresses, but that's all. Hopefully the producers have realized there's more to plotting than nude women, especially when you never see anything of interest. Anyway, that's not important. This is basically a courtroom drama, with some awfully muddied motivations. Quite what anyone is hoping to prove here, I'm not sure. If Diana is convicted of being a witch, so what? And quite what Cade wants to do is anyone's guess.

Things get a little clearer later, when the Book of Shadows itself is mentioned. Apparently this contains important information that may relate to the alien invasion, so Cade would like it. It's also the main exhibit in Diana's trial. The problems here are several. The trial is never really explained, and the end of it is a total cop-out, as if the writer ran out of time and had to finish the script the quickest way he could. Also, Cade is the most stupid he's ever been in this episode. The fact that he can't tell who the aliens are from the beginning (because us viewers certainly can) doesn't make him look good. Even the obligatory Cade/alien fight at the end could have gone better if he'd used some intelligence. Maybe Eddie really is the brains of the outfit.

Speaking of whom, at least he gets out and about this week, as opposed to sitting cooped up in a trailer somewhere. The scenes between him and Cade show a good friendship developing. Also good on the acting front is the actress who plays Diana, who brings a great air of power and mystery to the role, whilst seeming fairly normal on the outside. She's worth seeing again, especially now she knows Cade is the Twice-Blessed Man. But I ask again: how does she know? He never tells her...

A rather predictable offering that doesn't really come off.

**

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