Andromeda Main Page | Episode Guide | Links

Una Salas Victus - Episode #207 (some spoilers below) (Click here for synopsis)

Once again this episode had lots of action and was exciting to watch. However, if you stop to think about it, didn't make sense in many ways. This is the recipe for many action movies but could be a bit disappointing for a series whose characters and premise give the potential to also tell solid and believable stories.

As last week we had three story lines and they all had good plots. However, they again seemed to suffer from not having enough screen time to give the detail that could have made them better. This was especially true of the Beka/Quechua story that was poignant and I would love to have seen more time given to.

The lead ('A') story was Tyr and Dylan assaulting the fortress on Acheron. Both of the actors did a good job and the conflict between them was believable. Sorbo seems more relaxed and his character is shown to be increasingly willing to go to extreme lengths, likely due to the Magog threat. A problem with Dylan was how lightly took alienating the Nietzscheans who could be either an asset or hindrance in re-forming the Commonwealth. However an interesting point was that we continue seeing the Argosy special ops (and perhaps the Commonwealth) not always "nice guys", especially clear in the quote at the start of the episode.

The use of the force lance to fire a line was not only a stretch (no pun intended) but reminesant of the "Bat Belt" in the old Batman series that had a device to do almost anything. My more serious concern was Fleet Admiral Cuchulain (Adrian Hughes) and the Nietzscheans who were almost comically inept at stopping only two people from invading a fortress. The Nietzscheans are supposedly super-human and were able to topple the Commonwealth but this does not jibe with the way they are portrayed here (and in other recent episodes).

As I already mentioned the Maru ('B') story with its interplay between Beka and Quechua (Kendall Cross) was poignant and only suffered from insufficient time to flesh it out. An insight into Nietzscheans from the viewpoint of a somewhat disenchanted but loyal woman was interesting. One point that did seem inconsistent was the Maru, pointed out to be only a cargo ship, having the maneuverability and firepower to destroy the Nietzschean attack ships. The Maru generally has been seen as very light weight as far as military potential and if this was changed we were never told of it.

Finally, the Andromeda ('C') story was again very rushed and seemed there mostly to give a reason for the other two stories. That being true I thought Harper's character was well handled and showed more depth than at times in the past in making some tough but good decisions. One consistency point that bothered me was how easily Andromeda continues to handle major battles with few (in this case only two) crewman, an issue which Rommie raised but that has yet to be faced much.

Overall it was a good episode that I enjoyed watching but felt had some problems that took away from it.

The ratings for the episode are given below. For information on how my rating system works, click on this link.

Review 11/20/01 by Larry Kramer

Andromeda Main Page | Episode Guide | Links

© 2001 Larry Kramer (See Copyright Disclaimer)