Falling Skies: “Live and Learn,” “The Armory” & “Prisoner of War”
Airdate: Sunday, June 19 at 9 p.m., Sunday, June 26 at 10 p.m. on TNT

Slice of SciFi Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Worth adding to your summer viewing schedule or DVR season pass

While best known for his work on the silver screen, Steven Spielberg is no stranger to television. One of his earliest directing jobs was the movie of the week classic Duel and many genre fans will recall that he produced the anthology series Amazing Stories in the early 80s.

His latest venture into the world of television is as the producer for TNT’s summer series Falling Skies, a venture that falls somewhere between Duel and Amazing Stories.

Falling Skies is an alien invasion story that doesn’t start with the aliens showing up on our doorstep.  Instead, we hear about how the aliens took over our planet in the first five minutes and then the show settles into its real focus–how humanity copes in the wake of an alien invasion as groups across the globe fight for survival.

In the center of the fight for survival is former history professor Tom Mason, played by Noah Wiley.  Mason is second in command of hybrid military and civilian group who is trying to survive and possibly come up with a way to eventually send our new alien overlords packing for their home planet.   Mason is also driven by a desire to find and rescue one of his three sons from the aliens control.

There’s some tension between Tom and his commanding officer Weaver, played by Will Patton.   The tension between the military side of the group and the civilian side shows up several times over the course of the first three installments, especially in the second episode where both sides argue about which side should get the better accommodations in their current settled area.

Watching the first three installments of the show, it’s hard not to be reminded a bit of the early days of the reboot of Battlestar Galactica and the early storylines taking place on Caprica and later on New Caprica. There’s the tension between the military and the civilian groups, there’s an oppressive and seemingly relentless alien force and there’s the fight for survival.

But while Battlestar was bleak and dark at times, Falling Skies offers hope that while we may not understand the alien overlords today and may not yet know how to overthrow them, eventually we can and will send them packing.   While the visual effects are impressive early, one standout scene is Tom’s struggle to acknowledge his youngest son’s birthday and make the day special for him, even as the group wonders how they’ll survive once their current rations run out.

But for all that, the series runs a bit hot and cold. Working for the series are the fact that we don’t really understand much about our alien overlords and why they’ve come to Earth.  Also the sense of working to survive daily in the new world order while still clinging to hope and a desire to go back to the way life was before these aliens showed up is nicely done.   Also of interest is a group of marauders who show up in the second installment, led by John Pope.  The scenes with Pope (played by Collin Cunningham) are among the most compelling in the first three hours of the show and this storyline holds a lot of promise for future development.

Where the series stumbles a bit is throwing a lot of characters and faces into the mix early and often.   And while Wyle is clearly the star of the show, there are times when it feels like the series is cramming in to many characters, too quickly and not taking the time to develop them enough to create the interest and connection that audiences will want.   This is most apparent in a teenage love triangle between Tom’s oldest son and two girls, both vying for his attention.    The storyline feels cliched even before it begins playing out on screen.

All of that doesn’t mean the show doesn’t have potential.  And there’s enough interesting plot threads developed in the first three installments to make it worth adding Falling Skies to your summer viewing schedule or your DVR’s season pass.