Review

This delightful episode is just the sort of sequel I was looking for to Terra Firma's exploration of what aliens arriving to Earth would be like. If we had never seen Earth again after the events of Terra Firma, the series would have suffered. Obviously John's not ready to go back, so to continue exploring the fallout of his homecoming I greatly appreciate the documentary style storytelling choice because it takes John entirely out of the context of these events; it forces him to simply watch as a helpless observer. As such, watching John watch TV all episode is strangely compelling because the subject matter is so rich.

Indeed, almost nothing happens in this episode and yet it manages to be such a deep and essential exploration of each of the main characters, especially John. The only actual plot is John trying to remember where he heard the name Katratzi and for once the plot device isn't some mystical science fiction voodoo but simply a highly distraught man having a hard time remembering something that he is certain he experienced. The story is of course resolved when John simply remembers what he saw and heard in Unrealized Reality, but I enjoy that he didn't remember right off. That's very realistic. Memory sometimes isn't instant recall and when you're distracted by a painful loss it can be even harder to remember even the most crucial things. Especially for someone who's experienced as many strange things as John.

Beyond that, this episode offers many fascinating tidbits. The psychologist may have overreacted throughout most of the episode, but she was quite right that John stating that he's always waiting for something bad to happen is a sign of his being constantly subjected to high stress. He's become paranoid, jumpy, and trigger happy. Ever notice how often he pulls guns on people? It's a reflex now. Even in this episode he pulled on a gun on Sikozu for no good reason. And at the end of the episode, despite still having no evidence, paranoid old John once again accused Scorpius of setting him up to extract wormhole knowledge before caving and giving Scorpy what he wants in exchange for help freeing Aeryn.

Another prominent theme of the episode is the disconnect between the aliens and the humans in their reactions to the fact that the rest of the galaxy possesses the capability to wipe out Earth easily. To people like Aeryn and D'Argo this is a harmless fact because Earth is so irrelevant no one would ever visit it. But to the human characters featured in the documentary this is the most terrifying threat in human history. The culture shock is well explored. I especially enjoyed D'Argo's observations about aliens in human movies and his warning that humans won't always win like they do in the movies. ???? All in all this is a fantastic episode that favors depth and nuance over the speed of plot which is sometimes too rare on Farscape.