The Homecoming

[Serena Lewis]

I ADORE this episode. I loved it when I first saw it, and I think my passion for it has increased over the years. There aren't really that many important things I don't like, they're probably mostly nit-picks...
Here goes...

Pros

1. Green. She is such a sweetie, she really doesn't deserve to get all this angst. But at least she gets character development...
2. Blues concern for Green. He actually seems to really care about her. When Scarlet is wittering on about 'Millions of people will die', Blue still says to him, 'There has to be a way to get in there...' Come on. He loves her really...
3. Not much Destiny. Always a plus.
4. Greens cool driving. I don't know why, but I get a real...shiver when I watch that driving scene, and I don't when I watch any others. Hmm...
5. Facial expressions. Green looks intensely worried, Blue looks concerned, Scarlet looks annoyed. This is all good!
6. Fencing. Fabulous, really fabulous.
7. Colonel Whites compassionate side. How odd. Didn't think he'd got one.
8. Father/Daughter scenes. Beautiful, touching...
9. Excellent voice acting. Jules De Jongh, if I was wearing a hat, I would take it off to you.

Cons

1. Loping. Commander Lewis...why do you walk like that?
2. Isn't it a little drastic to ask Serena to 'step down' from her position? In my 'experience' (i.e. I looked in the dictionary), that means leave the job...
3. Scarlet and Blues goofy snow suits. Hahaha, what fools! Spectrum, get yourselves some fashion designers.
4. The death description of the real Lewis. Bit…descriptive (Sorry, brain drying out ). I was practically shouting at the T.V. telling Mysteron geezer to stop torturing Green like that. Look at her face...
5. The parachutes and the shooting. The parachutes just made me snigger, and Blue and Scarlet were shooting so much and so wildly they would probably of killed Green!

Little Things

1. The things like the spray of snow, the swishing the rapiers made, that sort of thing. And an extremely fine detail, Greens door button thing actually had fingerprints on it. That is so cool...
2. MoM cut both Green whacking her father over the head with that rod, and the first cryogenics tube unveiling.
3. Commander Lewis appears to say 'bummer' when he's fighting. Once with Scarlet in gym, twice at the end. Listen closely. It definitely sounds like he says it.
4. Serena's birthday is on August 12th.
5. Just a small thing. No offence meant at all by this, but if Greens father is black, and presumably her mother is, why is Green mixed race? My theory is that they made her father black because, otherwise, if they made him white, some people watching would be wondering 'How come Green's mixed race?' if they hadn't seen her bio thing which says her mom is Trinidadian.
6. Is it just me, or is Commander Lewis about seven foot tall? He absolutely towers over Serena in some shots, and she's reasonably tall for a woman, 5ft 9in...

Bloopers

1. When Green is crying at the start, the desk passes slightly through her. Hard to describe, but I know what I mean...
2. Green goes bald several times in the jeep scene.
3. When Green goes to hug her father after the 'corn dog' bit, her left arm disappears just before she's supposed to put it around him.

Rating: 10/10

xx

[luvmylops]

I just am not good at these things!

I enjoyed the episode, though it is not one of my favs. Loved the action packed fencing scenes!

I liked the developing "romance" between Blue and Green (maybe she can get him to crack a smile for once?) By the way, does Blue ever smile in any of the episodes? I can only ever seem to recall him either frowning or extremely angry .

Even my husband commented on the 'bouncing Commander Lewis' [why does he walk like that?] I thought they were using motion capture for the body movements.

What time is nightfall in the Antartic? I was under the impression there is a 6 month long day followed by a 6 month long night? (Am I nitpicking or what?)

We get to see bald Angel pilots again, as well as the previously pointed out bald Lt Green. (Is the hair that difficult for CGI?)

All in all, it is a good episode with a nice pace, even though the ending seemed a bit abrupt. (There I go again, nitpicking!)

I better get out of here, now and get back to work on my CS comic strips.

[gojohnniegogo]

One of my favourites of the series it has to be said (by series, I mean all 26 episodes - it'll always be a single series in my eyes!). Some excellent scenes in this - my favourties being the fencing scenes (White/Scarlet, Scarlet/Lewis and the pipe-fighting bet. Scarlet/Lewis), the touching scene between Blue and Green where they're just talking in a beautifully lit area in sickbay - so dark and moody, but lit in exactly the right parts. And the jeep as Green pulls it to a stop - the tiny, tiny little bits of dirt on the windscreen - attention to detail or what!?

[adam]

ok, sorry! Anyway, i do love this one, its one off the few that blue shows an emotion in, its a mazing too see! I love the fight between scarlet and lewis, its fantastic!! And the practice with the colonel, very realiasitc

[shadokp]

The Story - This one had no surprises at all - seen it all before feel to it. This was the type of episode that would really help develop the characters on an ongoing basis. What this episode was lacking for a final Green moment when she comes to terms with her father's death and so on - it just ended abruptly.

The Animation - I too noticed the finger prints on the door buzzer - great detail - makes up for bouncy Mr. Lewis.

Other - Good to see a non Captain BLack episode once in a while. Why didn't Scarlet say anything when he had barbells thrown at him?

The Ongoing Tally -

Someone falling off ledge or cliff - 2 (Mr. Lewis - he fell twice)

On screen Death Count - 0 - Lewis died 15 years earlier so this new death probably doesn't count.

I love the idea that the series would deal with character developement and for that admire this episode but not one of my favorites.
KP

[Serena Lewis]

I think that they should have shown Green crying or whatever again at the end. Come on, she's obviously going to, she seemed so close to her father, and to lose him so quickly after finding him again...I'm babbling.
And also, shown Blue trying to comfort her. Blue hugging her...aww...

xx

[Father Unwin]

My impression is that there are many episodes of NCS where the first half of the show is better than the second half, and this is certainly one of them.

This 'tale of 2 halves' is perhaps understandable because, whereas there is tremendous freedom in building up the story, there seem to be quite a limited number of Mysteron threats and actions - chemical and biological weapons, exploding reactors, destroying Skybase, etc.

In this episode, the scene where the Rhino drives in the dark through the snow showers to the capsule is beautifully lit. This is followed by a tension-packed sequence where Scarlet checks out each of the cryo-tubes. The background music and voice work of Wayne Forester really adds to this truly gripping moment.

As far as plot accelerators are concerned, the most obvious one is perhaps when Commander Lewis is able to take possession of the anti-matter reactor by just triggering the security system. This has the added benefit of locking all personnel into their sectors so that they cannot disturb him.

A second, lesser accelerator is when Scarlet and Blue just suddenly appear out of the sky firing their machine guns wildly and somehow managing to miss both Commander Lewis and Serena!

Finally, I now realise that the base had another piece of kit that was even more impressive than the anti-matter reactor, namely the sticky tape dispenser!

This could be released from its concealed hiding place by a blow of the fist applied to a very large button. I'm not sure what the other attachment was but my guess is that it was some sort of top secret milkshake vending machine.

[James. C]

Greens cool driving. I don't know why, but I get a real...shiver when I watch that driving scene, and I don't when I watch any others. Hmm...

I agree with you there. That shooting at Lewis in the jeep always sends me shivers and same with in IoD1 where Scarlet is parachutteing and Blue on the Raid Bike, and also one other is the Rhino closing in on the nuclear site in Trap for a Rhino.

James

[Skybase Girl]

Have to admit now, I haven't had time this week to watch this one again, but I agree ( from memory ) with a lot of the posted comments.

Blue does indeed seem to carry a torch for Green and I think her laconic coolness is a good foil for his all-American military type aggression. Apologies if there are any members of the American military who might be members of this forum, it was just an observation !

I think, again from memory, that the official bios described Green as the daughter of an Afro-American and a Jamaican, which may be why her skin is lighter is lighter than her father's. Takes after her mother, obviously !

I did think she might have looked a bit more startled when Scarlet came up behind her and clamped his hand over her mouth. Yes, the ending was a bit sudden, but that seemed to be typical of a lot of the episodes. It was as if they ran out of time. I suppose there was a lot to cram in, which brings us back to the half hour/ hour argument.

[Serena Lewis]

The Official bio of Green says that her father is (was) an American astronaut, and her mother is a Trinidadian singer (Trinidad was part of Africa...wasn't it? My encyclopedia says so), thus making her African-American. It also says that she was born in Houston, Texas, so maybe that's where her father is from. Wait, no, that's where they launch the rockets and he hasn't got an accent...
I really don't know why I care...

I love the fact that more people are agreeing with my Green/Blue babble!

xx

[Gun-wielding Lombax]

Trinidad is not in Africa, but in the Carribean. It's one half of Trinidad and Tobago, a country whom, to me, are best known for nearly embarrassing England at the World Cup last year. The original Green was from that country as well, and I don't like the fact that in NCS, the character was changed to an American. Why? It's not as if Americans are underrepresented on TV.

Regarding the episode itself, I agree with Father Unwin that the first half is better than the second. Although even the first half is spoiled slightly by the scene where Lewis hypnotisies Gold and gives away (to the audience) that he's really a Mysteron. I have thought that this episode might have been better if, as in "Syrtis Major", The Mysterons played no part at all and Lewis actually wasn't a Mysteron. The episode could have focused on Spectrum's paranoia as, of course, they would suspect he was one. I don't think the DNA test alone would have been enough to convince them, because how often do thought-to-be-dead relatives of your officers just drop out of the sky like that? I think that would have been more compelling than Mysteron Lewis just happening to find a nuclear reactor, or whatever it was, to explode.

[MMK]

6. Fencing. Fabulous, really fabulous.

Why do you think i chose that picture as my avatar?

I couldn't really work out who was fencing to start off with but i was slightly suprised when i found out that Scarlet lost to White ... hence the saying (i've heard of): "you can't win them all"... I've not got ANYTHING against White though.

[Skybase Girl]

I believe that Trinidad is part of the West Indies, not Africa. NCS Lt Green's father is the black Afro-American part of the gene pool, while her mother is the West Indian part. I think that in OCS, the male Lt Green was simply portrayed as being Trinidadian and I cannot recall if any other details about his family were published in the likes of TV21, etc.

[Marion]

There is a biography for OCS Green - who was born in Trinidad and the eldest of a large family. He was in the WASPs at Marineville before Spectrum headhunted him. (Check out the website for further details)
The place of his birth and his love of music, seem to be the only similarities between him and ol' bush-baby eyes....

[Serena Lewis]

My Geography is...awful, to put it mildly. Why, oh, why did I take it for Higher Education???

Or maybe I've got an ancient encyclopedia or...something...

xx