Episode Studies by Clayton Barr enik1138 at popapostle dot com |
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"Visitors' Choice" Written by David Braff Directed by Gilbert Shilton
In an attempt to curb Resistance
strikes within the open city, Nathan Bates imposes a dusk-to-dawn curfew on all citizens and a death penalty for possession
of firearms; the Visitors introduce a new food processor. Didja Know? I'm not sure why this episode is called "Visitors' Choice" unless it's a play on words of the coffee brand Taster's Choice, since the episode features the Visitors' introducing a new method of processing humans for food. Didja Notice? The Freedom Network report tells of battles against the Visitors in Texas in the Rio Grande Valley, Brownsville and at the Alamo (which is destroyed in the battle). Touching on the new food processing theme of this episode, the aliens have established food processing centers in Dallas, El Paso and San Antonio. Newscaster Howard K. Smith refers to Texas as the former Lone Star State. Why former? Within the waging of the war is it no longer considered part of the U.S.?The Freedom Network posthumously awards Miguel Ramirez for blowing up the Alamo! (He did it rather than let it fall into Visitor hands. As Seth Meyers would say, REALLY!?! Is it that important to keep the Visitors away from it that a national shrine should be destroyed instead?)
The new machine for processing humans for food is called an encapsulator. The Visitors' food processing meeting takes place at Playa del Mar. This town on the California coast is fictional. Nathan Bates sarcastically jokes that he's St. Francis of Assisi. St. Francis (1182-1226) was the founder of the Catholic order of the Franciscans and is known as the patron saint of animals and the environment. In this episode, in response to resistance attacks against the Visitors in Los Angeles, Bates declares a 9:00 p.m. dusk-to-dawn curfew in the city and that possession of firearms is now punishable by death. Presumably these ordinances remain in place for the rest of Los Angeles' (brief) existence as an open city. After escaping from Mr. Chaing, Kyle takes Elizabeth and Robin to hide out at the flat of his friend, Mongo. Mongo is not home, but Kyle lets himself and his friends in anyway to spend the night. Mongo must be an artist because his flat has several large painted canvases leaning against one wall, a couple of head sculptures, a small human body figure, etc. Kyle reveals that his father has repossessed his house. Presumably it was retaliation for Kyle walking out on him in the previous episode ("The Sanction"). At 11:37 on the DVD, we see a previously unseen visitor weapon, a large, mounted laser rifle.  Kyle is apparently a bit of a world traveler. He comments to Elias that he has been to London, Paris, and Monte Carlo. Perhaps the travel was for motorcycle races he participated in. While spying on the Visitors' meeting house in Playa del Mar, Julie spots a Visitor wearing gold chains around his neck (like a gangsta!). She says he is General Maxwell Larson (the "Butcher of Birmingham"). And she sees another Visitor, Mary Krueger (the "Dark Angel of Dallas"). Why would a Visitor have a first and last name? Most of them have just one human name. Did they pass themselves off as humans at some point in the past? Or is it just an affectation on their part? The Visitor called Mary Krueger, the "Dark Angel of Dallas", is played by Sybil Danning. She was a well-known queen of B-movies at the time V was made.  A slight flub seems to occur at 20:59 on the DVD. As Mary Krueger prepares her demonstration of the encapsulator, a man under the influence of the Visitors' procorb drug willingly steps into the processor frame and, as the camera follows Mary to activate the device, we can just see on the left of frame that the man steps out of the processor again before she pushed the remote control button to activate it! I assume he was supposed to step out after he was no longer in camera view, but why was it necessary for him to step out at all until the entire shot was complete? It's not like it was a real encapsulator with lasers to instantly slice and dice humans! OR WAS IT??! While describing her new processor, Mary Krueger comments that the need for freeze-drying has been eliminated. Freeze-drying? It's been stated before in the series that the Visitors eat only live or freshly killed meat. Whether that is due entirely for health reasons or just their preference is unknown. If just preference, they may have come to the realization, due to the shortages on their own planet, that they will have to change some of their eating and food-keeping habits. This may explain some similar comments about food preparation in the chronologically earlier story of the novel The Alien Swordmaster.
Mr. Chaing uses his "persuasive" techniques on a captured resistance member named Fisher and succeeds in getting information from him. Chaing also informs Bates that Fisher died while they were discussing the matter and the morally ambiguous Bates does not seem perturbed by this. The Boddicker brothers in Playa del Mar comment that commodities like coffee, milk, and sugar are luxuries around there. Presumably this is true in all Visitor-held territories. When Elias is explaining to Robin and Elizabeth that Kyle went with Tyler for some business up the coast, Willie adds, "Yes. They are playing del Mar." He is trying to say they went to Playa del Mar, but why would he mess up the name when he already knows it and spoke it correctly while reading the Visitor documentation folder they took from Raoul? Maybe Willie really is dumb as Caleb Taylor commented in the novel The Pursuit of Diana! It's also possible that Willie just likes to intentionally flub words to amuse his friends. Is it just me, or does this Visitor guard look like he could use a shave and a haircut? Do the Visitors have dermoplast that duplicates a human male's 5 o'clock shadow?!  After killing the Visitor guard, for some reason there appears to be a twig sticking up from his chest along with the crossbow bolt as the Boddicker brothers drag his body into the brush from 34:00-34:03 on the DVD.  When Elizabeth uses her psychic powers to blow out the light bulbs in the interrogation room to help Kyle escape at 38:52-38:57 on the DVD, it appears the same image of an exploding light bulb is used 5 times with each proceeding image just slightly zoomed in from the one before to make it look different. At one point Diana offers the guests some hors d'oeuvres in the form of a tray of live insects! Wouldn't the insects tend to just crawl away? As the Visitors sit down for dinner, we see that Diana is wearing glitter in her hair and multiple colors of mascara on her eyelids. The Visitors seem to have quite a penchant for mimicking the 80's human culture of the time!  From 41:06-41:24 on the DVD, Donovan enters a room in the Visitor meeting house and immediately walks over to what appears to be a bed and seems to pick up a pouch or bag to look inside it. But then the door begins to open and, startled, he drops it. It turns out to be just Tyler and Barry entering. But then Donovan urges them all to go looking for the absent Julie and they leave the room without whatever that pouch was. What was the pouch all about? At 41:54 on the DVD, the gun that Julie had set down on the kitchen counter earlier is now in a slightly different location even though no one has touched it. At the end of the episode, the resistance makes off with yet another Visitor skyfighter! I've noticed throughout these episodes that the resistance constantly uses Earth guns and bullets in their battles. They must have a number of Visitor laser weapons stockpiled by now, why not use them? They would be much more effective against shock trooper armor and allow the humans to conserve bullets which cost a lot of money and deplete their supplies. The real reason they use regular guns is that the laser bolt special effect costs the producers about $1000 a shot, but bullets shots are invisible and free!
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