Crusade 1.10 – The Memory of War

This episode starts with a minute or so of an ISN broadcast, just to remind everyone about the story back on Earth in case we had forgotten that there is a plague cure that needs finding. It feels like a filler to me. Perhaps the intro tease was too short so they needed to bulking it up.

Although I do like a good Galen episode it is probably a bit excessive to give him a slow motion walk as he boards the ship and heads into the meeting (no stealth hi? Most disappointing). Maybe the episode was running a bit short.

So Galen comes in and gives a cryptic message. The planet is not a place to visit but gives no information other than “it’s bad.” At least he is honest about what he knows (which is mostly nothing). That makes a change. Normally these guys withhold information from each other just for the fun of it.
People also seem to be a little smarter this week. They are taking precautions about what to do if they die (or making themselves valuable enough to force a rescue mission). Unfortunately, no one told the shuttle pilots that we were all being clever. Who in their right minds would attempt to enter the atmosphere of an strange planet in close formation? More sensible pilots might leave a gap giving more room to maneuver or react to attacks/turbulence.

Once on the planet, Dureena kindly decides to show us what the world looks like. The answer is a painful CGI failure of a planet which looks even worse when people move. Dureena manages to run and jumps at one speed and while travelling actually crosses the surface at another. I guess that is one of her special thief powers. Another one of her special thief powers is the ability to find just the right plot coupon when required. It turns out that the random crystal she finds is just one they need to explain the situation. If I was one of the last surviving members of my race and wanted to document our sudden catastrophic fall as a warning to anyone that might find the sight in years to come I probably wouldn’t hide that warning in a concealed location cross an invisible bridge off a high ledge up the top of a bland looking building.

Some random people die, Dr Chambers blames Galen (why can no one on this ship get along with each other?), and together they find a nano-virus. The image is only vague but the creator, obviously looking to protect his commercial interests has left a well defined glyph in-spite of the general image fuzziness.

23rd century scanning technology. Fuzzy on the outline but really good on the fine details

Galen goes to the planet and give an “I must do this alone” comment. At least he gives a good reason and not something stupid like honour. Of course Gideon then ignores Galen’s perfectly valid reasoning and decides that, as a potentially infected mad-man, he should follow Galen with a big gun, just in case he gets into some trouble. Still, as in matters outside of wanting to play the big hero is is still having a clever week and locks up the potential crazies in different rooms so that they can’t kill each other. Then he gives everyone guns so that everyone can kill each other more easily can protect themselves.

At the showdown time we get Dureena using her magical thief skills to throw knives at impossibly fast speeds. That throw covers 20 yards almost instantly. It is fast enough that Galen. Assuming a standard reaction time of 0.2 seconds that puts it close to 250 mph (and that doesn’t consider time taken to commence the throwing action up to actual release). It also shows how very strong he is because he takes a projectile travelling with about five times the kinetic energy of a pistol shot with barely a flinch. Luckily for the defenseless technomage it turns out that Gideon wasn’t crazy (as in homicidal crazy. He is still do stupid things crazy) and he is able to ride in to save the day.

Finally after all the running about we get something useful for the quest to the cure. The crew of the Excalibur now have a a technobabble shield. I am not entirely sure it is healthy to have Teflon particles floating around the lungs but it makes sense that it might work as a temporary protection. Cunningly it has lots of limitations so they can use it to ignore the prospect of infection one week and reintroduce the risk for the following episode if they want it to drive the conflict.

Overall, this a fairly good episode. It is quite good with the crew doing sensible things and the story progressing along. There is a nice mix of characterisation and action. Watching the episodes in this order some favours to the continuity. For a starter they are not using the virus shield before they use it (as opposed to the broadcast order). Additionally Galen is still a mysterious figure. We aren’t 10 episodes into the series so he should  that hasn’t could conceivably betray the crew at some point, making the Apocalypse box warning strike more deeply (although why Gideon trusts a spooky voice in a box more than the man that has saved his life multiple times is still unknown).

Number of stealth hi/byes = 3 (including a “Now I know what it feels like” when a hologram does it to Galen)

“Turn on the docking lights, clear away the breakables, I’m coming in”