The Last Wave:
Written by: Melissa Rosenberg
Directed by: Steve Beers
Original airdate: January 4, 1997
Synopsis:
A surfer named Nat dances with his girlfriend, Gina, but when he notices the waves rising, he instantly wants to surf, instead of talking about his future with her. He rushes to get his friend Dewey but Dewey is desperately pouring lotion all over his body and scratching at his skin, trying to get rid of something that isn’t there in reality, but rather only in his mind. As he collapses to the floor after ingesting insecticide, Nat finds him and goes for help.
John and Kim arrive in LA after hearing about what happened to Dewey, an old friend of theirs from their younger days and are shocked to see their other old friend Nat had dropped out of marine biology to become a lifeguard. While John and Nat go to catch up, Kim answers Nat’s phone, talking with the funeral home director saying that men from the coroner’s office want to take Dewey’s body. Kim goes to investigate, unknowingly watched from afar, and discovers that the men were not from the coroner's office but from Majestic. As she leaves, she notices a man in her rear view mirror watching her with a camera, but doubles back around and confronts him at gunpoint. He reveals his name as Jim, a film student making a film about the truth, indicating he has footage of the men who arrived to take Dewey’s body.
John tries talking with Nat about Dewey but he doesn’t have a whole lot to offer besides being busy with school.
While John and Kim walk along the beach at night. Discussing the day's events, they are shocked to see the beach covered in dead and dying fish. The beach is closed down, with the official story being the fish died from overflow sewage from the treatment plant being dumped into the ocean. Gina is upset by this news, since they are always out there in the ocean, but Nat seems unconcerned, with John backing her up.
Jim shows Kim his film, which shows shots of men in a boat extracting something from fish and Dewey being taken into an ambulance. When the shots of Dewey being taken from the morgue appear, Kim recognizes the fake coroners as the men on the boat from the earlier shot, with Jim commenting that he found out the boat is registered to the treatment plant.
Nat agrees to look at one of the fish that John found, but he concludes that it’s simply a dead fish. Kim arrives home and talks with Gina and she shares her feelings about her and Nat, and his refusal to grow up.
John and Kim go to investigate the treatment plant with Jim accidentally scaring them when he shows up to join them and together they break in, breaking on through, to the other side, so to speak. Once in, they hear some men talking in the Hive language before realizing that a huge wave of sewage is being released and they run, but are eventually washed out with it.
After Gina walks out on Nat the next morning, he looks at the water samples John and Kim obtained and finds the water contains a synthetic living cell feeding on bacteria, and they realize that human bodies contain water and natural bacteria. They theorize that this could be an experimental new way of implantation. As they drive to Jim’s, Gina is seen in the background, scratching at her skin. Jim shows them more footage of a tour he took at the sewage plant and they see that it seems like the plant is sending shipments all around the world.
Meanwhile, on the beach, Dewey’s body washes ashore, and Nat finds it, seeing that the kidneys were cut out. He demands to know what is going on, finding out that Kim knew about what happened at the funeral home. Their conversation is cut short when they hear Gina screaming and rush inside to see her trying to cut her skin, to get out the maggots she believes to be under it.
Nat says that the cell he found in the water will die out with exposure to DDT, being removed from salt water, or being starved by removing all the bacteria via antibiotics. Nat is adamant that he can’t save Gina, preferring to send her to the hospital, but John convinces him to do something because the hospital won’t help in time. He instead calls a friend who has more doctors knowledge than him and they manage to stabilize Gina.
John, Kim, and Jim sneak back into the plant, and while attempting to find the controls, are attacked by Hive agents. The group fights, eventually subduing the agents and managing to turn on the plants’ controls.
As the trio heads out to stop the trucks, they find themselves facing Albano who raises his gun and shoots one of the plant men behind them. He tells them that the Hive was trying to change human body chemistry to make them part of their food chain.
Nat tells John the next day that he is going to go back to school, determined to better himself and keep an eye on the ocean, especially after hearing that Majestic poured a ton of DDT into the ocean to kill the Hive cells, blaming it on a chemical company, as part of their cover story. Meanwhile, Jim finds himself forced by Majestic to give them his camera, exposing his film to light, ruining the footage of all he had captured at the plant.
History As We Know It:
Director Steve Beers also directed on Seaquest 2032, episode “Weapons of War.”
Jim Morrison, of the Doors, was indeed a film student and was described by one of his teachers, as narcissistic, and already possessing the laid back, neck cinched swagger that he became known for. He did make several short films, but all of them were lost, save for one silent movie which starred his girlfriend at the time, mainly consisting of just various shots of her.
Officials from The US Environmental Protection Agency determined that acid waste from the nation's largest manufacturer of DDT—a pesticide so powerful it poisoned birds and fish—had not been contained in hundreds of thousands of sealed barrels. Most of the waste, according to newly unearthed information, had been poured directly into the ocean from massive tank barges.
Regulators discovered that from the 1930s to the early 1970s, 13 other areas off the Southern California coast had also been approved for dumping of military explosives, radioactive waste, and various chemical and refinery byproducts—including 3 million metric tons of petroleum waste
Montrose Chemical was the nation’s largest manufacturer of DDT, located in Los Angeles. Starting in 1947 and continuing through 1961 (and perhaps even later), the company instructed its employees to transport barrels of DDT and acid sludge waste and dump them into the ocean.
The Enemy Within:
Written by:
Story by: Bryce Zabel and Brent V. Friedman
Teleplay by : Brad Markowitz
Directed by: Jim Charleston
Original airdate: January 11, 1997
Synopsis:
A man, later revealed to be Ray Loengard, John’s brother, camping in a tent, awakens to a strong wind around him, and a shadow of a Grey approaching his tent. Suddenly a light from a hovering hive ship pulls aside his tent and the grey approaches the man holding out a ganglion.
As the Warren Commision gets underway, John and Kim head to his childhood home to gather up some savings bonds he had saved.
Elsewhere, Steele hijacks an agent who gets him into the Majestic headquarters. Inside, Allen Dulles and Bach watch the Oswald assassination footage and Dulles wants to know why he wasn’t told about Steele’s involvement earlier, with Bach telling him that it’s his job to keep the commission from asking questions about Majestic and staying focused on the Oswald as the single shooter theory. Meanwhile, Steele goes to retrieve documents in the JFK assassination but is interrupted by Albano. A fight ensues with Albano getting shot and Steele running off before Albano can sound the alarm.
Upon arriving home, John and Kim are welcomed warmly, save for his father, Dick, who is slightly cold, explaining it away as just not expecting them, while Ray seems nervous and distracted. The family asks them what is going on, but they tell them they just have to trust them for now, leaving Ray cold to them. John’s sister Lucy later explains to Kim that John saved his older brother long ago from drowning and became a hero, and reasons that Ray felt bad about that, that John was suddenly the favorite and number one son, in turn building up resentment.
Bach and Albano wonder why Steele would be here to retrieve documents, with Bach reasoning that the Hive is as worried as them about what the Warren Commission may know and says it’s time to get Loengard back. Bach tries to appeal to Steele over the intercom, as he hides in a restroom, sewing up his own gunshot wounds. Majestic begins canvassing the building in a game of cat and mouse but as usual, Steele escapes.
John catches Ray in his car who explains he was looking for a key to the trunk and the two end up arguing. Later John tries to bond with Ray but he leaves to hang out by the river, thinking back to when he was saved. John tries to talk with him, hoping they can make up and move forward, telling him they may not get another chance. As John starts to walk away, Ray talks about himself in the third person, revealing that he’s been implanted.
John and Kim sneak up on Ray and overhear an agent telling him to not let John leave. Kim tells him what she remembers from her abduction in hopes of getting him to submit to the ART but he tries to get away, leading to a fight with John that is broken up by their father. John talks with his father and explains what has been going on. His father seemingly believes him, offering to get him to the bank now, but it’s a ruse to have him arrested and sent in for psychiatric evaluation.
Steele makes it to the Loengard farm and talks with Ray to find out where John is, telling Ray he needs to touch the sphere of light so he will finally be ready while Dick, who had seen Steele arrive, goes and checks his car, finding John’s top secret files.
Kim, with Lucy’s help, manages to break John out, pretending that John is attacking her and then getting a gun off of the officer who comes to save her. As they drive away, Majestic agents chase them but Lucy drives a car in between them, blocking them.
John heads down to the river to try and save Ray and sees Steele with the sphere of light, running to him and tackling him before he can touch it. Steele holds John at gunpoint and gives Ray a gun to shoot his brother, but Ray is still not completely taken over and refuses, causing Steele to shove him aside and take aim. Ray tackles Steele, causing John to be shot in the leg, but Steele recovers and shoots Ray, when Kim screams, distracting Steele, as Dock fires a shot at Ray, knocking him back into the water and into the river.
John and Dick hold Ray, telling him he saved his life, before he finally succumbs to his wounds and dies. John apologizes but Dick says he should have believed him and tells him to go before Majestic shows up and he loses another son. As he goes to leave, the ganglion leaves Ray’s mouth and Dick takes aim and kills it.
Bach questions John’s father but he isn’t extremely helpful, and Bach is surprisingly kind about it.
As John and Kim drive away, a car follows close behind them with another appearing in front of them, trapping them. The men get out of their car and reveal themselves to be from Attorney General Kennedy’s office and that they were sent there to protect them.
History As We Know It:
Director Jim Charleston also directed 2 episodes of Lois and Clark, episodes “Lethal Weapon” and “Virtually Destroyed”, and on Sliders “Exodus Part 1.”
Dick Loengard was Kent McCord. He’s known primarily for playing Jim Reed in several series: Dragnet, Adam-12, The D.A., The New Adam-12, and Emergency. He did appear in 10 episodes of Farscape and Galactica, and had a role in Airplane II: The Sequel. We’ve seen him in 5 episodes of SeaQuest where he played Commander Scott Keller.
Sean O’Bryan played Ray and we’ve seen him before in Quantum Leap: Running For Honor where he played Philip Ashcroft. He has a huge list of credits, mostly secondary roles and one-offs, though he did star in several series that only lasted one season such as Pig Sty (A friends style setup), Brother’s Keeper (football bro comes to live with his brother) and Abby (woman breaks up with boyfriend, but keeps their apartment together because of rent control, features Sean as her boss). He was a main cast member in season 1 of Persons Unknown as well (strangers wake up imprisoned in a ghost town and search for answers and each other’s motives).
Resources:
For more information on Dark Skies, please check out these great resources of information.
Dark Skies IMDb
https://needtoknow.today
Dark Skies Wiki
There is a full playlist of Dark Skies episodes. Account is active as of Dec 2022.
Contact Us:
Send in your feedback to TheRewatchPodcast@gmail.com
Follow the show on Facebook or Instagram
Support the Show:
Head over to our TeePublic and/or Redbubble stores today and buy some merch! Every item sold sees a small return to us, and covers our hosting costs. We appreciate every purchase.
No comments:
Post a Comment