"Target 117"
Airdate: January 9, 2000

A meteor that has crashed into the Earth hides the essence of one of the most talented Gua acolytes ever created. Lucas (Rena Mero - the non-actress formerly known as the WWF's Sable), a former student of Joshua (Roger R. Cross), is placed in a specially grown human husk which contains 60% more of the Gua DNA. Her mission? To test and evaluate the warrior potential of Cade Foster (Sebastian Spence) as a representative of the human race. The results of this trial will influence the decision as to whether the Gua proceed with the next step in taking over the planet or continue to undermine the foundation of our civilization until a better opportunity presents itself.

In this first installment of the second season, Crazy Eddie (Rob LaBelle) and Cade Foster are still unlocking the secrets of Nostradamus' quatrains and fending off the aliens. It's still a decent idea, but as the final episodes of last season showed, there needs to be some life breathed into the formula.

Okay, so perhaps "Target 117" isn't your standard Cade-finds-alien-experiment-and-exposes/destroys-it episode, but that's not to say it's an improvement.

First of all, someone near the top needs to learn the meaning of the word subtlety.

Shots of uber-wench Lucas fending off the bright lights surrounding the containers were force-fed (read: recycled) to the audience so many times I had to wonder how much was a result of underestimating the average viewer's intelligence and how much was just filler. And then there were the Bionic Woman shots. You know, where Lucas tucked a strand of her perfectly styled hair behind her ear and listened to Cade from a distance? How many times did we have to see that?

Yeah. They're going to use her heightened senses against her. I get it now so stop with the blatant visual cues, damnit.

And while it was nice to see that Crazy Eddie can actually leave his womb... er... I mean his trailer, it grated on my nerves to learn that he screamed like a girl. All he needed was a dog named Scooby. And some smart girl named Velma. And some hot chick named Daphne. And Cade would have to wear an ascot. What? Oh. Sorry. I got off topic. So Eddie is paranoid, sure, but he's also one of the good guys. Give the man some dignity, okay?

Perhaps the greatest tragedy however is the lackluster hero, Cade Foster. In the first season Spence played Cade as balancing on a knife edge, but in this first outing of Season 2, he seems to be sleepwalking through the part. Of course it's not like his acting chops are being challenged by a guest star who sounds like she's had to spend a lot of time practicing how to pronounce any words in her lines made up of more than three syllables. However, that's no excuse for phoning in a performance.

Unless she threatened to beat him senseless with her breasts. The same breasts that seemed to almost knock her off balance during a running scene. In that case, I forgive him because to tell you the truth they scared me and it isn't like I haven't got impressive cleavage of my own.

All in all "Target 117" was a pretty disappointing effort. I will continue to hope for the best though because I'm pretty sure Sebastian Spence still looks good in a form-fitting t-shirt and pictures from later eps show him wearing cammies. Yum!

-- Linda M. Najera

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