First Wave
"The Trial Of Joshua Bridges"

Airdate: August 27, 2000

Reviewing this week's installment of First Wave is almost pointless, as "The Trial of Joshua Bridges" was a thinly veiled attempt to save some money by doing a flashback filled episode. While I realize that another episode probably ate up the budget, an idea as complex as Joshua being tried as a traitor by the other Gua deserved more time and care.

Did you notice that Joshua's gun is bigger than Cade's? Hmmm...

Yes, that's right. Gua-turned-human-sympathizer, Joshua Bridges, as seen at the end of "Rubicon", was arrested and charged with treason by his fellow Gua. They cited his continued assistance of Subject 117 -- that's Cade Foster to you and me -- as proof of his human sympathies. In defiance, Joshua charges his accusers with being traitors to the original tenets put down by the first Gua-head, the one who helped them fight against an invasion of their own planet so many years ago.

Since the judicial system rarely ever answers charges like that with, "Hmmm... You know, you may have a point there." Joshua is sentenced to re-alignment and then to have his essence uploaded into one of those nifty silver balls where it will remained imprisoned for a while. Which means that we get to see Roger Cross nearly butt nekkid for a while. And I thought Sebastian Spence was impressive without his shirt. Ha!

During this re-alignment, Foster breaks into the supposedly abandoned warehouse -- which he and Eddie found by tracking a big drain on the city's power grid -- and rescues the almost brainwashed Joshua. Acting as a half kidnapper-half rescuer, Cade has to undo the damage that the Gua have done to his oft-time savior. But it's not as easy as it looks. Through a series of flashbacks, the two try to come to terms with what is really going on with the invasion and in the end Joshua breaks through the mental cleansing that he has been subjected to and joins Foster in a firefight against a slew of Gua operatives.

Well, almost.

In the end, a funny thing happens when they upload Joshua into the little silver ball and download a real baddie, Caine, into his husk. It was all a dream, see? (Insert snort of disgust here.) Anyway, maniacal laughter aside, I suspect that more than a little bit of Joshua still exists in that hunk of a husk.

As I said before, I really dislike the idea of a flashback filled episode, especially for a plot development as important as this one. But if the budget dictated it, so be it. However, that doesn't give them leave to get sloppy.

Surprise, surprise. They got sloppy.

Imaginary-Cade, during their discourse, spoke of adventures that Joshua was not involved in and should therefore have no knowledge of. In other words, he told himself stuff that he never knew. And that just reeks of sloppy writing.

-- Linda M. Najera

First Wave airs at 7pm EST, Sundays on The Sci Fi Channel.

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