Death March

"Death March"
Season 2, Episode 8

Episode	Eighteen
Air date	August 5th, 2012
Written by	Heather V. Regnier
Directed by	Seith Mann
US Viewers	3.34 million
Episode Guide
previous "Molon Labe"	next "The Price of Greatness"
Cast Guide
Starring
Noah Wyle as Tom Mason Moon Bloodgood as Anne Glass Drew Roy as Hal Mason Maxim Knight as Matthew Mason Seychelle Gabriel as Lourdes Delgado Peter Shinkoda as Dai Sarah Carter as Margaret Mpho Koaho as Anthony Colin Cunningham as John Pope Will Patton as Daniel F. Weaver
Also Starring
Ryan Robbins as Tector Murphy Dale Dye as Jim Porter

"Death March" is the 18th episode of Falling Skies and the eighth episode of the second season. It was written by Heather V. Regnier and helmed by new director viewers.

Plot Synopsis

The 2nd Mass pushes on to Charleston. Weaver learns more about Tector’s background from before the invasion. Hal learns about Maggie's dark past.

Plot

As the convoy continues on its trek to Charleston, Tom reminisces about letting Ben leave the group. Matt asks him to hang onto a will he just wrote out, assuring him that no one is going to die, Tom comforts the boy telling him they’ll reach their destination soon. Meanwhile at the front of the convoy, Tector rides with Weaver, Weaver intent on figuring out what he can’t put his finger on about Tector.

In an advanced scouting truck, Hal tries to prove that he can be a dark person to Maggie, who cheerfully chides him as they ward off Pope’s crass humor from the flatbed of the vehicle. Meanwhile Weaver sees through Tector’s simple country boy facade to realize that Tector must have been in the military, and as he explains why that would damage their trust something dives into the path of the truck! The convoy stops to find that they’ve hit a little harnessed girl, the impact having apparently disabled the harness. Thankfully, she’s only unconscious as the group reluctantly agrees to take her in. Just then, she wakes and asks for her brother Tyler, though no one knows what she means

Up ahead, Hal and Maggie’s truck begins to overheat, and Pope directs them toward a nearby river. Tom wonders over the little, slowly mutating girl, what the world will do with the millions of harnessed children if the Skitters should ever leave the planet, but Anne assures him that they’d find ways to adjust. Apprehensive about her appearance, Matt pays a visit to the girl, now calling herself Jenny, whose ravenous hunger has returned after so much time spent harnessed.

Hal and Maggie’s truck comes to a halt, and Pope inspects the engine to determine that the radiator hose has a leak. After sending Hal off to retrieve the water, Pope tersely questions Maggie over what she plans to tell Hal about her dark past. She counters that very little good comes from digging up the past, but pope challenges her to sack up and tell the truth. Meanwhile back at the convoy, Matt lets slip to the girl their plans to go to Charleston, despite her eerie insistence that she loves her Skitter “Guardian,” and misses her equally scaly “brother.” Matt begs her to come to Charleston with them, where he suggests they too could be a family, and she says “maybe.” Just then, she senses her brother Tyler’s presence, and we see the scaly tyke clinging to the bus. The creature soon disappears, and the group agrees to keep moving.

Back on the road, Maggie seems distant, and Hal’s prodding leads her to finally tell her story. Sure, she was in the hospital a few years ago, but what she never previously told anyone was that she became a heroin addict afterward, who turned to breaking into homes with her boyfriend for things to sell. When she got caught and sent to prison, she discovered she was 3 months pregnant. She carried the baby to term, but never saw him after that.

With little word from Maggie or Hal, the group makes a decision about the best road to Charleston, but suddenly “Tyler” appears once more looking for his sister Jenny. Her harness reactivates, and she easily breaks her restraints, and overpowers anyone in her path, fleeing into the woods. When Matt comes too, Tom comforts his son by assuring him that Ben won’t abandon them for the skitters permanently. Down the hall, Lourdes snaps at Anne when the patient she’d been treating dies on the table.

Hal and Maggie reason that they should catch up to the group soon, when all of a sudden their truck is surrounded by blinding lights!

Back with the 2nd Mass. Tector comes clean to Weaver that he doesn’t want to stay in Charleston knowing how he’d failed as a Marine, getting his squad ambushed and failing to protect Boone the other week. Weaver assures him that the deaths weren’t his fault, as Tector slams on the brakes, arriving at a destroyed Charleston.

Other Cast

Co-Starring

Olivia Steele-Falconer as Jenny

Uncredited

Deaths

Wounded Man

Significant Events

The 2nd Massachusetts Militia Regiment arrives at Charleston, South Carolina to find the city destroyed.
Colonel Porter is shown to have survived, and made it to South Carolina where he is now a part of national resistance force, known as the 1st Continental Army.
Margaret opens up to Hal about her past which includes: drugs, robbery, prison, and a son.
First Appearance of Continental Army.

Trivia

The plotline with the harnessed girl they pick up is never brought up again in Season 2.
This episode is what people in TV production call a "bottle episode" - an episode using a minimal number of sets, locations, and special effects to save production costs for a different episode. "Mutiny" in season one was much the same idea. Note how almost the entire episode takes place at night in vehicles, allowing them to film in the vehicles on a soundstage, which is a lot cheaper than taking the production out on location. The only real special effects needed are the girl's brother (only seen through the window), and the very end of the episode where they are outside and arrive in Charleston.


		Falling Skies Season 2
#01	Worlds Apart		#09	"The Price of Greatness"
#02	Shall We Gather at the River		#10	"A More Perfect Union"
#03	Compass
#04	Young Bloods
#05	Love and Other Acts of Courage
#06	Homecoming
#07	Molon Labe
#08	Death March