Review: Debris – Solar Winds s01e03

As it moves onto episode three, ‘Solar Winds’, Debris is definitely finding its feet a little, but still has a long way to go.  *Warning! Spoilers Ahead!*

Fairly early on in this episode you get the distinct impression that a corner has been turned and there is a sense of rhythm that is being established.  At the same time though, there is more and more of the influence of Fringe being stamped on the show, which seems much more overt than is entirely comfortable.  While it is understandable to a degree, bearing in mind creator J.H. Wyman’s past work on Fringe, Debris needs to define itself as its own thing.

At the core of this week’s episode there is a pretty solid mystery that is a little bit ‘Close Encounters’, and a little bit ‘The 4400’.  In the middle of a field in Ohio, a lone telecoms engineer discovers a strange shimmering rectangle with figures inside.  Sort of like an Earth-bound Phantom Zone.  The team are duly despatched, but as soon as they arrive it blinks out of existence.  More accurately, it ceases to be visible.

What is particularly interesting is that there doesn’t seem to be any debris nearby, so they actually have to investigate it and come up with some kind of theory on their own.  There’s no simple, ‘just switch off the debris and let’s move on’ this week!  It’s this kind of development that will help steer this show away from becoming a ‘debris of the week’ procedural and give the narrative a bit more meat on the bone.

As leads, Finola (Riann Steele) and Bryan (Jonathan Tucker) are gelling quite well as a team, and they both have substantial input to the initially confusing situation before them.  There’s no ‘X-Files’ style believer and sceptic for instance, although Finola is more likely to be open minded than Bryan, who still does have his moments in that regard.

A lot of that attitude is no doubt due to her upbringing with her scientist Father (Tyrone Benskin), who she still doesn’t know is actually alive.  That is an ongoing undercurrent of the plot this week, with Bryan still under orders not to tell Finola the truth about her Father that the CIA has uncovered.  The longer this continues, the worse the eventual fallout between them will be, so for the longevity of the series you hope they do it soon!

There are quite a few conspiracy type subplots being established that could easily take its place anyway, so it’s not critical for the show that they keep up this charade.  For instance, there is clearly something shady going on between Bryan’s handler Maddox (Norbert Leo Butz) and the Russian Tarkelov (Dmitry Chepovetsky – Re:Genesis, Killjoys) that is beyond the usual practice.  The mysterious ‘Influx’ have still not really shown their hand yet either, so there’s a major player that we don’t really know much about.

In ‘Solar Winds’ they make a brief appearance when Bryan and Finola finally discover the debris, but it’s only a fleeting visit for Ash (Scroobius Pip) and his friends.  It’s left hanging quite how ‘Influx’ were ahead of the CIA in locating the debris, which is an intriguing breadcrumb they’ve dropped for future episodes.  Once the CIA do find it, they do actually use it in an interesting way, which makes some sense in this narrative.  It could so easily have followed a simpler path, but instead they actually work it into theorising about the functions of the alien craft it came from.

So all together this was a much better week in terms of balance and rhythm than the first two episodes.  There is most certainly a way this can develop into its own thing and shake off the Fringe similarities, but that may take a little time.  On the basis of what we’ve seen so far though, it deserves the time and the chance to do so.