After a return to form with a stunning burst of action and good writing amidst that in episode 5, the follow-up to it flops so limply it breaks any momentum the show may have had. Littered throughout with lazy writing and a near total misunderstanding of pace, this episode fulfils one of my greatest fears, which the previous episodes had managed to avoid. This fear is simple: that the show would eventually lose it's balance among the multiple storylines it had to juggle, and crash. Bowker proves here that he shouldn't have written this show alone, without additional assistance.
Along with an unstated (though estimated 2 weeks or so) time jump, comes several massive leaps in logic, such as a French ambulance team who was allowed onto Dunkirk beach to take casualties and then transported them all the way to Paris, through German lines, which is Bowker's transparently contrived method to bring the Webster and Tom storylines together so he could save some time. Other logic leaps include Tom and his French escort teleporting through Nazi occupied Paris, Nazi occupied France, all of Vichy France, and over the Pyrenees without any trouble, even though Tom's scenes show him to be a bit of an idiot, and he has no French speaking capacity. The show makes it seem as though it's a trip that took them less than a week, even though they don't have any form of transport that we see. Very shoddy writing. Also missing here is character development, with Lois stagnating after a bunch of pointless scenes where she simply acts annoyed and does little else, Webster and Albert still remaining very dull characters, spending half the episode almost as though the Nazis have not barged into France while the two of them served on the front lines. Their plotline was already weak, and it weakens further here as Webster goes from running away from drunk Germans in his house to proclaiming confidently that the Germans won't touch him because he's American. More pointless scenes ensue as Stieber gives Webster the camp's location, where more useless scenes occur. Without any characters that have a deeper personality or indeed anything interesting to do or say, this is a plotline that really should've been cut completely or partially, especially given the massive amount of screentime it was given in this episode. Imagine if we'd had an episode where we replaced the Paris plotline with Kasia's resistance reacting to the German celebrations once they took Paris, or with Tom being rescued by deserters hiding behind the lines, or even with him and some others in a boat without power in the middle of the Channel? Or hell, just dedicate the time to giving more development to the established characters, instead of speedrunning everything into quick scenes that have no impact at all, like Hilda's mother standing on a table to repeat a line, which looked so dumb it pulled me out of the show.
Even if the scenes were well written, the pacing is horrible, all over the place, meaning that none of the show flowed and it was hard to get into any of the scenes at all, no matter how well done the sets, actors, special effects and wardrobe, other realistic features (like Germans speaking German as though have throughout), and not even some good direction and camera work could really get me back into the episode.
Really hoping for better in the next episode and the prospective next season; there are really solid parts of these storylines and some good ideas, but in this mess, it's looking more and more like it might not be enough, although this has been far and away the worst offender of this season, while previous episodes have ranged from average to excellent.
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