The penultimate episode of ‘Death Valley,’ as well as the season as a whole, was a mixed bag. Both timelines started out strong, but deteriorated as the story continued, and only just managed to salvage some interest to lead into the final episode by showing the main characters gawking at the alien babies. While it’s always great to see parallels in dual timelines, two wrongs don’t make a right, and it was hard to genuinely enjoy and appreciate the good aspects when there were more negatives that kept demanding attention.

The start of the episode reveals the return of Mamie Eisenhower (Sarah Paulson, Ratched), which was rather anti-climactic considering the cliffhanger for this timeline from the last episode, but it seems that, due to the short runtime, they had no choice. It was a good way to force Eisenhower’s (Neal McDonough, The Flash) hand, though, so his decision was at least believable.

Cody Fern’s (Eden) Valiant Thor was an interesting addition as he seemed to have his own general agenda separate from the aliens, as he was far more open with Ike, though not necessarily to help him, but rather because he has a different perspective and outlook than the aliens he’s ultimately sided with; he really did seem to be the bridge between the humans and the aliens.

It will be interesting to learn exactly what he is, as he seems to be a robot built by the aliens to seem human, but there’s little to no information given about him, only that he’s there to keep an eye on things and seduce the First Lady of the United States, because when it comes to limited run time, the quick sex scene and subsequent argument was definitely necessary to further plot and character; it’s not as if there was an entire dinner scene where Mamie made it clear she was on the alien’s side and convinced Ike to create Area 51 or anything.

Speaking of Area 51, it was no surprise that it had to be included, and it was actually rather clever that not only was it made for these aliens, but was actually given to them to house the kidnapped citizens, but the true aspect to focus on is whether the September 2019 Area 51 Raid will be taking place during the finale and, furthermore, will it be the key to the college kids escaping? If it is, then the entire season is redeemed.

In all seriousness, though, this episode had so much potential. The 50’s timeline fully began to deteriorate the second Marilyn Monroe (Alisha Soper, Just Roll With It) began to be truly involved in the entire thing. It hadn’t been fully clear whether it was her in the second episode, but once they made it clear and subsequently killed her, it was all downhill for the rest of this section, which is truly a feat considering just how low the episode had already gotten.

As for the modern timeline, the continuation of Troy’s (Isaac Powell, Modern Love) scene in the hospital room with Theta (Angelica Ross, Pose) was very strong and narratively fascinating. It gave so much information about the aliens without someone explaining it outright, and the emotional range portrayed by Powell is by far the highlight of this episode and ‘Death Valley’ as a whole. The birth and immediate murder of his alien baby was horrific, but made all the more heartbreaking with how he had asked to help and hold his baby, then broke through Theta’s control to try and stop them because of the deep connection and love he felt for his child.

Even his lamentations after the birth to his friends about what had happened and how he felt was compelling and there was genuine heart and character in what was being said. But then Calico (Leslie Grossman, Love, Victor) came along and it all began to go downhill; although, the flashes where they showed her initial alien babies were actually interesting, as well as hearing her mindset of how she perceives herself and the entire system in order to survive, as it depicts the long-term psychological effects of being held captive and essentially enslaved for decades without any hope of an end. Unfortunately, they weren’t really interested in exploring any of that.

The issue all comes down to the constant inclusion of real people. This had happened with the last season as well, it had an interesting premise with compelling characters all on their own, but then they began to bog down all the dialogue with references to real life people, inserting them in the narrative to the point where it’s not a fun little joke or clever insertion, but an easy way to cheapen the entire episode and ruin the entire scene that was set up.

The key is moderation, which the creators of this season don’t seem to comprehend.

The JFK assassination being an inside job to keep him from revealing the truth about aliens was clever. It was fun, it made sense, that’s all fine. Even the use of Amelia Earhart was acceptable, she’s one of the biggest examples used as “proof” of aliens or other strange, otherworldly phenomena. The confirmation that the moon landing was fake was also an interesting addition, what with aliens being from space—though the explanation for why they faked it could have been far better—and the fact that Area 51 was made, not for the government to experiment and hide aliens, but for the aliens to experiment and hide their kidnapped test subjects, was actually a very smart way to flip the script while still keeping the essence of the overall joke.

But they should have stopped there.

Some credence can be given to small things, such as the revelation that aliens invented the microwave oven and the iPod, but those are items and fun little gags about technology and innovation, they’re not people. It was already a bit much when it was revealed Dwight Eisenhower was going to be the protagonist, and the only reason it was acceptable was because, when it comes to alien invasions, there’s always a demand of, “take me to your leader,” so of course they need the president. However, they didn’t necessarily need to make Nixon (Craig Sheffer, One Tree Hill) more than a fun little cameo, nor did they need to confirm the affair between Marilyn Monroe and Jack Kennedy (Mike Vogel, The Brave) that most of their target audience wouldn’t have even heard about. Same goes for needlessly inserting Steve Jobs, Stanley Kubrick, Buzz Aldrin, and Neil Armstrong into the narrative; if they wanted Calico to discover the moon landing, they could have had her story be the exact same, but that she was kidnapped the same way everyone else was, not because she learned the secret of the fake moon landing while she was trying to seduce two of the three astronauts from Apollo 11—the Michael Collins erasure makes this even more frustrating.

It made sense to have to introduce the new standing President to the secret alien treaty, so it’s understandable why Jack Kennedy had to be part of the narrative, as well as Lyndon B. Johnson (Karl Makinen, The Walking Dead), but the furthest they should have gone with the real life references should have been Presidents and others directly tied to them when it came to the government, because that’s the whole point. There was no need to have Marilyn Monroe’s death be a cover-up, or to have Steve Jobs be in Area 51 for no reason while everyone thinks he’s dead, or for Stanley Kubrick to have directed the moon landing; there was no need.

This is the exact problem they had in ‘Red Tide,’ which makes these references all the more frustrating, because while there aren’t as many in ‘Death Valley,’ the quota had already been used up and then some by ‘Red Tide,’ because not only did Sandra Bullock and Joaquin Phoenix need to try and be part of the fictional characters’ work, but Quentin Tarantino also needed to be directly in on the secret and kill people for their blood to make his films; not to mention the fifteen writers, directors, and actors Grossman’s character would reference in every other line she had.

Also, just like in ‘Red Tide,’ the constant belittling of Hollywood by the antagonist-leaning characters isn’t clever, it’s just annoying; the audience gets the irony at the first joke, there’s no need for any more.

Maybe the real reason why they made Tarantino a vampire in ‘Red Tide’ was to stand in solidarity with him when he faced backlash after portraying Bruce Lee in an unflattering light—one that was heavily misinformed and Western-centric, but that’s not the point—as this season has done the same, especially ‘Death Valley,’ with a majority of these people having already passed away; it’s actually all the more disgusting that they included Marilyn Monroe’s death, as the belief is she died from an overdose and was one of the first victims of the opioid epidemic, which ‘Red Tide’ directly referenced and used to try and make some kind of drug abuse commentary, but discarded after the second episode. It feels wrong to use people’s addictions and overdoses for a quick laugh, especially when the first half used the concept of drug addiction then forgot all about the real world impact as soon as their contrived “talent pill” narrative got away from them.

While some of these criticisms are aimed towards ‘Red Tide,’ they still apply to ‘Death Valley,’ and it’s honestly frustrating because these cheap jokes and references didn’t even need to be included. They don’t add value to the story in any way, they actually detract from it, as they focus all this limited run time on these references rather than developing their characters—even though some of their characters include actual Presidents of the United States—or developing the alien species they invented, or the relationship between the aliens and the humans in ways that don’t use dead people; aliens accidentally inventing grilled cheese would be more interesting than having to watch a woman be assaulted in her home and have her addiction be used against her as large men hold her down.

In fact, an extended sex scene between Valiant Thor and Mamie Eisenhower would have been far more compelling and relevant to the narrative than those unnecessary references, which goes to show just how much of a shame this constantly recurring trope is.

Overall, if ignoring all the cheap jokes and references, this episode was good, though even then it had potential to go even further and be great, so it was something of a disappointment with a few gems hidden in between, though that’s not necessarily a surprise. With only one episode left, it will be interesting to see how this all concludes; for the sake of this show, they better have included the Area 51 Raid, because that’s a reference that would actually be clever to include.

Rating: 6.5/10