As we look forward to this week’s The Categories of Life we already know that death will return in some form and that the overflow camps are a bad thing.

As usual I have avoided spoilers but I have indulged in some debate about how poor the computer theft sequence was last week. In no particular order mistakes included:

• There would have been CCTV
• The trays are heavy
• Why plug in the cables so neatly if you are going to fake a fire
• Why fake a fire unless you are going to torch large parts of the room
• The security system and the expert were poor - in real machine rooms engineers / maintenance come in all the time to fix things
• Presumably the dead body will be a give away that something is up?

We are also promised some kind of reveal this week - as it is only part 5 of 10 methinks there will be further layers. See you after Thursday…

Immediate Reaction

Pretty critical I am afraid, this seemed very drawn out, I thought Gwen in Wales was weak. the ‘revelation’ about the modules was shocking but did it require a whole episode just for that?

The Good and the not so Good

Good: not afraid to kill off a character we identified with (and she was well acted even if a little one-dimensional); didn’t rely on the contact lenses this week; not afraid to suggest that humanity will quickly find ways to justify inhumanity. In passing I note that in the Dr Who story Turn Left concentration camps also quickly became a solution to the overwhelming tide of humanity;

Not so good: Gwen in Wales - entirely self centred, no subtlety, wanders around the overflow camp for hours and no-one seems to mind; Jack and Danes also took a lot of air time and we try to explore Danes but without him quite getting the narrative spotlight; what happened to being on the run - one week everyone is after them, next Gwen is back in Wales with her family / friends and the whole gang are out in the open; the so called ‘we find out the truth’ was nonsense, we still know nothing about why or how; all the trouble to steal the computer last week - where was it in this episode?

Next?

I will no doubt watch the rest of this and I suspect the greatest cynics are those that watched previous series and sci-fi in general. I suspect Jack will kill Danes at the end (he may even be the first to die once the morphic field gets fixed!