Alias 4.6: "Nocturne"

Written by Jeff Pinkner
Directed by Lawrence Trilling

In which Sydney is “infected” by a drug that causes her to experience increasingly paranoid waking nightmares, forcing Jack and Vaughn to frantically search for a cure…


Status Report

After the previous episode, a lot of people felt that the writers had ripped off an epsiode of “X-Files” called “Arcadia”. Similar accusations will probably be leveled against this episode, claiming that the writers lifted their central idea from an “X-Files” episode called “Sleepless”. In this case, at least, the concept of developing soldiers that don’t need to sleep has a real world origin. Such experiments were indeed conducted during the Cold War (and probably are still being conducted), and for the most part, the results were about as successful as Nocturne.

Though it has been kept relatively quiet by the producers and the network, the first half of the season is essentially being aired out of production order. This is the first time that this has been remotely possible, because the first three seasons were more serialized; airing the episodes out of order would have resulted in chaos. (When such things did happen, the episodes were adjusted with revised or new scenes to smooth over the effect on plot and character threads.)

One can only guess that the network (and possibly JJ himself) has decided to test whether or not the more episodic treatment of the series will work, even under artificially challenging conditions. It’s one thing to have about seven or eight episodes that are largely stand-alone at the front of the schedule; it’s quite another to take those episodes, mix them around, and then expect the audience not to notice that the character interactions don’t quite follow a logical arc.

If anyone is a victim of this kind of shuffled programming, it’s the writing staff. They are ultimately going to be blamed for every perceived stop-and-start between Sydney and Vaughn, for every time that trust in Sloane comes and goes, and the fact that none of the plot elements that were seeded through the season thus far have gone anywhere. It also doesn’t help that the series’ most oft-mentioned spy game rival, “24”, opened with a barrage of episodes that has helped them get a third of the season under its belt, gaining momentum as a result.

With almost a week more to work with, “Alias” has gained audience coming after “Lost”, but there’s no sense of where the season is going. It’s February sweeps, and there’s nothing special about the episodes thus far. The writers are clearly being ordered to wrap up each episode without a cliffhanger, and even if they were intentionally slipping plot elements into each episode for future exploration, there’s little sense of a developing arc. It’s all about the characters right now, and while that would be enough if the character threads were intact (something “Lost” does extremely well), mixing up the episodes eliminates that possibility.

As a result, the previous episode, really the ninth to be produced, came before this episode, which was much earlier in the production schedule (the actual production order is hard to pin down). In the previous episode, Sydney and Vaughn seem to come to terms with the fact that they’ve been dancing around their relationship issues; in the opening minutes of this episode, they are back to dancing around. Whatever sense of progression the writers built into each episode has been destroyed by what looks like network interference, a mandate to make the series into something it was never meant to be.

It didn’t have to be this way. The season could have been cohesive, even with a more episodic mentality. JJ brought in the writers from “Angel” specifically because they had demonstrated an ability to take the early part of that series’ fifth season and render it more episodic while also establishing character and plot arcs in the process. And they might have accomplished the same thing for this series, but the scrambled episode order has ruined it.

All of this actually relates to the ongoing comments that the series is beginning to look like it’s ripping off “X-Files” week to week. Well, in a sense, it is, because this kind of disconnected episodic format was something that initially gave “X-Files” a wider audience but ultimately left the audience feeling like nothing was going anywhere. Granted, that series survived for nine seasons, but by the end, the fans were deeply divided over the direction that the series had taken, yearning for better days when there was actual character development and the hope that the larger mythology was going somewhere.

While many people (especially network executives) love the episodic format, since it means skipping an episode doesn’t force a person to play “catch up”, there’s an obvious drawback. Not even taking into account the fact that the series gained a following for its relatively tight continuity, there’s the “safety net” that a more serialized format provides. If an episode is largely stand-alone, the central plot might not be very exciting. Having long-term plot and character threads present in the story helps to offset the weaknesses of a particular story. The previous episode, for instance, gained something from the Jack/Sloane intrigue, partially offsetting the disappointment with the main plot.

Episodes like “The Awful Truth” and “Ice” dealt with important character elements, leaving the audience with the knowledge that something more was sure to come of it. There’s little doubt that Nadia will eventually learn the truth about Irina’s death, and Vaughn’s confession about Lauren was a great payoff to that third season debacle, allowing him to move forward. This episode has only the scathing interplay between Sloane and Dixon, and in the end, there’s nothing new there. Is it really that big of a surprise that Dixon is simply waiting for Sloane to show his true colors? Isn’t that something that the writers have already expressed through Sydney?

So the episode must rest on the laurels of its sole plot: Sydney’s “infection” by Nocturne and the frantic search for a cure before the madness permanently sets in. While Sydney’s paranoid visions were fun, at least most of the time, it was not very strong overall. In fact, by the end of the episode, there were some disturbing levels to the fight between Sydney and Vaughn. And while it was good to see the writers address the central absurdity of sending Sydney into the field in her condition, it seemed a bit forced, as if it happened that way just to give Dixon an excuse to give Sloane a piece of his mind.

The episode felt somewhat in disarray, as if rushed to the point of needing someone to really give it a once-over to make sure the logic fell together. Having Sydney show visible signs of exposure to the Nocturne drug was a mistake, since it made it seem like the rest of the characters (especially Jack and Vaughn) were completely non-observant. How is it that Nadia, who barely knows her sister, can tell that something is wrong when the others don’t?

It might have been better if Sydney and the others had been given a somewhat deeper cover identity, forced to locate “the Count” less directly, so that Sydney’s symptoms could evolve during the mission. Imagine what the writers could have done with the story if Sydney began forgetting who was friend or enemy while also trying to maintain cover. As it was, the trip to another European goth club, though notable for giving Sydney another excuse for a tight corset, felt more like the third season than a return to the depth of earlier missions.

Of course, the writers were more interested in Sydney’s paranoid interactions with Jack and Vaughn, which makes sense from a certain point of view. If there’s one thing that the earlier episodes established very well, it’s the fact that Sydney has serious trust issues when it comes to her father. That goes back to the very first episode of the series, and that relationship has only marginally gotten better. Most of the good hallucination scenes come when Sydney imagines Jack betraying her, and while the audience can tell which moments are real and which are not, it’s hard not to understand why Sydney would find the waking nightmares so easy to believe.

This is such a ripe area for exploration, especially after “The Awful Truth”, that it might have been better to focus entirely on that relationship. However, the writers can’t resist having Sydney and Vaughn beat the living hell out of each other, and Sydney even tries to shoot him in the head. This is typically bad for relationships on the mend. The writers don’t play it for laughs, thankfully, which is just about the only way it could have been more disturbing.

The central plot is not the only weakness of the episode. There’re also some characterization issues. Throughout the episode, Marshall came across as completely out of character, down to the choice of dialogue and even the line delivery. It’s hard to pin down, but his usual mannerisms felt like they were stripped away, leaving someone with a style of tech talk that didn’t sound at all like what Marshall would usually say. Considering the fact that most of the other characters sounded like they should, it was rather jarring.

Visually, the episode was stunning. The various drawings were disturbing, enough so that it would have been interesting to see more of them. While there’s a certain sheen to everything they do in this season, a less sterile atmosphere than the third season, the production staff does a great job of making sure Sydney isn’t running around the office in her cover garb. She looks like a professional, down to the sexy as hell glasses, and even if she’s glammed-up a bit in those scenes as well, it’s very reminiscent of how she would look at SD-6.

The real problem with this episode is a symptom of its episodic nature. If this episode had never existed, would it really take anything away from the season as a whole? It’s usually hard to judge such a thing with an episode of “Alias”, because there’s always a feeling that some little detail will come back and haunt the characters. There’s nothing to indicate that anything specific to this episode will have future consequences. In the end, this episode is unnecessary, and that’s something that an episode of “Alias” should never be.


Final Analysis

Overall, this episode was a disappointment, exemplifying everything that has been changed and weakened by the network decision to make the series more episodic. The “vampire” angle is somewhat lame, and even though it’s acknowledged by the writers, the means of getting Sydney into the field while infected is contrived. Not only are there missing opportunities throughout the episode, but there’s nothing about the episode that makes it necessary. This is, in the end, filler.

Writing: 0/2
Acting: 2/2
Direction: 2/2
Style: 1/4

Final Rating: 5/10

Season Average (as of 4.6): 7.0