Andromeda: S02E11: Bunker Hill
“Here is the price of freedom:
Your every drop of courage,
Ounce of pain, pint of blood.
Paid in advance.”
Sebastian Lee “The Rising Tide” AFC 271
Our intrepid leader, Dylan Hunt, answer a distress call from a Sabra-Jaguar transport. The transport is under attack by three Drago-Katsov fighters, which are easily eliminated by Tyr from the command deck of Andromeda. The beautiful Elssbett Bolivar was on the transport (see “the Honey Offering”). In a gold lamee outfit, reminiscent LeeLoos bandages in Fifth Element, she breezes aboard Andromeda (Nietz must not get cold too easily). She tells Dylan Hunt and his crew that the Sabra-Jaguars have gone to war against the Drago-Katsov and since the Sabra-Jaguars signed the mutual defence pact, Dylan is now commander of their combined forces. Dylan has the “Oh crap, I knew that was going to come back a bite me in the bum” look. (Personally I find it a little suspicious that the “queen” of the Sabra-Jaguars is riding along, unescorted, in a transport) The Drago-Katsov have been building up their armada much quicker than the Sabra-Jaguars and have already taken one of the Sabras worlds “Hruska”. Elssbett wants to go there first but Dylan has other plans.
During Dylan and Elssbett’s postulating, Harper receives a “Help me Ob-B-One” message from his cousin, Brendan, on Earth. Earth belongs to the Drago-Katsov. Brendan has already heard that Andromeda is at war with the Dragos and wants Andromeda’s help to start a revolution against the Dragos and become part of the Commonwealth.
Harper tries to rally the troops but Dylan can’t spare time to go to Earths aid (remember he doesn’t have much sentimentality for Earth, He’s from Tarn-Vedra). Rommie coolly dismisses Earth as just one of 10 million Tarn-Vedra class planets. Dylan agrees and states that Earth doesn’t matter unless they make it matter. only Harper is our champion! Dylan sends Harper and Rommie to Earth’s aid. Dylan and the rest of the crew will focus on defeating the Dragos. He does lays out the promise that once the Nietzscheans on Earth put their armoured units into the streets to quell the resistance, He will come and attack Earth.
Harper and Rommie approach Earth in the Maru and use an artificial meteor to get past the Orbital Defence grid. With its T2 like bleakness the Earth is unrecognisable. Harper reminisces about his life on Earth. He and his friends would spend their free time trying to annoy the Nietzscheans. They would set “shrillers” off (kind of like an annoyingly loud fire alarm that really hurts Nietzscheans ears). one day he and his friends were ambushed and one of them killed. Harper is scared to death to return to Earth. Harper and Rommie sneak into Boston to meet up with Harpers cousin Brendan. At the prescribed meeting place they initially find no one until kids with weapons suddenly surround them. Brendan shows up just in time and vouches for them. Brendan lets everyone know how Harper is there to save them and he and Harper go off to discuss strategy. The kids are immediately impressed with Rommie’s strength and weapons abilities. Nietzscheans have gone from taking a few people as slave to taking a lot of people, as well as then shipping the people off to re-location camps. This has upset the Earthlings but Brendan only has 5 people he can trust to start the revolution but feels that others would join their ranks if the people had hope.
On Andromeda, Dylan has decided to attack the Drago’s capital. Elssbett thinks that is suicide and offers herself in marriage to Tyr for all of Dylan’s secrets. Tyr turns her down. Andromeda and her armada of Castilians and Sabra-Jaguars arrive at the Drago capital and attack. The attack goes very well…too well. Beka gets suspicious and it is figured out that the ships are just hollow hulls with slip drives (This is basically the last token time we see her this ep). Dylan has Andromeda stand down, as he doesn’t want to get sucked into a trap. But Elssbett is calls it a victory and has her forces continue their attack against Dylan’s orders. The fake ships begin dropping their slipstream drives and this opens a giant whirlpool portal that suck some of the ships, including Andromeda, into a waiting trap. Andromeda is sucked into an outer system where the real Drago ships are waiting. Now she is too far away and in too much trouble to go and help Earth.
Harper rallies the earthlings to join the resistance by making a moving speech. Rommie sets up recon around the Neitzschean compound, along with some nice big plasma mines. Brendan and Harper have a little heart to heart. The Dragos killed both of Harpers parents. Brendan gives Harper his old Tin Whistle, which Harper had placed in his parents’ grave. Rommie and Harper organize the resistance fighters and hand out weapons, mostly shrillers and force lances and briefly show them how to use them. The Neitzschean slave collectors arrive and to their surprise there are a few more “slaves” ready for pick up than they bargained for. Harper hesitantly calls for the attack to begin. The Nietzscheans call for back up and quickly more Dragos arrive. The resistance quickly retreats. Brendan gets caught by two Nietzscheans and is being pummelled when Harper rescues him by killing the two attackers. He helps the wounded Brendan back to the medical area for help. While Rommie patches him up she informs him that she has hacked into the Neitzschean communications grid and is broadcasting the revolution over the entire Earth. (That’s cool, but why isn’t Rommie fighting? We all know she can kick some Neitzschean butt).
Back on Andromeda, the head guy for the Drago-Katsov hails Dylan and introduces himself. He is Cuatomoc and has replaced Cuchlain because Dylan kept beating him. The new guy apparently did try for peace with the Sabra-Jaguars by marrying one of Charlemagne’s sisters but to no avail (why can’t these guys have easier names?). He now sends his regards to Dylan and fires upon Andromeda. Tyr panics and orders Beka to get out of there via slipstream but the new guy has chosen his battleground well. Beka can’t outrun the pride.
Earths revolution is going badly and Harper is wondering where Dylan is when “tada”, Rommie receives a signal from one of her slip fighters. Dylan has sent Tyr to let Harper know that he can’t come. He needs to re-group his fleet or the Dragos will win against Andromeda. Harper is more than crushed that this time Dylan did not keep his promise. Tyr advises that Harper stop the revolution and then, without firing one shot, leaves to return to Andromeda! Brendan refuses to stop the fighting and calls Harper a coward because he ran away from Earth last time. He reminds Harper how heroic his father was, fighting to protect his mom. Harper pulls his gun on Brendan demanding that Brendan have the people stand down or he will shoot him. Brendan says he knows they will lose but he will keep fighting. Harper reveals that it wasn’t his mom his dad was protecting, it was him. The Nietzscheans were coming for him, probably because he was too smart and causing them problems. His parents died to save him. He feels even guiltier that he was too chicken at the time to make the same sacrifice for them. Brendan continues the fight saying that if they stop now they may never chance it again.
On Andromeda, Dylan has come up with a plan. He has recovered about 90% of his fleet, only half of which are still in fighting condition. Since most if the ships wouldn’t have a pilot like Beka that is capable of whipping through the fragmented slipstream area they are in, He calls for a fleet formation in which all their ships will line up behind Andromeda and thus Beka will slave control all of them. Cuatomoc hails Andromeda again and Dylan invites him to try and follow them. He scoffs at Dylan for thinking he can navigate through collapsed space. Beka manages the tremendous feat of piloting for everyone; except they almost get torn to shreds and a few ships don’t make it. They emerge back in friendly space with no Dragos about. Elssbett believes they have lost but now Dylan calls it a successful test of their alliance (yeah, whatever).
Harper and Rommie are preparing to leave Earth to her fate. Harper struggles with the fact that he is, indeed, fleeing once again but Rommie reminds him that his home is now Andromeda and that he is needed there.
Andromeda receives a signal from the returning Maru. Apparently the Dragos have crushed the rebellion on Earth. So Dylan doesn’t bother to go.
Later, Dylan finds Harper in the Obs deck staring at a Shriller. Dylan hands him a flexi that shows a transmission from Brendan, telling the people of Earth that they will not give up until they have reclaimed what is rightfully theirs. Not only did the whole Earth see the fight, but it has been seen all over the universe and other slave worlds are proceeding to revolt as well! It looks as though he cousin has achieved much through his death.
Moral of the story?: “He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day!”
I enjoyed this ep very much, except for the annoying, nagging at the back of your mind fact, that we are just supposed to accept that Dylan, with a whole Armada, doesn’t at least sweep by Earth and take a few pot shots. Not to mention employee dissatisfaction. As Harper I would be completely less loyal if my boss with the best freakin Starship in the known universe doesn’t help me out the one time I ask.
I rate this ep 18500 out of 2
What did you think?
More if you care info
Brendan Lahey: Mark Hildreth , besides being a cutie pie, the performance by “Brendan”, Mark Hildreth, was stellar. Mark is best known for his voice work on Animes like Gundam Wing and The Bots Master, but hopefully we’ll see him, resurrected so to speak, as Brendan once more. check out www.fansview.com/2003/animeboston/041803g.htm for some pics.
Elssbett Bolivar: Kimberly Huie The beautiful Kimberly Huie is getting quite an Andromeda fan fic following, but since most of it is NC-17, I’ll let you search that out yourself J
Cuatemoc: Kevin McNulty He has performed in a whole whack of movies and T.V. but I can’t find anything except his movie & T.V. credits. Happy hunting if you are interested in this new Neitzschean!
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