ROCKS 18B: Exosquad - Veil Of Doom

WELCOME EVERYBODY TO THE SECOND DISCUSSION IN THE EIGHTEENTH STRAND OF "R.O.C.K.S." - REWATCHING OLD CLASSIC KIDS SHOWS! A big thanks to everyone that are joining us through all of this.

The next few weeks we're covering another great show from the early 90s, Exosquad. Again, as with other 90s cartoons, the continuity arcs are stronger than their 80s counterparts so picking individual episodes is tricky. So as the first season was 13 episodes consisting of a 5-parter and two 4-parters, that will fit nicely into this format


We're continuing this week with the four part feature "The Veil Of Doom". The individual component episodes are:

- Target Earth
- A Traitor Among Us
- Scorched Venus
- Sabotage

Just a friendly reminder to everyone that, whilst fans are obviously welcome to passionately discuss and give their views on these episodes, please remember to keep things on a friendly footing and respect your fellow posters.
Also, please do not post where or how to find the full episode online. And do not post asking others to PM it to you. You are however allowed to watch the show in whatever manner you want.

I must say I had to watch these epiosdes on a certain site and they were not the best of quality.
Since they are all linked rather than talk about the individual episodes I will just give my overall opinion on the 4-parter.

A great story with the team going to Venus.
It was cool how Burns found her brother and how Algernon sabotaged the shield.
I like how this show has a real strong space military theme like Robotech. But the characters are quite interesting.

Aside from Robotech the characters remind me of the Colonial Marines from the Aliens movie.
Also wonder if the power loader from Aliens inspired the E-Frames.

It's very difficult to discuss individual episodes of Exosquad as the episodes are so interlinked. It's the first adventure(s) after the opening story, and it picks up right where that one left off - well, a year later, as Marsh and his squad have been in the cooler for a year.

This story introduces yet more characters who would appear down the line. Two of Phaeton's three generals appear in this one - Shiva (Earth) and Draconis (Venus). His third, Typhonus (Mars) appears in the final 4-part story arc of the first season. This story also introduces Nara's brother, and shows what happened to her parents. She's the youngest member of the squad and is there as a means by which we can see that war isn't pretty, we see her grief at the human cost and we understand we wouldn't want to be in her place.

The other new character is Professor Algernon, inventor of the GRAF shield - he appears quite a bit down the line as well in the second season. Interesting how much this series shows the Neosapiens collaborating with the humans, first with Mayor Reed in the pilot and now Professor Algernon here. The Neosapiens aren't stupid, and they know when humans can be useful to them. Equally, the humans suffering on the homeworlds know that their everyday lives depend on not getting on the wrong side of the Neos, and they'll do what they have to in order to survive.

This show does take a lot of ideas from WW2 movies and put them in space - kind of like Ulysses 31 did with the Greek myths in the 80s.