In further efforts to wipe out humanity, Howlyn unfreezes Zo'or to convince her to use the mothership's weaponry on Earth. Meanwhile, Renee attempts to exonerate Lt Michaels, who is being framed for a theft that is only necessary due to blocking from high up in the government.

There are a lot of aspects here that could have been brought into play much earlier in the season. The idea of hybrids being everywhere is a good one, but it hasn't been explored before now, and if General Kirkland is an example of what to expect, it's going to be an easy fight. He stops people from attacking the mothership, but if they're Renee there's nothing he can do anyway, and she still has Hubble on her side. He also gives himself up awfully easily when he is accused of being a hybrid. Why give yourself away with the whole flashy eyes routine?

The rest of the episode is just stretched out to ridiculous proportions. Zo'or's return presumably wasn't trumpeted because it's such a waste of time. She trades insults with Howlyn, acts superior, manages to get weapons under her control, then gets killed in an aerial battle with Renee. Like Howlyn, she doesn't do anything, merely sitting about on the mothership for the entire story. It takes half the episode to get round to her even trying to get the weapons working, and it's all just padding. The fact that she is killed in such a low-key way at the end when there was a lot more that could have been done with her in these last few episodes is also disappointing, especially as it leaves Howlyn without a foil once again.

Again, two of the regular cast aren't properly serviced. Sandoval isn't present at all, and Street barely gets a paragraph's worth of lines. It looks like she's after Lt Michaels, but then she just tells him Renee fancies him. Well, of course she does. This season, she'll shag any man that passes within two feet, and that's certainly where things are heading by the end of the story. If he comes back, he'll now have to die.

The other aspect that I may appreciate less than the US viewer is the overwhelming patriotism on show here, with everyone banging on about duty, honour (hence the title), respect and all those other annoyingly overbearing and overrated concepts. With half the episode given over to talking, and most of the rest standing about proudly and saluting, you only really get to the meat of the thing in the last five minutes, and by then it's too late to do anything more than what's totally predictable: the goodies win. Well, whoopee. And why is Howlyn still not making any progress towards his allegedly grand plan to dominate the planet? There's not even a hint that he could win in this episode. Where's the dramatic tension?

**

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