Trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pQMflDA8bI

Overall I thought the premiere was decent. It's decent in quite a few areas, script, sets and cgi (for low budget), and story. It is full of tropes and I hate julie benz as the mayor, I don't think she has the acting chops to be much more than playing someone's wife. I doubt this will be an awful show, but I have a hard time believing it will be anything but a nice show that sci fi nerds will like. Compared to falling skies this was a homerun, I guess when it comes to sci fi on tv it doesn't really get much better than this aside from firefly and maybe bsg (which I haven't seen). I grade out the pilot as a C+. It's definitely earned a watch from me for at least a few more episodes.

C+ is very generous. I couldn't even finish the pilot. It didn't look cool, I didn't care for the characters or actors playing them, cliche after cliche. I'm trying to think of a pilot I've seen recently that this was superior to, and I really can't. Terra Nova, V, and Falling Skies were all better and that's not saying a lot. Battle: Los Angeles was better. The SyFy knockoff of Battle Los Angeles was better.

That said, you're right about sci-fi on TV. BSG and FF **** all over this though. I'd go through BSG first.

I gave it a bit of a break since there are so many damn ppl, plot, and alien races to introduce. I thought this kicked the pilot of falling skies ass. I remember thinking when watching the fs pilot that maybe this will be decent or maybe I'm just remembering how horrible the first 3 or 4 eps were. In a world built this big I want to give it a chance probably because I like sci fi. If I'm going to take the time to watch a mediocre show it's gonna be in a genre I like like sci fi.

gonz it did pick up quite a bit in the last 30 minutes.

It had a really tough time establishing the world and introducing all the characters. Voice overs are just brutal. The last half of the episode got a lot better but I'd still put it on the level of a mediocre STNG episode. It has some potential but I really didn't give a **** about either of the two principal characters and I'd be shocked if it ever rises much above meh.

I thought it was ok. I take anything to fill my desire for firefly. God that show was so good.

I'm playing the game on xbox. I switched off the episode halfway through. I'll try again soon

Isn't it basically Deadwood? Except w/o all the "****s"?

I thought it was decent though.

The CGI looked ridiculously cheap.

I thought it was OK. I'll watch a few more episodes, because the world is interesting, but I thought the pilot really lacked any tension. Really bland.

Whats the game like?

I thought this show was pretty good for being a science fiction show. Most of them I just cant stand, for whatever reason I love the movies but most series just seem ******ed and this one kept me watching where most shows I just end up watching something else during commercial break.

Wayyy better than Falling Skies and Revolution. Seems like they are continuing the plot decently from the trailer for the 2nd Ep so will keep watching.

Hopefully will be a good long term plot and not too many one off villain of the week type stuff.

The game is repetitive. I've played maybe 15 hours and I have no idea what's going on story wise. None of the missions have excited me.

I liked the pilot a lot. But I also read the wiki on the show before I saw it so had a good handle on the backstory.

Thought the CGI was pretty good for TV, there are a tonne of fairly cliche plots going on but it has potential to develop well. If nothing else there is basically zero competition for sci fi on TV right now and I really love the premise of the show.

Definatley a significant lack of sci-fi, solid pilot. I was a little dissapointed when I realized the towns name was Defiance, I had slightly different expectations going into the show. Now I realize most episodes will be taking place inside the town

Pilot was OK-ish. This show could easily be pretty good or horrible depending.

Better ending to the pilot would have been them going thru the mental/emotional struggle of deciding to help defend the town but the attack is months away so the last shot is just them helping to build defenses of some sort. They could have built up to the battle all the way until the season finale so that we'd actually be emotionally invested in the outcome.

I think I would've opened with a better bad ass chase scene ala banshee. Actually I'd love to see what alan ball could do with this show. My guess is it would be amazing.

Lol Alan Ball. Could you have picked a writer with less sci fi writing experience? You exec produce one show with one scene someone likes and you are in the running for fantasy remake ideas

J. Michael Straczynski, Ronald D Moore or if you want to go very well known writers Whedon or Abrams would be awesome choices to speculate as having the chops to make this first class amazing.

JMS would be my personal fantasy choice, though in 2014 sci fi fans are going to get the awesome show they deserve called Sense8 from him and the Wachowski brothers so we just need Defiance to be good enough for a year

I think Wachowski brothers isn't the correct term now.

I had no idea that Larry Wachowski had a sex change. Shows how much celeb news I try to avoid where possible I guess.

Have you watched banshee? I don't think you need to be a sci fi writer to do sci fi. Whedon is the obv pick. I was thinking how awesome the chase and fighting scenes are in banshee and how meh they were in this.

I have seen Banshee, I also dont think Alan Ball has much influence in the show. Exec Producer doesnt mean much, he probably didnt have any input into the show once it got out of the embryonic stage and his credit is likely just a token thing due to owning the production company behind the show and attaching his name to promo material will get people to take notice of it.

Whoever does have influence does the best action scenes on tv.

Ep02 was rather weak. I cant see this show having a future unless they scrap this town. Need to see more badlands/flashbacks from the initial alien attack, chase antarctica and kill the mayor, but preferrably after she gets naked.

Haha, agreed, that is one super-hot Milf Mayor. Also the wife whos constantly in the bath with her husband is pretty fit as well. I thought it was alright, its only the 2nd ep and there is lots of plotlines being seeded. Enjoyed the under-ground city stuff.

Reminds me a bit of a slightly more light-hearted Babylon 5. It craps on the rest of the recent sci-fi like Revolution etc and actually has a bit of grit like the torture/religious cleansing stuff and him showing up with a slit throat.

Someone said earlier could easily be good or terrible in the end, which I agree with but I reckon its still too early to call.

Honestly I'd be shocked if this turned out good. I think it's gonna mostly be a 3rd tier show or maybe bad. I thought the 2nd episode was as meh as meh can get. Boringly shot, the town looks like a set, the mayor is horribly cast.