With Dred escaped and on his way to take word of Rosmund’s rebellion to the Citadel, the Outpost prepares for the worst as Talon tries to figure out how to summon the army of demons to defeat the Prime Order once and for all.

Starting with an opening monologue by main character Talon which sort of signposts one of the episode’s big reveals, The Outpost is back and on form as its usual, cliché-ridden self. Garret and a team of his men are pursuing Dred to try to prevent him revealing all to his masters at the Citadel, but run into a little bother along the way. The show actually tries to do something a bit bold here, though whether it will actually follow through on it is anyone’s guess. On the way to that destination though, it’s just as I recall, all cheesy dialogue, stilted delivery and overacting.

Still, it does at least look better. The FX work is still fairly shonky, and the fight choreography is laughable, especially when it comes to Talon herself, but the sets and costumes definitely look as though some money has been spent this time, and there’s nice little touches like soldiers who clearly can’t afford to get their armour re-worked having painted Rosmund’s symbol on their chestplates over the moulded Prime Order symbol. Clearly, when the show got renewed, its budget was increased, at least a bit.

At the Outpost, Talon isn’t having much luck in persuading the Dragman to come up with the long list of demon names she needs to summon an army to help Rosmund’s cause. The Dragman will only give her the one name, and when she summons it, a whole new world of trouble is caused.

This also leads into the second of this episode’s two flashbacks to Talon’s early life with her adopted human family, which themselves tie into the episode’s title. One is a fairly typical hunting scene, wherein Talon is taught the difference between killing for sport and killing to eat. It then leads somewhat clumsily to the climax of the second flashback wherein Talon is forced to defend herself against an unexpected threat. It feels very much like a set of scenes put together by a writers’ room somewhat surprised at the renewal of the show, trying to add some depth to a central character and lead into the new plot thread they’ve come up with for this new season.

The other old favourites are all basically as I remember. Janzo is that extremely creepy guy that no sane woman would willingly spend time alone with. Marshal Wythers is grumpy, outspoken and mainly there to advance the plot to its next point by explaining to other characters what they should be doing, and Elinor is up to another scheme to make money in the fact of all sense and reason. There’s something oddly comforting in the fact that in spite of the evidently increased budget and the opportunity of a second season, the show really doesn’t seem to have learned much. Exposition is still clumsy, dialogue is still mostly risible and characters’ actions make little sense. Towards the end of its maiden season, I have to confess I started to have a little soft spot for this show, and it still persists. It’s bad, and not even in a ‘so bad it’s good’ way, but somehow it’s not quite bad enough to elicit any anger or vitriol toward it.

Verdict: I can’t honestly say it’s good to have it back, but it’s still plodding on in its peculiarly awful way, and it does at least look a little better than it did aesthetically. 5/10

Greg D. Smith