The V Strategy Guide: Whose Battle Tactics Missed the Mark?

Unsound decisions were made by human and Visitor alike in last night's V, in which Valerie finally found out Ryan's not human, and Lisa followed up on her empathy-test failure by trying to dissuade Tyler from joining the Live Aboard program. But what tops the list of last night's most ill-executed battle plans? Read on to find out.

Scenario: Anna finds out a human woman (Valerie) is carrying a human-visitor baby, so she sends out a few soldiers to bring them both back for analysis. And also murder.

Execution: 0 of 10. Two regular V's can't get the job done, so Anna sends out one of her super-soldiers, who, even after he takes an axe to the chest, keeps on trucking, Terminator-style. Still, somehow, the pair escapes. You know, I berate the resistance week after week for obviously ill-formed plans that serve only to enhance plot while seriously undermining the audience's ability to think critically about what's happening on screen, but come on. You guys have this miracle blue energy, easy to program death-barb balls and super-soldiers, and you can't find two barely armed people that you're also tracking? Sigh.

Scenario: Valerie's been implanted with a Visitor tracker, so with a tenuous trust between them, she and Ryan flee so the V's don't kill them both.

Execution: 6 of 10. Oh, they get a reasonable mark, I suppose -- but only because the V's failed so utterly. To cap it all off, Valerie decides to leave Ryan at the end of the episode. "I don't want to see you again, Ryan, because I don't forgive you," she says before hopping on a train. The woman is still being tracked, and, though they didn't prove it this week, the V's aren't completely useless.

Scenario: Lisa finds out that Anna will probably kill Tyler after he's done with the Live Aboard program, so, to keep him alive and not dissected, she tries to break things off.

Execution: 9 of 10. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Lisa, the 17-year-old alien girl, is probably the most reasonable character on this show. She treads a fine line, week after week, between tipping her mother off to her growing capacity for emotion, and serving her mother's agenda. And this week she seemed to alienate Tyler while keeping Anna at bay. A rousing success, I'd say.

What did you think? Are the V's or the resistance worse strategists? And how many V's will it take to haul in Valerie and Ryan? Now that they're separated, I say... three.