Alphas (SyFy)

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I guess the point is that he let Gary believe that he would let him drive at that moment, and then wouldn’t let him. I don't remember him telling Gary that he would let him do it later. It seemed like he was explicitly breaking a promise he had just made.

At least that’s how I interpreted it.

That's how Gary interpreted it, as well. I think he wound up guilting Bill into letting him drive at the end.

On another forum, someone pointed out that Bill skipped what would have been a very important instruction to Gary. Don't worry about the mirrors, just remember to tell him, "Hands at ten and two, signal all turns and lane changes, and visible spectrum only!"

Ha. I really do have AS.

What makes you think the aliens won't have autism? They'll be just as diverse as us. Probably more so, given that they'd have multiple species.

SyFy is, unfortunately, full of reality TV. The owners found that shows aimed at high-IQ people have a very small market, so they've switched to targeting the far more voluminous low-IQ audience. We're fortunate that a few shows are able to target both.

Note that the creators of the Simpsons and Futurama realized that when they started and deliberately write material for both audiences. That allows the shows to be commercially successful and yet still slip in a few cerebral zingers that most of the audience will miss.

The character Gary claims that he's a "32 on the Karr scale". WTH is that? Is that based on any real index?

CARS = Childhood Autism Rating Scale

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childhood_ ... ting_Scale

I had never heard of it either. At 32 Gary is rather high functioning.

Edit: After a little more research it appears the CARS is for classic autism. A new version called the CARS2-HF was developed to help assess high functioning autism and Asperger's. It appears that aspies and HF autistics will not score as autistic on the original CARS. So at 32 on the CARS Gary is high functioning on the classical autism scale.

Somebody typed up the original CARS and I found it here:

http://www.wierdkids.com/wierd/autism/cars2.htm

I have not been able to find the CARS2-HF on-line except where to buy it.

I saw the first 45 minutes of another episode last night. (Episode 4: "Rosetta," according to Wikipedia.) I was enjoying it but turned it off because I could already tell exactly how it would end. (If I'm wrong and they ended up not stopping the truck bomb and arresting Anna, someone let me know.) The plot twist was great: "I'm not working for them. They're working for me." But I didn't like the implication that Gary (correct me if I'm wrong) can care for himself but prefers his mother doing everything for him. On the other hand, I wanted to stand up and cheer when he stood up for himself when Sarcastic Alpha Girl (again, I don't know the names) was treating him like a child and trying to force him to leave. And I'm liking the whole Professor X vs. Magneto theme of pacifist Alphas fighting militant Alphas, even if the show is a shameless rip-off of X-Men.

Good job, Alphas. You don't completely suck like everything else on TV.

You're right! They didn't stop the truck bomb and Anna slipped away to appear in another episode I'm sure. There was a scene at the end with Gary again brushing his teeth and his mom bringing him a glass of water. This time though Gary says he'll take care of it himself if the temperature is not right. I guess that was a sub theme of moving from dependence to independence.

Baby steps

Now I feel like a dick for assuming they'd go the predictable route.

Touché, Alphas.

Anna escaped by orchestrating a DDOS attack on Gary's head, overwhelming him with data. The pattern of the DDOS attack caused Dr. Rosen to conclude, at episode's end, that Red Flag cells were virtually covering the country; apparently, he's never heard of a botnet.

Oh, and they very nearly did stop the truck bomb (Cameron shot Danger-Sense Guy in the hand that had the detonator, crippling both hand and device), but Electrical-Generator Guy crawled under the tanker and set the bomb off with his power - sacrificing himself in the process. Turned out the factory was producing a medication for pregnant women, one designed to prevent birth defects, that would as a side-effect stop any Alphas from being born.

It's starting to look like the story arc for the beginning of this series is Rosen and the gang realizing that they're on the bad guys' side...

[quote="DeaconBlues"]Anna escaped by orchestrating a DDOS attack on Gary's head, overwhelming him with data. The pattern of the DDOS attack caused Dr. Rosen to conclude, at episode's end, that Red Flag cells were virtually covering the country; apparently, he's never heard of a botnet. /quote]
Yeah, I too wasn't quite able to follow his logic and how he arrived to that conclusion...

Well, dunbots, apparently both Rosen and his government contact assumed that each computer used to attack Gary was owned by an actual Red Flag member. Like I said, they apparently never heard of botnets.

But no matter how different a human is, s/he is still a human. For example, every human needs to eat and drink. Maybe we'll meet aliens who use photosynthesis or convert heat directly into energy or something. They would see our eating/drinking as rituals that all humans would have to go through.

In the latest episode, when Bill tells Gary he will let Gary drive, I smiled and turned to my better half and said (while laughing a little), "He did not tell Gary when he would let him drive. Gary is going to be upset. But, Gary will likely get to drive by the end of the episode."

I have a very, very rough time with lying. I am able to lie, but opt not to. However, after being in situations.. such as the above one I described.. I began digging into language. Granted, I was only about 4-5 years old, so I was likely not great at it, but I would utilize lack of qualifiers/quantifiers to my advantage, but only with those who would lie, manipulate, abuse, etc. Just as I will overscan my environment no matter how seemingly safe it may seem (even my own bedroom), so am I constantly scanning verbal communication. When someone ignores my qualifiers/quantifiers... sometimes it leads/contributes to a meltdown.