Roland Emmerich's quite short contribution to tv-sf shows carries some interesting aspects. While it might not reach the greatness of other shows of its time, like that of Space: Above and Beyond, Millennium or The X-Files, it certainly has something to say. The story about an alien obductee returning to Earth to prevent Armageddon is carrying basically two messages: One, we are right now destroying our very basic living conditions on this planet; and two, if we tried, we would be able to prevent it. The future isn't prewritten yet - there are some people who can change the future.
It is Adam McArthur's mission to find those people and lead them into the right direction. But at the same time, he is chased by both NSA and FBI, and also by the aliens, each representing different agendas. Thus the show feels a bit like The Pretender, but with a different background. Adam is sort of an improved human being, capable of using energies unknown to us yet.
Visually, this show is a bit disappointing, and its atmosphere and storytelling are much too conventional to really be impressive or outstanding. But still the show somehow caught my interest, although I'm not too surprised it was cancelled. It's a good show when standing alone, but with the extraordinary shows on the air in that season, The Visitor just couldn't cope with the competition. Somehow, it deserved cancellation, although the story itself deserved to be told.
May 25th/29th, 1999
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