Alias 5.9 musical commentary on "The Horizon" and predictions

[theladyrose]

Notes: This is mostly a mind dump for my initial impressions and recollections; I’ve already forgotten a fair amount of detail after an hour and a half of temporal distance. I will be rewatching this episode in order to further clarify a few points, so if I make any factual mistakes please tell me!

General episode comments:
My predictions about more of the general thematic merge of season 1/2 and season 4 do indeed seem to be fulfilled; we’ve got more of the crazy overarching story arcs, multiple plotlines, the return of Sark and obscure Sloane/Irina motives-are they really evil Rambaldi fanatics or not? And today's episode provided us with tons of shippy Syd/Vaughn moments. And we’ve really been needing some romantic Syd/Vaughn to help counterbalance the lust that is Rark (see 5.8 “Bob” which wasn’t terribly noteworthy music-wise; notes to be posted later because I can’t find them right now). Not that I don't like Rark, but there's just been a certain shippy touch that's been missing lately.

It has made me so unbelievably happy to see the show go back to what made it so addictive; the Sydney and Vaughn dynamic is so fundamental to the dramatic interest. What sets Alias apart from older spy shows is the focus on the private lives of the agents, how their career choice impacts the interpersonal dynamics and personal growth. There are virtually no spy marriages/long-lasting relationships in other series because one of the spouses is either killed in the line of duty or the other spouse is discovered to be a double agent and killed upon that discovery. Alias has that and more. The characters are much more emotionally complex; character development in the past few episodes has been rather flat. So I'm delighted to see the retrospective of sorts of Syd and Vaughn's relationship and its current consequences for Syd. Plus, every spy series has to have some sort of vague dream-like "going into the past" sequence/episode to review old missions and such, to revisit the good old days.

The replay of the proposal in s4's finale "Before the Flood" was beautifully done in the way that Sydney wanted to believe she was really with Vaughn but deduced that someone was trying to manipulate her into giving away information (more links to the Prisoner!). The bridge between the season five premier “Prophet Five” hospital scene’s “We’ll always find each other” made a gorgeous link to season 3’s “Crossings” in the North Korean jail-I'm glad that the filmmakers picked up that connection! There was that gorgeous revisiting of the scene by the waterfront with the Ferris wheel in the background from “A Broken Heart,” the polygraph test training from “Time Will Tell,” the revelation of the real SD-6 in “So It Begins” and a fake backdrop of the beach much in line stylistically with the not-dead Emily and Sloane at the end of season two’s “Phase One.” (double check that episode title) I love how all of the season 1 moments featured fit in so beautifully with this episode’s storyline. I really like how the dialogue is almost the same as it was in the original but recognizes the present situation. “We’ll always find each other” really does sum up the S/V relationship. I was surprised, though, that this phrase wasn’t tagged with the thematic marker of the “Almost Two Years” theme that became the S/V love theme of season 3 (heard during the scene where S & V get really shippy in "Crossings").

Notes on the score and predictions: These will be refined upon a second viewing; as I was watching with my family I was unable to write anything down. Notes on instrumentation will be especially unreliable as I sometimes have problems telling trumpets from violins!

-Opening pre-titles: Weird vaguely Spanish/Asian (something foreign) figure with strings and synth (double check choice of instruments) that give a disorienting effect-i.e. there’s something funky going on with this situation. It’s not quite like any other of Giacchino’s Alias drugged up/dream state motifs-s4's "Nocturne" was all eerie horror-movie strings with a rising tonally ambiguous scale, and "Conscious" had something else entirely. Perhaps there’s some kind of hidden connection with Nadia or Rambaldi stuff from South America? Or maybe it’s the whole “Latin music is really trendy in Hollywood right now so let’s just stick it in the score to contrast with the more traditional stuff” thing going on. It’s only used for the pregnant Syd and Vaughn in the kitchen scenes. My mother claims it's a rip off of Tan Dun's Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon score but I really don't believe her.
-I knew that Irina was the one behind the screen once Sloane made that phone call to the evil Scottish dude because there was a muted version of the Irina theme (think of the rendition on “Do I Have To Do Another Eulogy?” from the season 2 soundtrack) playing quite clearly. There have been hints of the “Irina” theme sort of floating around for a while, almost always during the Nadia in the hospital scenes. That might be because Nadia’s motif from season 4 is a based on the Irina theme and a variation/inversion of Sydney’s “new life” theme from season 1. I could swear that I heard I's theme used during another one of the Sloane phone call themes in a previous s5 episode but I have to check my notes.

Other giveaways: "Before the Flood" clearly indicates that she knows about Vaughn's involvement in Prophet Five; she's the only APO person besides him who had such knowledge. And it's so classic spy show to have an unseen shadowy leader be assumed male when said leader is actually a woman. Don't you remember "The Man" of season 1?!

As for Irina-I don’t think she’s evil Spy!Mommy. The fact that it’s a take on the “Eulogy” variation of her theme seems terribly significant; sure, she appears to have dark intentions (like in season 2’s “Truth Takes Time”), but I think we’ll find that she has to take some really drastic measures that will end up helping Sydney in the end.

-There’s a very short subtle cue of “the Prophecy” motif vaguely associated with Sloane being asked to find more contacts to help locate Sydney. Hmmm, how does Sydney’s bit of information fit into the grand Rambaldi scheme? There's no Sloane theme this episode-this endgame goes far beyond Sloane’s personal agenda, if I’m to deduce correctly. And to paraphrase Marshall, I'm usually right.
-Speaking of Syd’s “new life” theme, it makes a beautiful, heartbreaking return in a slightly minor variation for one of the Syd/Vaughn dream sequences. Again, I need to rewatch this to remember which one, one of the ones near the end of the episode.
-The dream version of the hospital scene in “Prophet Five”: the beginning part of the “Prophet Five” Sydney and Vaughn love motif appears as an aural reminder. This motif has made a brief appearance in a few other season five episodes for when Sydney sees reminders of Vaughn. This season 5 S/V theme has part of “Almost Two Years” incorporated into it, although in this episode it’s not developed enough to really tell.

I’ll be honest-I never thought that Vaughn was dead, and I still think that he’s alive. Vaughn is too important of a character to kill off because so many fangirls love him; without their ratings the show would never recover. The angst and romance of Syd/Vaughn is one of the biggest draws of the show for many “Alias” fans (see the Lauren of season 3 backlash and how the producers killed her off to make everyone happy), and I don’t think that the producers would jeopardize a relationship that they’ve been developing for over four seasons. Plus, we never actually saw Vaughn die in “Prophet Five” as the blinds were closed in the last few minutes, allowing a possibility of a return. Considering how many supposedly main “dead” characters there are on this show who return (Irina, Alison, Anna-I never thought that Irina was dead, either) it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Vaughn come back. And the continual reuse of the many Syd/Vaughn themes of the past four seasons in season 5 seems to hint that this relationship will never die. The variation of “Almost Two Years” that keeps appearing is a subtle reminder of all that this couple has endured; as cheesy as it sounds, I don’t think that a fake “death” could part them.

-No Rachel “Mockingbird” motif in this episode; the only one of the new characters who really got much screen time was Renée Rienne who is still theme-less. I’m rather curious about Tom Grace’s ex-wife, though; there’s definitely something going on there.
-The action cues were a little disappointing on this one; there weren’t too many fight sequences, though. It’s pretty much some simple though effective staccato strings and brass.