OK, hands up who wasn't taken in by the excellent beginning to this episode? Some time later, my mivonks! Just for a moment it seemed that season four would lead on directly where Dog With Two Bones left off. Instead, Farscape tricks us, as usual.

Like Crichton's experience, this episode constantly throws things at you to keep you off your guard. There's alsmost too much to take in in this hectic, claustrophobic story.

Crichton's bizarre Bondi dreamscape and the arrival of new girl Sikozu are quite enough to be getting on with, let alone a maurading horde and the return of old friends. As they promised, the Farscape team serve up confusion in big dollops with this season opener.

The decaying Leviathan Elack and the effects used for Chiana's vision are all stunning. The Grudeks are a slightly disappointing alien race - Klingons with Yoda's syntax, but Sikozu makes up for it with her utter other-ness.

There's a good healthy dollop of Farscape's traditional sexual tension running through it, too. But it's too odd to be easy watching.

No-one seems quite on the level in this determinedly off-kilter episode. Sikozu's motives are opaque, and Chiana is strangely unfriendly and shaken by her new powers.

As for Crichton... should this be called Crichton Cracks rather than Crichton Kicks? At first, certainly, he doesn't seem the wise-cracking, plan-hatching hunk of probably mis-placed confidence he used to be.

Somehow, though, despite the unnerving music, strange camera angles and masterfully cranked performances, this episode ends with a feeling of resolution. Faced with a crisis, Crichton slowly returns to his old self. Normal service is resumed, but with an opener this strange, I wouldn't put any money on it lasting for long this season.

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