I had planned my Sunday wisely. Beginning at 11 am I turned my trusted telly to ABCFamily and spent the next 8 hours watching the Alias Marathon. Properly caught up with the twists and turns of the season 1 plot, I was ready for the ABC season premiere at 8 p.m.

The moment arrived and as overly hyped by the network for the last few weeks, Sidney and her long lost Mother were reunited, for just long enough for dear mummy to lob a bullet in her darling daughter's shoulder. Naturally Sidney manages to get out of her dire straights with the finesse of MacGyver.

My suspension from disbelief (one of those writer terms that basically means that you actually believe what you are seeing on the screen despite the out of this world circumstances) was deterred while Sidney received a cell phone call from her roommate Francie while Sid was mid-flight over the Pacific in the belly of a cargo plane. Just to tell Sidney about Will's article being published. Will someone please tell Hollywood that nobody but nobody believes that crap anymore. They didn't believe it when Harrison Ford did it in Air Force One and this viewer didn't believe it then.

But back to the show, dangling threads galore were resolved. What about Vaughn? Sidney rescued him while planting a bug in a house to go after a few "exposed" agents associated with Sid's Mom, Irina Dekevko, and Alexander Khasinau. And all this by the 30-minute mark in the first episode.

Somehow I expected more after the on the edge of my seat season finale I'd watched immediately before the season 2 premiere. Adding to the slow parts of the episode were Sid's flashbacks and consultation with an agency psychiatrist, played by Patricia Wettig - wife of Alias' executive producer Ken Olin (who also holds directing credits for Alias as well as appeared in a few episodes in a small role).

After assisting Will to reappear publicly in a drug raid, we are flashbacked for how Vaughn got out. Turns out he's really good a swimming, but they caught him anyway. With the CIA controlling what SD-6 now hears via the bug Sid planted for SD-6 (altered with a delay mechanism), Sid and Vaughn are sent to Barcelona Spain. Even Vaughn's partner Weiss is along for this one.

The team closes in on Khasinau. But wait, Sid's mom is shown ever so briefly with a gun. Gunfight ensues. Weiss is shot in the neck and doesn't appear long for this world as he makes coughing and gurgling noises. A rifle has been set to go off automatically. Sid intercepts Khasinau and a fight ensues. As Sid gains the upper hand, Irina (aka Mom) puts in another appearance - ordering Sid to drop it. Naturally Mom is totting a gun again. She fires, but it isn't Sid she hits. It's Khasinau. Sid is ordered to put her hands on her head, and is then told to get on the ground. Irina mutters, "Truth takes time" and disappears with a briefcase. Leaving a shocked Sidney behind.

The episode closes with Sidney eulogizing Sloane's wife Emily. Sid waxes poetic about mothers. And Sid's father receives a call that her mother turned herself into the CIA wishing to cooperate. Sid tells the psychiatrist this is problem she doesn't know how to handle.

Next time:
She always knew the job could kill her, she didn't know her worst enemy was her mother. Like mother, like daughter.