Quotable Moments

MARIA: I don't know what your problem is. This could be big, Liz. Yourdream guy, tailor-made. The human version.    Related Links The WB network LIZ: OK. Embarrassing, humiliating, mortifying. I don't know: choose your SAT word.

KYLE: (to Max): Wow, she really did a number on you, didn't she? But I've come to realize that's her pattern, her MO. She's a man-eater, and I pity the fool that radio station fixes her up with 'cause she's gonna fall in love and then the hunger begins again.

MARIA: Alex, look, I really don't want to go on stage with you guys looking like high school geeks. ALEX: We are high school geeks, and we like it like that, so please stop tryingto take control over it.

Written by Thania St. John
Directed by Keith Samples

James O'Shea -- Radio DJ
Michael Yurchak -- Doug Shellow

Valentine's Day comes lightly to Roswell this year, and the focus is on Liz and Max. In recent episodes, we've seen the other aliens in and out of love, but this time our attention returns to our central couple.

At the Big Dance, Liz even gets her choice among her suitors: newcomer Doug Shellow, ex-boyfriend Kyle, and sometime-ex Max. For Liz, the choice is clear, even as she and Max share a passionate, flashback-filled kiss.

The college boy and the old flame simply can't compare.

Roswell's romantic center is on this forbidden love, the love that crosses boundaries and threatens to transform what it means to be "normal" in this town. For the show to work, the viewer must believe that the love between Liz and Max is truly special.

Even still, the episode lulls a bit when writer Thania St. John falls back on a TV commonplace: Max says he has no memory of what he did while drunk.

The episode becomes more compelling if Max is faking his memory loss, but there's little indication that this is the case. His return to the balcony to look at the heart he drew is a clue that he may be lying, but it's inconclusive.

Instead, we are left with an almost-might-have-been moment, rather than something memorable. Yes, we see how Max really feels, but St. John gives the character a way out via his drinking.

Max even says Those Three Magic Words to Liz, but only in her own fantasy before the date.

On its own, this scene tells us something about Liz's state of mind. But its inclusion even as the real Max -- albeit intoxicated -- almost confesses his love of Liz makes the fantasy sequence a little redundant.

This might-have-been quality makes us wonder where the romance plot of the series is going. Are we always destined for near-misses? When will these two be able to confess their true love?

And while this episode was a fluffier one than most -- more love and less alien-hunting -- the series may be heading into much more serious territory in the immediate future.

At the season's midpoint, we want to see plotlines evolving and at least the beginnings of certain answers. Like Michael, we wait and we hope. And we will see what happens next.

Alcohol appears to affect the aliens differently than it does humans.

Michael has apparently convinced himself that the fourth alien is the aliens' father.

The fourth alien knows enough about the kids that he has a photo of them.

Will Kyle have any memory of the odd things Max did?

Will anything come of the record scout's visit to Roswell?

And then there's that fourth alien . . .

The University of New Mexico's archaeology program is actually quite good.

"Michael Guerin has always handled everything alone, even through his father's abuse. He's never asked for help." Plus, the fourth alien returns to Roswell in "Independence Day."