Roswell Fanatics

I was reading a fic last night and there was a scene where Michael and Maria were discussing a new character and whether they could trust her or not. Michael mentioned that they had trusted Tess and look where that had got them. And Maria replied that Liz had never trusted Tess. I've seen that remark in other fics but for some reason I got thinking about it.

Was Liz suspicious of Tess? Or did she trust her?

There seemed to be nothing in season two to indicate that Liz didn't trust Tess. She didn't like her but did that translate into distrust? Was Liz suspicious of Tess all along?

IMO she never really trusted her but after all who could?
no one really *knew* Tess. Even Max didn't really know her.

obviously she wasn't a character to trust

Did Liz trust Tess?

Probably not. When Tess first showed up she used her powers to manipulate Max, to set up situations that were detrimental to Liz and Max's relationship. She induced dreams and hallucinations to the whole Pod Squad to a degree, all of which to make them conform to the Destiny that Tess believed in. She lied, she cheated, she treated the humans as tools. Not a lot to build personal trust.

Ah, but then the question comes, did Liz distrust Tess?

Probably also no. While on a personal basis there is no reason to trust, Liz had no reason to believe that Tess was the enemy. Liz might have seriously disliked her, and not trusted her personally, but I do not doubt that she trusted her in the whole alien dynamic. She did use her powers to help them out of some tough spots.

And there is Future Max to consider. He stressed the importance of Tess. So to a degree, Liz invested some trust in Tess simply because of that.

So my answer is simply both yes and no. Personally no, but Alien Abyss wise yes. Liz had no reason not to trust Tess in that limited regard. Liz is to rational a character to let her own personal hate cloud her 'professional' judgement. Even if in this case it would have been wise.

I think Liz trusted her to a large degree except her intentions towards Max. But Tess wasn't subtle about her intentions towards Max, she was there to claim him as her own. Once Tess had helped them free Max from Pierce's custody and was revealed to not be Nasedo, Liz had no other reason to distrust her or be suspicious. Her suspicions about why Tess was in Roswell were confirmed.

I don't think Liz ever suspected that Tess had any other intentions. Even when Liz realised that Alex had been murdered and an alien with some form of mindwarping powers was possibly involved, she never suspected Tess. She went to Tess for information so it showed that she wasn't afraid of what Tess might do or had any suspicions that Tess was somehow involved.

One thing that I feel it necessary to point out is that Liz is on the record, in a cannon episode, telling Max that she doesn't trust Tess. I'm pretty sure the episode in question is Four Square, but that's neither here nor there. There also seemed to be certain patterns to her behavior and outbursts in Departure season three that suggest that on some level, she blamed Max not for sleeping with and impregnating just anyone, but Tess specifically. Ironic when she was one of the ones pushing them together.

To a certain extent I agree with nibbles and PML - Liz might have been jealous of Tess, disliked her, or flat out hated her guts, but that doesn't necessarily mean that she wouldn't have accepted her in an alien capacity. I never got the feeling that Liz really trusted Michael in season one and some of season two - following Max's comments, the fact that he stole her journal, and just the fact that his demeanor and occasionally loose cannon personality didn't really build the best case for him in her mind - but she also viewed him as a friend and, more importantly, someone who Max trusted and loved. So she accepted him. And she certainly didn't seem to have the greatest liking of Isabel - she envied her to some extent and got fed up pretty quickly with the way Isabel treated her and Maria - but she made an effort to be understanding and nice because, once again, Isabel was one of the most important people in Max's life. And although they never became bosom buddies or even really girlfriends, the three girls did eventually develop a camaradery and friendship. So I think that even if Liz knew that the end result would never be friendship, she wouldn't have made it a point to target Tess as someone that she distrusted or "warned" others against. She worked with the pod squad, including Tess, quite a bit in season two. She also had Future Max basically reinforcing the comment Max made in Destiny, "It's the four of us". So to some extent Liz probably 'knew her place' so to speak, and believed that Tess was someone important enough that she had to be included and put before Liz's personal comfort.

I do think, though, that Liz was probably always uneasy around Tess to a certain extent. This is vaguely reinforced in VLV when Tess tries to mindwarp the bouncer into letting her and Liz into the casino and Liz vetoes it immediately - I think it must have hit pretty close to home for Liz, who had watched her boyfriend mindwarped into infidelity a year earlier. There was also a very firm line drawn between Liz's interactions with Max, Liz's interactions with Tess and the group, and Liz's interactions with Tess. Liz kept her feelings and relationship with Max completely separate from the group on a whole - or at least tried to. She never pulled a Maria or Max and let her personal feelings affect how she dealt with the alien abyss crises, or even made similar comments to her snippy one to Isabel in 285 South. But the few scenes that we saw of her alone with Tess, I always got the feeling that Liz was uncomfortable around Tess for some reason besides Max - she didn't necessarily know why, but it was there.

Liz was proven throughout the show to have very good instincts - most of her "scientific" assumptions regarding relationships, the aliens, etc. were pure instinct or her piecing together a whole picture with only a few pieces to work with. One of the things that was funny about Liz's character is that with very few exceptions, she never seemed terribly surprised about any of the "shocking" developments - she was usually the one uncovering them. That's probably why the writers decided to make her clairvoyant.

I think that on a subconscious level at least, she always knew that Tess was not to be trusted. She just had so much conflicting information and was really trying to paddle upstream in her relationships with everyone in season two - she kind of lost not only herself but her objectivity.

Liz didn't trust Tess at all and never did. She told Isabel that in Surprise, but as the season went, she wasn't really in a position anymore to tell anyone that.

No, I don't think that Liz trusted Tess. She had to put up with her because she was an alien and unfortunately, she was going to be around for some time. And after TEOTW, she thought that Tess might be trustworthy if Future Max told her that they needed her. But that didn't mean that she really trusted her. She trusted Future Max and what he was saying, implying the trust but did she really trust her? No, I don't think so.

xmag wrote:No, I don't think that Liz trusted Tess. She had to put up with her because she was an alien and unfortunately, she was going to be around for some time. And after TEOTW, she thought that Tess might be trustworthy if Future Max told her that they needed her. But that didn't mean that she really trusted her. She trusted Future Max and what he was saying, implying the trust but did she really trust her? No, I don't think so.

I think that after hearing Future Max's thoughts, that she wanted to trust Tess. She never went out of her way to be mean to Tess, but she certainly held back from getting too friendly with her. Which was understandable after what she'd seen Tess do in season one. I think she was honestly conflicted about her. Up to that point, Liz had been a pretty good judge of character. While Tess had 'helped' the group, Liz never forgot her actions when she first arrived. Aside from that, she had someone from the future who'd only made her fears come to life. Who was she to fight against that?

LysCat wrote:

xmag wrote:No, I don't think that Liz trusted Tess. She had to put up with her because she was an alien and unfortunately, she was going to be around for some time. And after TEOTW, she thought that Tess might be trustworthy if Future Max told her that they needed her. But that didn't mean that she really trusted her. She trusted Future Max and what he was saying, implying the trust but did she really trust her? No, I don't think so.

I think that after hearing Future Max's thoughts, that she wanted to trust Tess. She never went out of her way to be mean to Tess, but she certainly held back from getting too friendly with her. Which was understandable after what she'd seen Tess do in season one. I think she was honestly conflicted about her. Up to that point, Liz had been a pretty good judge of character. While Tess had 'helped' the group, Liz never forgot her actions when she first arrived. Aside from that, she had someone from the future who'd only made her fears come to life. Who was she to fight against that?

You definitely said it, LysCat.

I don't believe Liz ever trusted Tess as a person. But she trusted her as a member of the "group" so to say. She trusted that Tess would help Max in his alien quest more so then she trusted Tess as a person of character.