Maybe he did, i always like to assume that we don't see everything in a drama universe.
Of course by the time they met a lot of other things had happened so maybe he never got around to it!
Of course by the time they met a lot of other things had happened so maybe he never got around to it!
Which has kind of been my problem with this show. In order for The Show to Happen, all the characters have to become idiots.
Kind of what really soured me on Alien Earth in the second part of the season which up until then was awesome.
I hate when shows break their internal rules and setting just to keep characters in the show where others have been "let go" for far less.
Bathysphere used? Check
Traitor dies on Venus? Check
Characters suffer traumatic finale? Check
Eliminate evidence of Venera's mission? Almost a check.
Now, my question is how do they silence Lakshmi? Threaten her husband? She's in Finland, so it's possible/likely she will be debriefed by the US. So the US knows the truth. The Fins know the truth (at least in part).
Is it explicit from FAM that Venera was a secret? Would it contradict anything if this becomes public in the Star City universe?
Yeah, the coincidence of Anastasia commandeering essentially an escape capsule and landing it not only 15km from where Sasha and Lakshmi landed and finding the exact spot where they were crossing the border and arriving just in the nick of time is a bit way too much.
Instrument package. There was no plan to land a person on Venus.
Which also might be a plot hole because why send an entire bathysphere? Talk about excess mass.
I searched for real life examples. Here is what I found. I have linked to non-Ai sources. OK, wiki isn't a great source...
USSR: Dissidents and Critics
The Soviet Union could be extremely harsh toward some critics while surprisingly tolerant of others.
Writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn spent years in labor camps and internal exile before eventually being expelled from the USSR.
en.wikipedia.org
Physicist Andrei Sakharov openly criticized Soviet policies and was internally exiled to Gorky.
en.wikipedia.org
Yet other scientists, artists, and intellectuals who occasionally crossed political lines sometimes received warnings, lost promotions, or were quietly monitored rather than imprisoned.
en.wikipedia.org
Traitor dies on Venus? Check
Characters suffer traumatic finale? Check
Eliminate evidence of Venera's mission? Almost a check.
Now, my question is how do they silence Lakshmi? Threaten her husband? She's in Finland, so it's possible/likely she will be debriefed by the US. So the US knows the truth. The Fins know the truth (at least in part).
Is it explicit from FAM that Venera was a secret? Would it contradict anything if this becomes public in the Star City universe?
Yeah, the coincidence of Anastasia commandeering essentially an escape capsule and landing it not only 15km from where Sasha and Lakshmi landed and finding the exact spot where they were crossing the border and arriving just in the nick of time is a bit way too much.
Instrument package. There was no plan to land a person on Venus.
Which also might be a plot hole because why send an entire bathysphere? Talk about excess mass.
I searched for real life examples. Here is what I found. I have linked to non-Ai sources. OK, wiki isn't a great source...
USSR: Dissidents and Critics
The Soviet Union could be extremely harsh toward some critics while surprisingly tolerant of others.
Writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn spent years in labor camps and internal exile before eventually being expelled from the USSR.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - Wikipedia
Physicist Andrei Sakharov openly criticized Soviet policies and was internally exiled to Gorky.
Andrei Sakharov - Wikipedia
Yet other scientists, artists, and intellectuals who occasionally crossed political lines sometimes received warnings, lost promotions, or were quietly monitored rather than imprisoned.
Roy Medvedev - Wikipedia
Just watched the Season Finale. Never did I expect that the Cosmonauts would've survived. No surprise that Vayla would be the one to opt to land on Venus, since he had nothing to back to. What I am surprised about is that he lasted on Venus as long as he did. Even brief seems too long. But his capsule was crushed in short over, so he didn't have to experience what I imagine feels like being roasted alive for very long. In a weird way, he preferred going to Hell (Venus' surface) rather than going home. Says a lot about what he would've been in for, symbolically.
I can't believe Sasha was so close to the Finish border. So close to the Finish line.
So: Sergi and the Chief Designer are arrested. So are Sasha and Anastasia. I feel like they could either do a time skip to a year later if there's a next season, or pick up right where Sesaon 1 left off and show their hearings and/or what happens in the immediate aftermath.
And then there's Irina who has Roskova bugged, and I'm looking forward to the other shoe dropping.
Except for Irina and Sergei, anything can happen to any of them, but I'm wondering how Sergei can still be working for Star City by the time For All Mankind Season 2 rolls around. Granted this is 1971 and FAMK S2 is in 1983, and a lot can happen in 12 years, so we'll see.
I'm really looking forward to Season 2.
I'll be re-watching the entire season pretty soon. I loved the directing, the atmosphere, the pacing, the designs, and the harsh sensibilities.
There's an article from Variety where Matt Wolpert and Ben Nedevi discuss the season finale.
I can't believe Sasha was so close to the Finish border. So close to the Finish line.
So: Sergi and the Chief Designer are arrested. So are Sasha and Anastasia. I feel like they could either do a time skip to a year later if there's a next season, or pick up right where Sesaon 1 left off and show their hearings and/or what happens in the immediate aftermath.
And then there's Irina who has Roskova bugged, and I'm looking forward to the other shoe dropping.
Except for Irina and Sergei, anything can happen to any of them, but I'm wondering how Sergei can still be working for Star City by the time For All Mankind Season 2 rolls around. Granted this is 1971 and FAMK S2 is in 1983, and a lot can happen in 12 years, so we'll see.
I'm really looking forward to Season 2.
I'll be re-watching the entire season pretty soon. I loved the directing, the atmosphere, the pacing, the designs, and the harsh sensibilities.
There's an article from Variety where Matt Wolpert and Ben Nedevi discuss the season finale.
It was part of the Chief Designer's plan to keep things hidden from the authorities, he needed something which could survive the landing (even if not for long) but would not arouse suspicion, the bathysphere was surplus and hanging around forgotton in storage.
I've been lagging behind in watching this, so I didn't want to post until I finished the season, which I just have. All in all, I don't think this is a show I'll be returning to next season. I like the space stuff, but it takes too much of a back seat to the spy/paranoia stuff, which is just unpleasant and annoying. I loathe Raskova, I hate her smug attitude and her small-mindedness, and I hate it that she kept winning and got no comeuppance at the end. (I was really hoping Anastasia's Salyut re-entry capsule would land right on Raskova's head.)
There's too much in the finale that was left unexplained, like how the Venera crew survived, or left unresolved, like what happened to them after the landing, or what the fates of any of the major characters are. Too many loose ends, a frustrating cliffhanger. It wouldn't be the first time that my dissatisfaction at an ending that resolved nothing has made me lose interest in continuing a series, at least when there's too little else about it to make me care to stick around.
And it still feels wrong to me that the Russian characters speak English here when all the foreign languages in For All Mankind were the actual languages with subtitles. Also, why do they have British accents, and why so many different regional British accents?
On the mobility thing, I remember a time quite a few years back when I watched a news broadcast of the return of astronauts from a relatively long space mission and was surprised by how easily they could walk within moments of landing, compared to what I'd been led to expect. So I'm borderline okay with this, though it is hard to believe they made it two miles so quickly. As for the shooting thing, my understanding is that it's actually pretty hard to hit a moving target, especially if you're running yourself. I think they covered it on Mythbusters once or twice -- it's actually surprisingly plausible that someone can run through a hail of bullets and not get hit.
There's too much in the finale that was left unexplained, like how the Venera crew survived, or left unresolved, like what happened to them after the landing, or what the fates of any of the major characters are. Too many loose ends, a frustrating cliffhanger. It wouldn't be the first time that my dissatisfaction at an ending that resolved nothing has made me lose interest in continuing a series, at least when there's too little else about it to make me care to stick around.
And it still feels wrong to me that the Russian characters speak English here when all the foreign languages in For All Mankind were the actual languages with subtitles. Also, why do they have British accents, and why so many different regional British accents?
On the mobility thing, I remember a time quite a few years back when I watched a news broadcast of the return of astronauts from a relatively long space mission and was surprised by how easily they could walk within moments of landing, compared to what I'd been led to expect. So I'm borderline okay with this, though it is hard to believe they made it two miles so quickly. As for the shooting thing, my understanding is that it's actually pretty hard to hit a moving target, especially if you're running yourself. I think they covered it on Mythbusters once or twice -- it's actually surprisingly plausible that someone can run through a hail of bullets and not get hit.
We finally finished Season 1.
I absolutely love this show.
I do agree the British accent thing is weird. I realize they don't want a whole show of subtitles, but why not Russian accents?
Anyway, that's a minor point to me.
The ruthlessness of the Soviet state is fascinating and disturbing. Lyudmilla is a great villain (even the name sounds evil). And seeing how Irina and Sergei came to be the characters we know is pretty cool.
My understanding is that Star City is not doing the time jumps For All Mankind did, so I think the cliffhangers will not be left to dangle.
Solid "A" from me.
I absolutely love this show.
I do agree the British accent thing is weird. I realize they don't want a whole show of subtitles, but why not Russian accents?
Anyway, that's a minor point to me.
The ruthlessness of the Soviet state is fascinating and disturbing. Lyudmilla is a great villain (even the name sounds evil). And seeing how Irina and Sergei came to be the characters we know is pretty cool.
My understanding is that Star City is not doing the time jumps For All Mankind did, so I think the cliffhangers will not be left to dangle.
Solid "A" from me.
IIRC, the explanation from the producers is basically, they obviously weren't going to have the characters speaking Russian since this series is aimed at an English speaking audience. We're just supposed to accept the fact they are speaking Russian to each other, but for convenience sake the audience hears English. With that in mind, the decision was made not to have the actors use Russian accents, since Russians speaking Russian to each other aren't going to hear the accents. There is also a belief among some people that Russian accents always sound fake, even when spoken by actual Russians, though I'm not sure if that opinion is held by anyone on this show. The use of British accents was a combination of providing a shorthand to American audiences to code these characters as "foreign" and since many of the cast are British actors anyway, just let them use their natural accents to help their performance feel authentic.
Some have compared this to how accents were handled in The Hunt for Red October. While the Russian characters in that movie did have Russian accents, Sean Connery kept his actual Scottish accent, since his character was Lithuanian, as a means of differentiating him from the Russian characters, as it was felt the differences between a Russian accent and a Lithuanian one would be too subtle for western audiences.
I just can't see her as a "great" villain -- I see her as stupid and small-minded. Ideologues irritate me, because they see everything through the filter of their narrow ideology and lack the mental flexibility to imagine any other way of thinking. Raskova has a profoundly narrow, rigid mind that's only capable of perceiving things through the filter of obedience to the state and its ideology, with no ability to comprehend or respect any broader worldview or priorities. Such a petty, closed mind, such an inflexible bureaucrat in a position of such power over others, just frustrates and infuriates me. I can't enjoy a villain who's so small. And her smug, condescending attitude just makes her more infuriating. Every time she's on screen, I just want her to go the hell away.
That's all too accurate to how people like that really are, of course, but that's just why it grates on me -- because it reminds me of real obstructionist people I've dealt with in the past. It's not a kind of villainy I find entertaining to watch. The fact that she didn't get any comeuppance and will implicitly still be a central character next season is one of the main reasons I've decided to quit watching.
I understand why they did that -- it's pretty obvious, really -- but it still feels weird to me, since FAM is so diligent about using actual foreign languages with subtitles, and it feels incongruous for a show in the same reality to handle languages in a different way. I know this isn't a widely held attitude, but for my own part, I would've been perfectly happy to watch an entire season of people speaking subtitled Russian. It just feels more authentic that way. (Plus it's weird that other languages like German and Hindi are spoken for real and subtitled, even when the characters are alone together.)
As for the accent thing, it is something of a corny conceit to represent a foreign language by foreign-accented English. If you're going to use English dialogue to represent Russian, you might as well go all the way and change the accent too. But making it British accents throughout is also corny, playing into the typical American "All foreigners/aliens are British" convention.
Star privilege.
With the lack of Russian accents, I just suspend my disbelief and pretend I'm watching a show that's been dubbed. Added bonus: it's not dubbed, so I don't get distracted by dialogue not matching the lip movements.
I'd rather have that than all the actors speaking Russian and getting it wrong either because of getting the accents off, mispronunciation, or both. I may not speak Russian, but I trust my ears to tell me "Something about this sounds wrong" if they had. And I have some friends who actually are from what part of the world, and who'd be quick to point out how far off it would've been.
I'd rather have that than all the actors speaking Russian and getting it wrong either because of getting the accents off, mispronunciation, or both. I may not speak Russian, but I trust my ears to tell me "Something about this sounds wrong" if they had. And I have some friends who actually are from what part of the world, and who'd be quick to point out how far off it would've been.
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Except that's precisely the point. Soviet Russia was buried in rampant paranoia and Raskova is the focal point of that paranoia for this series. The whole purpose of this show is to demonstrate how such a nation could operate a space program that outpaced the Americans. You cannot tell that story of the cosmonauts without the Soviet paranoia.
Which is fair but all of that is a reflection of our world today, including the lack of consequences.
I get why that's frustrating but I'm less bothered by it because of my strong interest in Cold War espionage.
The difference being For All Mankind is strictly focused on Americans with the occasional Russian, whereas Star City's focus is firmly on Russians. I would've been fine with English subtitles, too, but it was never going to be that kind of show.
Well, the way to avoid that, of course, would've been to populate the cast entirely with Russian actors and fluent Russophones.
Yes, as I already said, I know it's authentic, but that doesn't mean I find it enjoyable to watch. Explaining the obvious to me is not going to change my opinion.
I mean, really, the only thing I particularly like about For All Mankind is the space stuff and the mostly-accurate science. I've always found its character stories overly melodramatic and the political intrigue a distraction from what I wanted to see. This show is almost all political intrigue and even the space stuff is subsumed to it, so that's a much higher ratio of stuff I dislike to stuff I like. Ergo, this is not the show for me.
Which is fair, I suppose, but I have to wonder what you were expecting from a show that's set deep in Soviet Russia during the Cold War.
A Socialist Utopia?
It's not that I didn't expect it, just that I hoped the ratio of stuff I was interested in to stuff I wasn't would be higher. I wasn't sure I wanted to watch the show at all, given what I'd heard about it, but I was curious enough about the space parts, and enough of a completist by nature, that I decided to check it out anyway. What I was hoping for was something that gave insight into the real history of the Soviet space program, which is a subject I never learned much about (because it was still mostly classified for the first couple of decades or so of my life). But the show didn't seem to have much connection to real history or real people. FAM at least had fictionalized versions of some of the real astronauts and NASA personnel in its first season or two. Here, there don't seem to be any real historical figures in the cast, except possibly for the Chief Designer implicitly being Sergei Korolev. And the handling of the space missions feels far more implausible than anything FAM did. I never found it convincing that they could send three people on a 9-month interplanetary flight in 1970. That's just too huge a leap.
I was always ambivalent about the show, which is why I worked through it slowly, but again, I'm a completist. I was tempted to give up more than once, particularly after episode 6, but at that point I figured that with only two episodes left, I might as well see it through to the end of the season and then bail out.
Part of the reason I stuck around, I guess, was that I was hoping for a resolution where the Chief Designer was vindicated and Raskova got her comeuppance for her actions and was written out of the series. As I said, the fact that the season ended with her apparently still in power and in a central role in the show is a major part of the reason I don't plan to continue.
Should there be a Season 2 (waiting for the announcement!), when it's done, I'll be re-watching the first two seasons parallel to when they take place in-between episodes of FAMK S1 and cut back-and-forth between the two shows according to roughly when each episode takes place. Something a little different.
Since Star City Season 1 only got up to 1971, and FAMK Season 1 made it up to 1974, I'm waiting until next season to try this out so they can run parallel for longer.
Since Star City Season 1 only got up to 1971, and FAMK Season 1 made it up to 1974, I'm waiting until next season to try this out so they can run parallel for longer.
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