I think it was mostly because it seemed they kept their heads down. When Marcus started thinking he was a prophet people started paying more attention.
Wife and I just finished the season last night. I agree, it started out as a pretty straightforward sci-if concept, but it increasingly felt like the writers were just throwing stuff at the wall to see what would stick, ‘Lost’ style. I mean, what the frick is up with:
- The seemingly evil ghost of Tally, appearing to humans and androids alike
- The whispering that Marcus/Caleb and his son hear that they are convinced is Sol talking to them
- The stone polyhedron that is alternatively hot, warm and cold- incinerates some and warms others
- The ‘Mother’ Android gets pregnant, seemingly by having virtual sex with the virtual version of her creator, or something, but it turns out to be a serpent creature instead of a new, half human half Android successor to humanity, as she thought it would be
- Re: the aforementioned baby serpent— I take it that it’s a baby version of the extinct giant serpents whose skeletons are everywhere on Kepler 22b? What is up with it being able to fly or float through the air? That seemed pretty silly.
- Who are the black-clad trio that Marcus/Caleb attacks in the last episode— another Earth faction just arrived, like the Mithraic? they and Marcus/Caleb seemed to know each other.
- How about the hoodie robe wearing weirdo that Mother killed when he tried to sneak up on her, who or what was he?
- Why was hoodie robe dude carrying a Neanderthal skull, which Father analyzed as having lived on the planet due to its carbon signature? Also, something about creatures on the planet devolving instead of evolving.
The last episode alone introduced so many new plot elements, it really seemed like the show was going off the rails towards the end.
I mean all of that seems to point to a Genesis 2 (Adam & Eve in the garden) narrative. And your listing it out like that actually made me see even more clearly the plan the writers had in doing that.
I do see your point about the Adam and Eve narrative, but I don’t see how the other stuff I listed fits in. Like the Neanderthal skull, for one example.
A return to the garden, by de-evolution. So that a new creation could spring forth. You’ll note where they get spat out at the end looks more like the Tropics, with a lot more greenery
Yeah, but the whole idea of the Adam and Eve story is anti-evolution. And anti-de-evolution, by the same token— humans sprang forth as-is, due to the hand of God, and have never changed. Maybe I’m being too literal with the allegory.
I think you are. And the Christian denominations that believe in evolution still have the Genesis 2 Adam & Eve narrative as part of their mythos.
Yeah, you’re probably right. I guess we’ll find out in season 2 - if there is one.
Nothing about the Adam and Eve allegory makes me care at all about anything that happens on this planet. I don’t have the capacity to ponder the brilliance of 13 loose ends unless something interesting or engaging is also happening.
“Lost” in space.
It was renewed for season 2.
And if seems like the showrunner has a 5-6 season arc planned:
Yeah that news lost me. I’d be willing to give it another season to see if they tie things together in some interesting ways but potentially multiple seasons to find out if there is a payoff? Especially since they do seem to going for Paradise Lost style stuff.
Summary
Is one of them the prophet? More orphans sons than I can count as contenders. Or will it be that no one is and the bigger point will be intelligent minds desire to believe in a greater power and destiny whether raised in cultures that teach it or androids programmed as atheists. And the ability of that to be manipulated. Are the Wolves Mother and Father or will the Serpent actually be the Wolf raising new humans to start a cycle again?
And once Mother found the kids trackers that she threw down a tube on the surface she should have realized they pop things back up? Tal?
Interested enough that I’d watch another season to find out. But just one.
In terms of the show’s future, here’s some quotes from the writer, Aaron Guzikowski, in a NYT interview:
It’s like a big haunted house, and it’s about the people who lived there before, all the rooms you haven’t seen the inside of, the backyard you haven’t seen yet.
Mother and Father think the giant skull is from an extinct creature, not realizing that someday Mother would give birth to one and reintroduce it to the world and reactivate the planet. You’re seeing all of these iconic elements — the serpent, the garden, Adam and Eve — but they’re not the versions we know. We subvert expectations a little bit.
While she was communing with her creator in a virtual space, basically having sex in the simulation, something else got inside and downloaded her drive with information about how to build a new being. In essence, Mother is like a 3-D printer.
The serpent can also fly because it has traits that Mother passed down to it. So it’s slightly different than the monsters that have come before.
The first episode hooked me pretty well, I love a good alien world, but the more it went on, the more I started getting flashbacks of Prometheus. I know some people loved that movie, but I felt like Jay here.
More thoughts (spoilers for the show and for Prometheus if anyone cares):
There seem to be a lot of the same themes here from Prometheus and the original of human life. In the movie, we learn that human life was probably started on earth by a pale-skinned forebearer who dissolved himself into a waterfall. This makes no sense with the clear progression from fish to apes that we can see on earth, but the show seems to be hinting at similar origins. Either Neanderthals were seeded on Earth and Keppler 22-b at the same time, or space travelers transported human ancestors from one planet to the other. The humanoid that Mother kills even looks like the forebearer from Prometheus.
So we have questions:
- What is the relationship between human life on Earth and human life on Keppler 22-b?
- Why did the humanoid feel it important to carry around a 40,000 year old Neanderthal skull?
- Why are the snakes significant on this planet? Why was mother co-opted to create one?
- Why does the new snake need to fly?
- What is the voice talking to people?
- Why do things thrown into the holes seem to come back?
- What’s the deal with this ancient android skull that Mother stumbled upon?
- For that matter, who or what were the humanoids that were dancing around it in her flashback?
- Are the creature monsters really devolved humans like Father suspects?
- What are these giant pentagonal prism things?
Thing is, like DSied, I don’t really care about any of the answers to these questions if it means slogging through 5 more seasons of dull characters doing things that don’t make sense. In the first half of the first episode the character motivations were simple and made sense: survive on an alien world and save the human species from extinction. Ever since then, nobody has seemed to care about that anymore, and I don’t care about the things they jump around to caring about. There’s never enough food or water in the show, that should be everyone’s primary concern. Everyone makes rash decisions without thinking about how it will affect them living through the night. Blah.
[quote="steronz quoting
A bit on the nose that white goo covering her.
A comment on a spoilered bit -
“What is the voice talking to people?”
Or voices? There may be different voices competing to different desired ends.
Also a bit that just seemed out of place for the tone of the show was Mary’s frequent Dr Bones refrain “I’m a doctor not a …”
Finally got to see episode 1 (HBO isn’t available here, but a local streamer carries the show now)
First thing that struck me - hey, this was obviously filmed right here in Cape Town.
Second thing - Amanda Collin is really good.
Will definitely be watching the rest.
S2 started.
Anyone keeping up with it?
I have to admit that the last two episode both have gone in directions that I had NO clue they’d go in. And lurking on reddit, no one there called these directions either (although I do learn things there).
Amanda Collins is simply amazing in this role.
I got sucked into the first several episodes of season one but my interest was waning by the end. I’m not sure if it’s my decaying memory or the writing, but I was totally lost watching the first episode of season two. I really don’t like the bad guy…and not in a good way.
2 episodes in so far, still on board. Also still delighted at all the local scenery.
Although I’m hoping Mother regains her necromancer powers at some point.
Eps 4 and 5 are the show just wows me and leaves me wonderfully confused. Worth staying on board.