btp

Dumping core is not dumping the engine; it's just basically what is burning inside the reactor at that moment. After dumping core, you can restart the reactor (assuming that you still have fuel). It might take a few minutes, but it's doable. I loved this episode; it was quiet but tense throughout. Amos & Clarissa make for an odd couple, but a very compelling one. I can totally get what they see in each other, and Nadine Nicole is doing a fabulous job of playing Clarissa/Peaches v2 (Vulnerable Edition). Given that she is now appearing in the main credits, I'm presuming that she will continue to be on the show, and I'm looking forward to that.

That link seems to be to an article in Science Magazine about allergic reactions to COVID-19 vaccines. Maybe you copied & pasted the wrong link?

I guess he never got out of Baltimore. Interestingly, neither IMDB or Wikipedia lists his (Frankie Faison's) casting in The Expanse, at least so far. I wonder how many other surprises we might see in this and/or upcoming seasons. I'm keeping book spoilers out of this, but there are certainly several characters in the books that I am hoping we'll get at least a glimpse of this season. EDIT: You know, we've had both Cutty and Burrell on the show now, can we get a cameo in which a distant relative of Clay Davis shows up and says "sheeeeeeeiit?"

A-fucking-men to that. Shorter's score, too, has been incredible this season. I wonder if there's any chance, with the increased exposure the Amazon platform has given the show, that it might actually get nominated for some technical Emmys. I'm not expecting any nominations for Wes Chatham or Cara Gee -- those would be well-earned, but history suggests they'd never happen. But sometimes shows like this win for things like costuming, musical score, VFX, and that kinda thing. It would be awesome to see that.

Oooh, I like that, but I'm coming up short here. Diogo and ... who? Of all the plot lines this season, I find this one the least believable, unfortunately. I mean, I get it, they needed something for Shoreh to do, and I get it, it might be interesting to see what happens when Avasarala ventures out of her comfort zone into places where she may actually not Get Shit Done or Keep Her Head Attached To Her Neck. But this is just a little too on the nose for my taste. This show usually eschews the broad and obvious in favor of the nuanced and enigmatic, but Chrisjen's story this season is pretty heavy-handed. Very uncharacteristic of this show, and very unfortunate. They can't all be winners, of course, and overall this show still continues to amaze and delight. But so far, at least, I feel this part of the story rings rather false for me.

What's causing the collapse of Martian society and the "Martian dream" is not the onset of a period of (relative) peace, it is the emergence of over a thousand habitable planets within a few month's journey, which completely changes the economics of terraforming. The terraforming project has basically been Mars' raison d'etere since Earthers first colonized there, and now there's little reason for it to continue. Some will make a go of it still, certainly; presumably companies like the ones own by Private Hillman's family, whose fortunes are entirely tied up in the terraforming effort, will try to convince the Martian public that it's still a worthwhile endeavor, but that's going to be an uphill battle. Most people will wonder why all this effort (not to mention money) is being put into this technologically difficult project when it would be a lot cheaper and more expedient to ferry large groups of Martians through the ring gates, where they can use their superior technology to make a new home in a much more habitable place. The military is shrinking as a result of easing tensions in the system as well, but we all know that humans will always find things to fight about, so I don't think anyone thinks the Martian military will shrink to nothing. They won't likely have to deal with as many conflicts, though, so some shrinkage there is likely too. Without a terraforming project to protect, it just doesn't have to be as big as it was.

Miller's appearances in those scenes reminded me a bit of another show. I think it would've been much more fun if he had a hand terminal that he kept banging on, saying things like "Ziggy says there's a 67% chance that you're supposed to do something at the alien station." But seriously, yeah, there really wasn't much to be done there to keep that from looking hokey. Maybe if they had made Miller appear a tad less substantial and introduced some of the glitchy effects they had early on it would have helped. Though that would have been contrary to the narrative that "the signal is stronger" in the ring. Tough call, but I think in the end it worked well enough. I'm not sure staying with Team Roci was ever really an option for Bobbie, at least not at this point in the story. She trained to be a marine all her life, and her decision to defect was one of desperation, I think. Once the bad guys at the top were exposed and the MMC reached out to her and offered to reinstate her, I don't think she really felt she had the option to say no. It would have been extraordinarily unpatriotic to do so. Bobbie is still young, though. I wouldn't be surprised if she followed Naomi's example later on, once she realizes that she has a "family" there, and one whose moral choices seem more pragmatic than dogmatic. Bobbie certainly has the grit and guts to be a Marine, but I don't think she's very good at blind loyalty, and eventually I think she's going to become disillusioned over that. And even if you don't buy that, obviously the show needs to get her back on screen and on the side of the Good Guys, so I'm pretty sure they're going to figure out a a way to do that regardless.

I did, briefly, but honestly I didn't spend much (enough) time with it. Not the podcast's fault, really, just life and work intruding on my leisure time (as they do). I'll get back to the podcasts for sure, though, probably more than one of them, but possibly not until the long Expanse drought we're about to enter. At which point I will likely consume every bit of Expanse-related media I can find. :)

For what it's worth, there seem to be examples in this series already of (mostly) unmanned support vessels being brought along as part of a fleet of vessels on their way to one thing or another. I could imagine any number of reasons for this. For example, a science vessel like the Seung Un might be packed to the gills with instrumentation, leaving no room for crew quarters, galleys, etc. Think of it as a science lab in space, which is what it basically is, really. People may work there, but they don't live there. And while the fleet was still underway to the ring, there wouldn't have been much reason for people to be there in the lab, as there was nothing yet to study, analyze, etc. They may even turn life support off during periods when it is uninhabited, much as you might turn off the lights and the Air Conditioning when you leave your office at night. There are current day, and even historical, examples as well, going back as far as the 60s (the Lunar Modules on the Apollo moon missions were empty during the trips to and from Lunar orbit). So I think it's entirely plausible that the Seung Un had no humans aboard (other than Ren) when Melba blew it up. As to the reaction, Fake!Holden declared the explosion to be a demonstration and a warning of things to come if the Inners didn't turn tail and go home. So that was a bit of a non-starter, to say the least. Plus, manned or not, that wasn't exactly a cargo container "Holden" took out; it was likely millions of dollars worth of scientific equipment, plus the multi-million dollar vessel carrying it. When someone robs a bank without killing anyone, society is not exactly soft on them because no lives were lost. Same deal here, I would think. I'm not saying there's a huge amount of evidence any of this speculation is on the mark, but there certainly isn't any evidence it isn't, either. Fair enough. The point that motivation plays a big part in this is well taken. I think I could quibble that, in Clarissa's mind, her father's motives were probably way more noble, and the deaths not his fault, but still, revenge -- even if you stipulate that it is against someone who falsely imprisoned your father -- is a far poorer excuse than saving millions from an unjust war. So yeah, that's reasonable. Thank you both for pointing it out. I always think it's a bit of a cheat when the published description of an episode reveals critical facts that were not evident from the presentation itself, so yeah, I agree with your minor complaint. Perhaps there were parts of that sequence that were cut out that would have made that clearer? Just a guess. But definitely, that reference to the future, plus that depiction of a solar system that looked an awful lot like our own getting itself Blowed Up Real Good was rather unsettling. But was it a clue? A warning? A prediction? Or was it all just a bit of misdirection? Hard to say. I'm kind of surprised that there hasn't been more detailed, nerdy frame by frame analysis of Holden's Vision in forums, comment sections, reaction videos, blogs, reviews, etc. I think of things like the final sequence in 2001, to which this sequence bears at least a superficial resemblance, or Cooper's Dream in Twin Peaks, or any number of other visions, dream sequences, and the like in television and film over the years, and many of those generated reams of analytical text. Though I've seen some discussion of this one, most of that analysis has been pretty tentative. Maybe it's just that this one was comparatively brief and, at least compared to the Twin Peaks example, wordless. I also suspect at least half of the audience has read the books, and those folks are (admirably) avoiding too much public comment, so as to avoid spoiling anything. But all that aside, I was looking forward to reading a lot of interesting theories, and while there have been some, the discussion hasn't been as extensive or robust as I would have expected. Oh, well.

You know, this comparison of Cotyar's crimes with Clarissa Mao's does raise a question. One of the things that seem to set Clarissa's crimes apart from Cotyar's is that Clarissa is said to have been willing to murder many people in order to frame Holden. But this presumes some facts that are not necessarily in evidence. All indications from what we saw was that the ship the blew up, a Science Vessel, was unmanned. There certainly were no crew members wandering around during their time there, and when the ship did blow up, nobody on screen seemed to be mourning the loss of anyone other than Ren. So... let's suppose, for argument's sake, that Clarissa killed (so far) the same number of people that Cotyar did. Does that make any difference? Both characters seemed to be fairly decent, helpful people, but both were arguably red shirts, whose deaths we seem to accept more readily for some reason. And Clarissa took out millions of dollars worth of equipment, but that doesn't usually get our rankles up as much as murder. Putting the ship aside for a moment, though, the murders committed by Cotyar and by Clarissa seem to line up pretty well. Both were committed, not as a primary objective, but rather in the mode of collateral damage (cleaning up a perceived loose end in both cases), both characters seemed remorseful, both characters likely saw their actions as necessary because they were at war (Clarissa's may be mostly in her heads, but that's the way she sees it).... I dunno. I mean, this is all moral relativism anyway, and so it's all kind of suspect. But if we're willing to forgive Cotyar so easily, why are the rules for Clarissa so different? And that's not a rhetorical question; it's something I really do wonder. I feel that way too - Cotyar is a hero and Melba/Clarissa is ... well, not. But why? If you analyze their actions dispassionately, (and assume the blown up ship was indeed unmanned), aren't they pretty similar? What does everyone think?

I have no quarrel with how Melba is executing her plan, such as it is. I just think, from a storytelling perspective, we need a better view of her thinking, of why she holds James Holden, in particular, responsible for her father's demise. That honor would seem, to me, to go to Chrisjen Avasarala, the person who pursued Papa Mau initially and, presumably, had him arrested and prosecuted. Holden just happened to be the guy who picked him up. If you wanted to avenge the person who ruined your family, wouldn't you focus on the person who actually directed that operation, not the street cop who cuffed him and brought him in? I can understand that Holden is getting a lot of credit for being the big hero, and so in some sense he is the "face" of the entire operation, but it's not like Chrisjen is some sort of shrinking violet in this matter. I'm sure she spoke out forcefully, as she did all along. I just feel like her hatred of Holden above all others is, lacking any further explanation, a little over the top, and I'd like to see the logic (even if it's flawed) behind it. Otherwise, she's just angy, and fixated on an inexplicable target. I have to believe there's more to it than that. I'd like the writers to show me.

Either? Object [noun ob-jikt, -jekt; verb uh b-jekt] ... 3. the end toward which effort or action is directed; goal; purpose: Profit is the object of business. "Objective" works too.

I am traveling on business this week and was forced to watch this episode on a hotel room TV with analog only service. Noisy, low resolution analog. And stretched out (as people often do in hotels) so as to fill the screen horizontally at the expense of maintaining the proper aspect ratio. Hence, everyone was stretched out such that they were short and fat. Even the Belters. Short and fat. And grainy. I do not recommend this as an optimal way to view an episode of this, or any, show. But even with that obstacle, I enjoyed this episode quite a bit, especially that last 2 and a half or so Kubricky minutes. Yikes. The first sentence of Zack Handlen's review of this episode for AV Club is "There aren’t enough characters like Anna Volovodov on TV." He then rhadpsodizes for two and a half paragraphs about how great, fun, and important the character is, and how she reminds everyone of the importance of making connections, which he sees as a major theme of the episode. I'm not bringing this up to be argumentative - my own feelings fall somewhere between your extreme and his. And I'm not going to go on again about grey areas and how this show is chock full of them, because that's pretty obvious. I mention this instead because I frequently marvel at how this story seems to speak so well to so many viewers, each person reacting somewhat differently to individual characters, plots, and even visual effects, yet seemingly agreeing on the whole that the show is excellent (or at least very good). That's a tough high wire act to pull off, and yet the people who make this show do it on a weekly basis. It's pretty impressive. I think ProtoMiller is what he says he is, an agent of the protomolecule, which/who has been tasked with accessing the "locked records" aboard the station. Holden was chosen, as Miller said, because he has a ship. Miller is a tool that find things, Holden is a tool that goes places. Or whatever the exact quote was. As to why a human was needed to "complete the circuit," I initially wondered that myself - like, why doesn't the silly thing just grow those two pieces the rest of the way and complete its own damned circuit? But then I realized (I think) that Miller was speaking metaphorically. The object was not to complete the circuit as in connecting the top piece to the bottom piece. The object was to "unlock" the "records" and provide the means to receive them. I can postulate (fancy word for fanwank) here that, likely for security reasons, the information that Miller seeks has been "firewalled" in some sense; it is not accessible to the other parts of the automated system that the protomolecule as a whole sort of is. A living being (not necessary a human) was necessary to download the data. The circuit being completed was the circuit that delivers the historical record to a living host. Holden wasn't replacing a missing "fuse" in this scenario, he was more like an external hard drive, plugging in to receive a copy of the data in the system. Yeah, for all my "defense" of Melba/Clarissa's misguided motives, I have to agree that she is doing little more than mustache twirling at this point. I know there's more going on there, but it needs to be shown right quick, else I have half a mind to space her myself. And I will yell at her, "forget you, Melba! Forget you and your clusterfudged problems!" as she drifts off into the vacuum of space. Or protobubble.

Of course. Perhaps my tongue was not firmly enough in my cheek. As I said, that was my "fanboy" reaction. The real me is well aware of the world and how it works. I just now and then long for a time when everyone wasn't so jaded. I know it's a pipe dream, but in the words of one Mr. Holden, "I'm going to hold on that for a little while."

This was a really interesting read, but I have to say, the fanboy in me wishes the studio execs quoted in this piece were not so damned cool and collected and professional. Like, Jennifer Salke (new studio head for Amazon Studios) talks about how she heard good things about the show, so she decided to watch some of it, and she concluded that the show was "actually really well done." Which is fine, but, I mean, "really well done?" Is The Mona Lisa also really well done? Citizen Kane, really well done? How about the collected works of Beethoven? I wanted her to tell a story about how she turned the thing on just to satisfy her curiosity, and then, 14 hours later, she had to be pried away from the TV by her family and trained medical professionals and sedated to force her to get much needed sleep. Or when she says that co-head of TV Vernon Sanders was saying "we can make that show into something," I wanted him to be more effusive. I wanted him to be chomping on a cigar and saying something "I ain't seen this much talent in one place since MGM in the 30s." Sigh. I guess I'll take it, though. :)