S01.E03: Virtual Faith

[paulvdb]

Quote

After the Mithraic kids fall sick, Campion believes Mother is poisoning them and plans an escape. As Mother and Father attempt to prove otherwise, Marcus and Sue work to convince the other surviving Mithraic to mount a rescue of the children, desperate to get their son Paul back.

 

[AnimeMania]

This should be way more interesting than it is. The only person I like now is the mouse.

[paigow]

This will be another Prometheus prequel...Michael Fassbender is in one those pits breeding these aliens

[NeenerNeener]

This show isn't quite as convoluted and hard to understand as the reviewers have made out.

So there was a big war between the religious and non-believers that messed up Earth. Both groups launched survivors to the same new planet but the athiests only sent some embryos and 2 androids. The Mithraics sent a whole ship full of people.

Mother is a superweapon built by the Mithraics and reprogrammed by the Athiests. The radiation from the space yams is making the kids sick. 

What's so hard to understand? It's not really enough people to keep humans from dying out, though. 

[skotnikov]

17 hours ago, NeenerNeener said:

This show isn't quite as convoluted and hard to understand as the reviewers have made out.

So there was a big war between the religious and non-believers that messed up Earth. Both groups launched survivors to the same new planet but the athiests only sent some embryos and 2 androids. The Mithraics sent a whole ship full of people.

Mother is a superweapon built by the Mithraics and reprogrammed by the Athiests. The radiation from the space yams is making the kids sick. 

What's so hard to understand? It's not really enough people to keep humans from dying out, though. 

Exactly. For me it all sounds like a  pastiche of the Sci-Fi of the 1960s and the 1970s, Le Guin & Co. Great stuff. 

[Tachi Rocinante]

Pretty good episode, but the pace is a bit slow.  Still interested, although the religious shit is a bit tedious, especially with the "orphan kid prophecy" or whatever.

Edited September 5, 2020 by Tachi Rocinante

[greekmom]

So did Mother kill all the kids except the ones she took? Because there should have been more children on board.

[PotterOtherP]

So far it is way too much about malfunctioning android personalities and not nearly enough about an alien planet that definitely has alien life on it. Isn't anyone curious about where that life came from? And who dug those pits?

[ottoDbusdriver]

19 hours ago, PotterOtherP said:

 And who dug those pits?

I'm thinking those pits were dug by the giant serpents whose bones were found in the fields, and those bones appear to fertilize the soil (as Campion mentioned that the carbos only grow where the bones were found).

When Father was down in the pit closest to camp he grabbed something that kind of looked like snake skin.  So it's possible the giant snakes are still around.

As for those 4-legged predators, it's curious where they have been all this time since it has been years since they first landed.  It is a big planet so maybe it took a while for the predators to notice them and get to their location, or they could be migratory -- who knows at this point ?

[Citizen A]

I got the impression that the fissures caused by the arc crashing might have released the predatory animals.

Still, it’s strange that this planet clearly has animal life with giant sharp teeth, which implies predators, which implies prey, so there should be an entire food chain of animals and yet in 12 years they saw no animals whatsoever? Maybe humans would’ve been curious about this and investigated, but I can believe the androids would be too focused on the task of raising children for such second or third order concerns.

What I find harder to believe though, is how they would not know about the radioactivity. I was assuming the carbos are plants that they brought with them, Maybe genetically engineered to provide food fiber and other materials.  But even if they are native to the planet, It’s hard to believe they could create radioactive pits, if there was not already radioactive stuff in the soil. Maybe all the geiger counters were left on the craft that went into the hole? But wouldn’t the ambient radioactivity still be problematic?

 

 

Edited September 6, 2020 by Citizen A

[Citizen A]

I’m also a bit skeptical about this whole necromancer class android. If the society has a technology to create not only fully functioning human-like androids, but also add to them the ability to fly, to emit what are effectively death rays, and to be impervious to harm, why aren’t there just handheld versions of these things for humans to use? It’s not clear what the androids are powered from, but clearly Mother would need a lot more power to be able to fly, and yet seems to weight the same as Father.  Maybe he’s solar and she’s nuclear?

If the faithful were creating the necromancers, as I think it’s implied , you’d guess they’d be starting with all the component parts already as developed tech.  
 

 

[paigow]

1 hour ago, Citizen A said:

It’s not clear what the androids are powered from, but clearly Mother would need a lot more power to be able to fly, and yet seems to weight the same as Father.  Maybe he’s solar and she’s nuclear

 

 

Yet the ships can fly on potatoes...which seems problematic in that you would need a greenhouse on board to grow fuel...

[marinw]

Father has brought lame Dad jokes to a whole new place.

Edited September 7, 2020 by marinw

[nodorothyparker]

Good gods, the near future of Earth in this one is bleak. I mean, I know that's the genre, but everything about this just seems terrible even before you get to the matching white outfits and haircuts that all look like they were performed with kindergarten safety scissors. 

The whole design of the necromancer androids doesn't seem very practical or well thought out, and I'm realizing part of my issue is probably that they're using "necromancer" in a whole different way than how I normally associate the word. I guess if you just want to kill scads of people without worrying too much about the details that's fine, but as the religious folks are seeing now, they can apparently be reprogrammed and turned back on you. Interesting that it was the religious side that came up with them in the first place.

At this point, I'm mostly interested in the complexity of the emotions that are at play here. Marcus and Sue 2.0 aren't actually Marcus and Sue, thus not Paul with the pocket mouse's parents, yet they seem to have embraced the role fairly quickly and enthusiastically. (And how great is Fimmel roughhousing with the kid and making stuff up on the fly in a way that makes me miss Ragnar Lothbrok all over again?) All the kids can agree that Mother is acting emotionally in a way they've never seen with androids and she's visibly relieved she's not inadvertently poisoning the kids. So is that really the extent of her motivation? She wants to be a good parent, which sorry Father, no she isn't or she would have shown some curiosity on the subject five dead kids ago.

[paigow]

On 9/6/2020 at 5:35 PM, marinw said:

Father has brought lame Dad jokes to a whole new place.

He is a victim of inferior coding...all recordings of observational comedians were destroyed in the first days of fighting.

[Joimiaroxeu]

Did Mother out Tempest to the other kids? They seemed surprised to learn either that she was pregnant or that she was open about it.

Would people's minds mature while they were in hibernation? It would be weird if they woke up 13 years older but their minds were still stuck at 13 years younger. Or if their minds did mature but their bodies didn't while they were in stasis. Imagine being 18 but having the body of a five-year old.

Marcus daydreaming wistfully about being in the war as a boy. Oy.

I just realized that Mother is basically a banshee.

Wonder if there's something at the bottom of that nearby abyss? Besides dead bodies, that is.

[Starchild]

Just caught up. A few observations:

• Is it me or are the British accents coming and going with Father and Campion?
• So the prophet is actually "Marcus" right? Orphaned even before he became a soldier.
• So those predatory animals sure look humanoid. Former inhabitants of the planet, now living underground?

[paigow]

12 hours ago, Starchild said:

So the prophet is actually "Marcus" right? Orphaned even before he became a soldier.

This planet is full of orphans...Mother created more when she crashed the ark...the prophecy has to work

[WatchrTina]

Well, they sure decided to end that episode on a children-in-jeopardy moment, didn't they?

As for the head guy ordering an android to lead the Necromancer away  . . . damn.  That was cold.

I'm still not really a big fan of anyone in this show but I am at least somewhat invested in the faux parents being reunited with their faux son.  If that does NOT happen I'm going to be pissed.

[rubyred]

I’m trying but I’m baffled by the directorial choices. I can’t blame the actors because they don’t have much to work with, but would an emotional beat here or there hurt? All of the kids’ parents are now dead, which is stated flatly in exposition, but no one seems upset? And yeah, did Mother blow up Tempest’s spot? I couldn’t tell if they were shocked, didn’t know, or just never talked about it.

Maybe I’m looking away from the screen  at the wrong moments but how do you go from “you never talk to me” to “I can’t be a parent/why not / you know why” to duck-duck-goose in ten seconds flat?

Also not loving credulous Campion and his artfully mussed hair. I like Paul better.