Another Life - Netflix First Contact SF series

I finally got through the first episode. I have very conflicting reactions to it. I like the basic story well enough, especially the storyline on Earth. And Katee Sackhoff is good. However, the crew Salvare is so monumentally unlikable that I doubt I'll be in any hurry to finish the series.

The fact that they mutinied and then proceeded to nearly kill themselves was so eyerollingly stupid I had to turn it off for a while before I could bring myself to finish the episode.

Netflix really needs to hire some decent editors with the power to really change things. Also, they need to test screen these things before releasing them.
 
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I've only watched the first episode so far.
I would expect them to be professional astronauts, the best of what that humanity can produce, being smart enough to play mental chess (for example) and have multiple talents, to follow orders without emotional outbursts or self doubts, and especially not to crumble at the first sign of trouble.
Ian is a violent pathological idiot. I can't believe that (whenever this is set, post 2026) in the future, they don't have, at least, the same psychological tests for astronauts that they already have today. The crew looked unfit both physically and mentally for such an important mission.

I also can't understand why, if they already have this interplanetary ship and previous missions undertaken, they haven't yet spotted the humongous local dark matter cloud that bends starlight.

Apart from that, it was okay (but not making me need to see episode 2 immediately.) I'm a little tired of shows that link everything back to the same family, and try to make a strong mother-child relationship. That is especially unbelievably here as in the comm after months of sleep, the daughter was way down her list of questions.
 
I also can't understand why, if they already have this interplanetary ship and previous missions undertaken, they haven't yet spotted the humongous local dark matter cloud that bends starlight.

Yes they have the ship and no, the mission into the interstellar space is the first one. Before they have only done interplanetary missions.
 
I've watched 3 episodes now and it didn't get better. Looking at the comments here should I bother any further? The science is dodgy? The crew are ill-disciplined and very stupid. Their leader has no leadership qualities. The mission is compromised. Why can't they find better people to man this very important first contact mission? The b-story with the husband on Earth is going nowhere very fast - just sack him and get someone who knows what they are doing!
 
Looking at the comments here should I bother any further? The science is dodgy? The crew are ill-disciplined and very stupid. Their leader has no leadership qualities. The mission is compromised. Why can't they find better people to man this very important first contact mission? The b-story with the husband on Earth is going nowhere very fast - just sack him and get someone who knows what they are doing!

If it's a pain then yes, why bother? There is no point on watching anything that doesn't appeal your senses of satisfaction. Over the years there has been a number of first contact stories, and many of them has been about hostile aliens and even this turned out to be about one. But, the way they went telling the story was very controversial as instead of strict military code followers they sent out a punch of radicals. You take a sample of current scientist and you'll find out that there are a number of them that follows same patterns.

I do agree that the producers should have put a bit more effort on making it more official, just like it was in Nolan's Interstellar. Wait, no, they put a farmer in ship and sent him in the study a black hole. At the end it was very Kubrik like movie that hinged on the success of Nolan's previous products. Not a great success in my eyes.

In this one, towards the end, they got more of the plot together and they showed some progress towards a real plot. What I didn't liked was that once again they were showing humans against a god like species, that has been doing things in this corner of the galaxy for a long time. Yet, nobody never saw anything. UFOs were denied until one landed in the North America and said nothing.

I was surprised that they didn't tried to nuke it. No, instead they got together talented, smart kids who knew how to think outside the box, where as similarly aged military people would have ... personality issues in the space, while they were hunting the source for the alien species. Why is that there cannot be something similar to the Sagan's Contact or Spielberg's Close Encounters of Third Kind? Why does all the stories that end in the small screen has to go through the similar type of plots that at end are nothing more than invasion type stories?

In fact, why there are no stories about the Alien Artefacts or super old history that get uncovered in our solar system, which then leads to a hunt for the source ... wait, am I describing the Expanse and Babylon 5, as both involved history and aliens to explain cosmos teaming with life. What if whenever we finally go out there, that we find out that is the case, and Another Life was just a fantasy?

I'm sorry that this series didn't please most of you, and I'm apologise for getting your hopes up for something good. Sorry.
 
I'm sorry that this series didn't please most of you, and I'm apologise for getting your hopes up for something good. Sorry.
No need to apologise, at least not to me. I still respect your opinion and hope you continue to share it. I am often far too critical of scifi series and hope to ease up a bit, but I am just so spoiled for good tv that it's not easy. :giggle:
 
Certainly, no need to apologise. I have Netflix and it suggests that I will like it with a 94% match. I may still watch this but the fact is that we are spoilt for choice today (a very good thing) and I have other series to watch first. 20 years ago, in the absence of any other choice, I may have even been saying how amazing this was.
 
,,, the fact is that we are spoilt for choice today (a very good thing) and I have other series to watch first. 20 years ago, in the absence of any other choice, I may have even been saying how amazing this was.
Excellent point.
Even 20 years ago television science fiction offerings were not that bad. Imagine going back another few decades to a time when My Favorite Martian was the best I could do.
Choice is a wonderful thing, even if a few less than tasty items occasionally appear on the menu.
 
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In fact, why there are no stories about the Alien Artefacts or super old history that get uncovered in our solar system, which then leads to a hunt for the source ... wait, am I describing the Expanse and Babylon 5, as both involved history and aliens to explain cosmos teaming with life. What if whenever we finally go out there, that we find out that is the case, and Another Life was just a fantasy?
They why hasn't someone adapted James P. Hogan's Inherit the Stars? There's a story that could work extremely well. And the less said about failed Rendezvous with RAMA adaptations the better.

And there is no need to apologise. If anyone should apologise it's Netflix and everyone involved in Another Life.
 
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James P. Hogan's Inherit the Stars

I had to google it as I've not read it. The only problem I have is the multiverse. It cannot be edited out from the Giants saga. It would destroy the story. But that long timeline also creates a kind of conflict as it would have to be spoonfed to the audience. However I kind of like that it explains almost everything and while certain things has artistic license, it's acceptable. They would have to do it same way as Amazon is allegedly doing with the Asimov's Foundation. You know how difficult that has been over the years to bring on the small screen. It is not a small feat.
 
I've now watched episode 7. I think the series took a sea-change for the better with this episode. It is no longer just about a ship of fools on a fools errand, and has now become a much deeper story about the intentions of the aliens. Some diverse story strands are getting pulled together now and the possibility of dark secrets. I particularly liked the alien's method of communication since "alien communication" was a discussion within another thread on Chronicles, and I mentioned then that it may not be verbal or even a language, and cited the music in Close Encounters of the Third Kind as an example.
 
Given this is unlikely to get a second season, the ending was rather unsatisfactory, but the latter half of the season was a big improvement on the first half. Whether anyone is willing to hang on in that long is debatable.
 
Given this is unlikely to get a second season, the ending was rather unsatisfactory, but the latter half of the season was a big improvement on the first half. Whether anyone is willing to hang on in that long is debatable.

What was the biggest fail and the biggest success in your mind? Personally to me, I hated the goofiness, but I loved that the producers did some very bold moves with the aliens, and how they are. At the moment the antagonists feel overly powerful, but if the Netflix can get the producers and writers to really think how they move forward, this series could get amazing at the next season.
 
What was the biggest fail and the biggest success in your mind? Personally to me, I hated the goofiness, but I loved that the producers did some very bold moves with the aliens, and how they are. At the moment the antagonists feel overly powerful, but if the Netflix can get the producers and writers to really think how they move forward, this series could get amazing at the next season.
I still don't believe they would choose a crew that stupid or irrational, with so many psychological problems, and with no discipline or regard to the safety of the ship. They were also obsessed with sex, getting naked, and have zero depth of character. Or when they need someone to die, they summon a crew member up from stasis.

While not very original, both the aliens were sufficiently unusual, and I liked that they are still a little mysterious, but that was tempered a little by making the main guys genocidal. Also, both planets visited had flowering plants as their vegetation, another bug bear of mine.
 
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Or when they need someone to die, they summon a crew member up from stasis.
That annoyed me, because when they had the first crisis by that blue star, I thought they were going to wake the whole crew to get ship fixed. They didn't. Instead it was that small crew even though the logical choice would have been to wake up everyone and then allow these extraordinary personalities to take charge of the play.

This is the same problem that Matrix write Lana had with the Sense 8. There were too many personalities that needed to be on the screen at the same time, and some of them weren't logical choices. In the Jupiter Ascending that whole thing was magnified and the end result wasn't that great. So, I identify it as a writer problem, and the series writers were willing to put in these ones instead of the professional types, even if they could have filled in the background places as we have seen in the Expanse.

I guess Netflix has to roll die if they go forward and give a go-ahead for the second season as they've done with many productions.
 

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