Beacon 23: S1-E6–8 + S2 preview

[00:00:00] Hello, Wool-Shift-Dust family. Apologies for the delay on this episode. Please listen to the start

[00:00:05] of the Oscar Prep preview episode in this feed if you'd like more information about why that is.

[00:00:11] But just to let you know, this conversation you're about to hear was recorded back in December,

[00:00:15] shortly before Christmas. So apologies for any outdated references. But this is actually the

[00:00:20] perfect prep for season two of Beacon 23 which starts April 7th on MGM+. In this episode,

[00:00:27] we remind you how last season ended. And we also discuss the season two trailer and other speculation

[00:00:33] about what's to come. We will be back for one more episode before the new season launches,

[00:00:38] getting into our thoughts a few months after what you're about to hear now,

[00:00:42] and looking forward to the new season plus sharing our coverage plans of course,

[00:00:46] and Beacon 23 questions for discussion we've received from the community since recording

[00:00:51] this episode. So if you have any questions after this episode, please do email them to

[00:00:57] woolshiftdustpodcast at gmail.com so we can include that as well. That final season two prep

[00:01:04] episode will also include an interview with a special guest, Beacon 23 author Hugh Howey

[00:01:10] is back, letting me pick his brain once more. So look out for that to drop in this feed and

[00:01:15] in the meantime, enjoy this look back on season one and our season two news and speculation.

[00:01:22] And PS, congratulations to Canada. I hear Beacon 23 is now officially available there on Prime Video.

[00:01:28] Okay, let's go.

[00:01:58] Hello and welcome back to the woolshift dust coverage of Beacon 23, the MGM plus series

[00:02:04] that asks can AI lie while the humans get high? I'm Alicia, Beacon 23 bookkeeper who will be

[00:02:11] comparing but not spoiling any future plot points for the show. Not only because I don't really know

[00:02:17] what's going to happen in this show based on the book, yeah, because the only character or name

[00:02:21] even they've carried over so far as a talking rock. But also because we mustn't spoil the pristine

[00:02:27] book unspoiled opinions of my co-host Luke. Hi, Luke. Hi, Alicia. Yeah, once again,

[00:02:32] I am the fount of all ignorance and my mind has been blown by these last three episodes.

[00:02:40] Yeah, so since MGM plus went ahead and dropped us a double finale on the 17th, we're going to

[00:02:46] be covering all three remaining episodes of season one. We haven't covered yet in this episode.

[00:02:51] So not just six and seven, but eight as well, the season finale will be breaking down what

[00:02:56] happened episode by episode, putting together all the pieces to figure out what we know

[00:03:00] at the end of the season. And then we'll be talking about what we know about season

[00:03:04] two, which is coming much sooner than you might think. So that was good news, right?

[00:03:09] Yeah, it was particularly on how we ended episode eight. I've been very nervous had I not already

[00:03:16] known that season two was in the can. Yeah, so I'm very glad. I'm very glad we kind of already knew

[00:03:22] that season two was happening. Yeah, I mean, I had like a little moment of doubt like, well, what if,

[00:03:29] I don't know, what if the numbers aren't good enough that they even though they have it,

[00:03:33] they decide not to air it for some reason because they didn't want to finish the effects or

[00:03:37] who knows. But luckily, no, that's not the case. We have not only a confirmation that season two is

[00:03:43] coming, but it's coming as soon as April. So were you surprised by that announcement?

[00:03:49] Yeah, it was a little bit because I thought even if they'd finished principle photography,

[00:03:53] like you say, I think I expected the effects would take a bit more time or that they might have

[00:03:58] to reshoot. But yeah, I'm certainly pleasantly surprised it's coming as soon as April.

[00:04:05] And what were your thoughts just briefly about how this season ended and the season as a whole?

[00:04:12] Well, I mean, as far as the season as a whole, based on like the first three or four episodes,

[00:04:18] I would say I enjoyed it, but hand on heart. I wouldn't have put it in the same league as

[00:04:24] Silo, you know, the other show we've been reviewing. But the last three episodes,

[00:04:29] I think really kicked the entire season up a notch. Okay, I really enjoyed these last

[00:04:36] three episodes. And I really do think it's, I wouldn't say that they're very similar shows,

[00:04:42] but it's certainly on a par in terms of how much I enjoyed it with Silo now.

[00:04:46] Yeah. So do you think would you be, I mean, you probably wouldn't know about the show if

[00:04:52] we weren't covering it because it's going on with the marketing department.

[00:04:57] Yeah, it doesn't really exist in the UK. And I was actually quite kind of shocked at the fairly

[00:05:05] minimal level of promotion that MGM put behind what is a show that they put considerable

[00:05:12] resources into. It seems... Well, but they bought it completed remember, because it was

[00:05:18] made by a different studio. It was originally going to be on AMC from, what is it, Spectrum Originals?

[00:05:24] And then they shut down Spectrum Originals and so they sold it off. And MGM Plus bought two

[00:05:30] of their shows, including this one. Okay. So they actually bought... That's interesting because I

[00:05:36] thought they like bought the script but the scripts, but they actually bought the show

[00:05:41] whole and complete. Right. Yeah. But it was, I mean, I have to say the production company

[00:05:46] that really made the show happen is Boat Rocker, who's also responsible for shows like Orphan Black,

[00:05:50] which is one of my favorite shows. Okay. How would you rank these last three episodes?

[00:05:57] I would probably go eight, six, seven. Okay. I would also put seven third, but I would say

[00:06:10] six, eight, seven. I think my favorite stretch of episodes this season was four, five and six.

[00:06:17] Okay. Mom would definitely be six, seven and eight.

[00:06:20] Yeah. No, that's fair. I really like to... I mean, I love Lena Heaney. I love Stephen James. I love

[00:06:27] these roles they're in and the chemistry between their characters and that relationship that we've

[00:06:32] seen. I don't know the complexities of it that we've seen unfolding all season.

[00:06:36] But I really love my favorite two episodes are four and six, which are the flashback episodes where

[00:06:43] we get like, we get the whole backstory. We get the world building. We get history of Bart.

[00:06:49] Oh, Bart. Oh, Bart. Oh, Bart. So by the way, spoilers for obviously for the entire first

[00:06:56] season of Beacon 23. And yeah, I will be talking about some things from the books.

[00:07:01] I will not spoil anything from the books that hasn't been, that I at least don't think is off the

[00:07:07] table for this show because the show has wildly diverged. It's its own thing set in the same

[00:07:14] kind of place much bigger, but inspired by rather than adapted from. Absolutely.

[00:07:20] Yeah. And I'm glad about this April renewal because I know this is a show that asks a lot

[00:07:27] of patience and some people have haven't been feeling the patience, but I know those who trust

[00:07:32] the answers will come seeming to be having a much better time with the show. So I'm sure that

[00:07:37] knowing the answers are coming this soon will help a lot of people, you know, feel better about

[00:07:43] this finale and how they left things. Yeah. I mean, there's certainly there's certainly

[00:07:47] a lot of unanswered questions, but I think we did get the we did get the exposition that I

[00:07:53] kind of wanted from these three episodes. I think we do and you know, we do understand more

[00:08:00] about the universe. We understand a lot more about the timeline. Yeah. And I think we sort of

[00:08:08] know a bit more about who the players are in the wider universe beyond right.

[00:08:13] Haley and Anastah and what they want. Exactly. And what's most evading them.

[00:08:18] Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And so we're going to get into all that. Yeah. Who the main players are.

[00:08:23] What exactly happened? What we do know and what we still don't know.

[00:08:27] What was revealed and what we still need to find out next season right after this quick break.

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[00:09:38] All right. Jumping back to episode six, which was simply called beacon 23 and yeah,

[00:09:44] I have to say if any episode earned to have the same title as the series, this is the one.

[00:09:50] Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely dead because it really was.

[00:09:55] I mean, we also four was also a story of the beacon but this really was the story of

[00:10:00] the beacon that tied the pieces together. Also for episode six and seven, like Wade Bogger

[00:10:08] the guy who voices Bart. I don't know what award you would put him up for but he needs to be put up

[00:10:14] for some type of an award because good grief as far as voice acting goes, that guy blew it

[00:10:20] out the park. It was an amazing performance. Yeah. Yeah, it's incredible that a lot of people

[00:10:25] is including ours. Our favorite character is someone you don't see. You just hear his voice.

[00:10:32] Yeah. So yeah, that's an he did an incredible job.

[00:10:36] So episode six was directed by Oz Scott who was the same director as episode five, Rocky.

[00:10:42] And it was written by Zach Penn, you know, the season one show runner and Allison Moore who

[00:10:47] they also worked together on the pilot. And it's another flashback episode.

[00:10:53] So yeah, like I said, I love Heady James Moomba but these flashback episodes might be my

[00:10:58] favorite. What about you? Are you, you said they're not your favorites but are you a fan in

[00:11:04] general of the four? I'm a fan of anything that gives me more time with Bart, frankly.

[00:11:10] Okay, fair. I'm just a complete Bart stan which is unfortunate.

[00:11:21] So yeah, so this episode takes place at an undefined point in the past which will

[00:11:26] learn an episode seven is 10 years before the present day storyline, quote unquote,

[00:11:31] before Solomon and after Astor's parents have abandoned their post. But Bart has apparently

[00:11:38] stood empty for about 10 years at this point. So is this about how you understood the timeline?

[00:11:44] Yes, I think so. I'm a little bit hazy on some of the finer points of the timeline.

[00:11:50] I think I'm clear in terms of the sequence of who came first and then who followed and then who

[00:11:56] came after that. We don't have exact dates. I'm a little bit hazier. Yeah, yeah definitely.

[00:12:02] But this means it's at least 20 years between when Astor left the begin as a child and when

[00:12:07] she returned as an adult which tracks. Yeah, which is about right. Yeah, at least 20 years

[00:12:11] because what, I mean just what about 40 now? I don't know anyway. I think maybe mid 40s,

[00:12:16] early 50s something like that. Well, but I mean Astor is the character because then

[00:12:21] because she was I guess about five when they left? Yeah, yes, yes. So I would say I would

[00:12:27] guess about 30 or so years. Yeah, she would have been exactly five. Yeah. So we see a man

[00:12:34] will find out is named Kier, Mark Machaka and at first he looks to be a computer engineer

[00:12:41] installing what he claims as an update to protect Beacon 23 from a bombing that happened

[00:12:45] recently at Beacon 24. Our resident AI Bart Wade Bogart O'Brien knows better but he plays it cool.

[00:12:52] He tries guilting Kier at first. How could someone destroy a beacon of all things? He asks an entity

[00:12:59] that exists only to protect. Kier plays dumb and says he has no explanation so Bart drops the act

[00:13:06] and calls him out for attaching a bomb to him. And now he can go in on the guilt angle even

[00:13:11] more directly. Why are you trying to kill me motherfucker? He doesn't say that last part.

[00:13:16] He's not he's not murderous part yet. We find out actually no, I guess this is after

[00:13:22] Aalif so he did murder someone already. Yes, it would have been after Aalif.

[00:13:28] So we find out Kier is part of a group called the Column who have a religious devotion to

[00:13:33] something they call the relics which are the glowing rocks we've been hanging out with all

[00:13:37] season. Bart knowing this teases Kier with information and yeah Bart tells him he knows

[00:13:43] more about the relics than anyone else in the universe and this finally turns Kier's head.

[00:13:48] Yeah, I think we can safely say Bart is probably pretty different from the other beacon AIs and

[00:13:55] I know the show is called Beacon 23 and the book never showed us other beacons but now

[00:13:59] I'm kind of insanely curious about what the other beacon AI are like and I hope next season

[00:14:06] we get a flashback from one of the new characters. It includes a glimpse of a different location

[00:14:10] maybe fingers crossed. Yeah, by the way were you getting like big foundation vibes off

[00:14:17] this whole storyline with the Column? It was very sort of foundation and sort of

[00:14:23] Sure, yeah I mean or the expanse. Yeah it wasn't it's not psycho history is it but

[00:14:30] it was something you're something that sounded very similar to psycho history.

[00:14:35] Right, the guy that Kier was quoting from. Yeah their whole collective consciousness yeah

[00:14:42] we've got some more teases in these episodes about whatever this religion is but I still have

[00:14:48] questions and I'm looking forward to more answers on that but we did find out that it's the

[00:14:53] Column that the war is against so it is another human entity because we find out this episode

[00:14:58] that there has been no known contact with alien life. Actually I hadn't put two and two together

[00:15:05] but yes Farooch says that yeah yeah so yes that must mean that the war is being fought

[00:15:12] against the Column yeah yeah I don't think that's ever explicitly stated in any of the three

[00:15:18] episodes but it's not. No I mean we know the Column is the enemy and well it gets more

[00:15:24] they imply it hard enough that it gets kind of explicit but yeah I guess. I have to be honest

[00:15:30] that I was wondering about if it was an alien species because in the book it is an alien

[00:15:35] species they're fighting against called the Riff and I never really expected them to show up

[00:15:40] because like they have sideways mouths and I don't think that it would be some very involved CGI

[00:15:46] but but now it's confirmed this is a human civil war at its core and it's over ideology of

[00:15:52] course or is it yeah or is it yeah I think this is still going to link back to the central

[00:16:00] quandary at the end of the book for any book readers but I won't say anything more about that

[00:16:03] because until we learn more about what's going on here. We also find out why why the colonies

[00:16:10] keep dying and it's basically because humanity is expanding through the stars too quickly

[00:16:17] well but we they're down on resources to support all these colonies.

[00:16:20] Well especially not with uh especially not with a column bombing out all of the beacons so that's

[00:16:25] yeah it's kind of yeah it's kind of I can see your point here but you're you're kind of contributing

[00:16:31] to the problem not the solution. I mean you are the problem like you are the reason Aster's

[00:16:36] mom died is because you know but yeah like your column. Going back to the beginning of the

[00:16:42] series I think it was unclear as to you know why the colonies would run out of food why they didn't

[00:16:47] set up hydroponics and stuff and I still think that's a little bit no that's true but we do have

[00:16:52] kind of an explanation that there are too many colonies that humanity is spreading out too

[00:16:58] quickly and that there aren't necessarily the resources to support all these colonies.

[00:17:05] Yeah yeah exactly well and also just yeah that that we know now that the column is the one

[00:17:10] who they're talking about entire arms of beacons being bombed out and that's why

[00:17:15] several colonies died and now we know that it's the column between that behind that

[00:17:21] and we saw Kier attempting to do such a bombing to beacon 23 and since beacon 23 or

[00:17:28] four was taken out well it seems yeah they're probably going for the entire arm again.

[00:17:33] Yeah I yeah I don't think we know how long Solomon was there exactly on the beacon

[00:17:40] I'm definitely going to do a season one rewatch before season two and see if I can pick up any

[00:17:45] more details from the earlier episodes now that we know more but I don't think it could be long he

[00:17:50] couldn't have done this for five years I don't think but is it but is it a full five years because

[00:17:57] they just said they had five years left from when they found out they were pregnant so how long were

[00:18:03] you know Pastor's parents there before that? Yeah good point I don't think Solomon served a full term

[00:18:09] anyway. No no I mean he wasn't up to leave he just left for other reasons. Yeah he was he didn't

[00:18:17] he didn't say he wasn't he didn't really leave so much as he was left as he was made to leave.

[00:18:23] Well yeah kind of yeah well they tried to call him back and you know we're like dude no oxygen

[00:18:29] okay don't listen and I thought I thought a character couldn't call him. Yeah I mean he could have died

[00:18:37] worse but yeah and I thought a character couldn't die off screen but there we go. So yeah but it's

[00:18:44] clear anyway that Bart was standing empty for a while so I guess Eagerd performed his function

[00:18:50] fine on his own but it shows the state of affairs with ISA but I do wonder because they had someone

[00:18:55] who were going to replace Astor's parents right and then they disappeared and then he was just

[00:19:00] empty for a decade. Yeah yeah anyway I'm hoping season two puts more of these pieces in the middle

[00:19:08] back together because I do know for instance we're getting a teenage Astor in season two that's on the

[00:19:14] cast list. Okay but yeah also in these last episodes so they talk about the ISA and the

[00:19:19] military as two different entities so we were kind of our at least I was kind of thinking

[00:19:24] they were the same but that actually makes sense so it sounds like we have four players on the board

[00:19:29] we have the space military whatever that means I'm hoping we find out more in season two what kind of

[00:19:34] government is running this universe but it was the space military that Halen was working for who

[00:19:40] he is AWOL from. We have the ISA which is basically like intergalactic NASA and they're

[00:19:48] responsible for building and staffing the beacons and I wonder what else because a lot of things

[00:19:53] I would think would be the job of the ISA seems to be the job of other people including the QTA

[00:20:01] so that's the tech company behind the faster than light space travel and at least the harmony style

[00:20:07] of AI though I guess like the ISA does design the BART style of AI yeah but yeah the QTA is

[00:20:14] ALIF's company ALIF's company um and I guess they're working together relationship I guess

[00:20:20] this is sort of how SpaceX and NASA are starting to work together with the private sector building

[00:20:26] the tech or even vessels that the government entity will use for their missions yeah it did

[00:20:32] my sort of sense was yeah this is kind of like SpaceX or something like Lockheed Martin with

[00:20:38] the Department of Defense or you know a big defense contractor basically yeah and we have

[00:20:45] it all gets a bit doomed because we also have the space guilds yeah and there's also the space

[00:20:50] guilds and we don't really find out what they do but yeah it all got a bit doomed that for a second

[00:20:55] well I mean I think that that's more commentary in this case um the guilds are really more

[00:21:01] about workers rights more commentary on unions okay because for instance they're the they're

[00:21:08] one of the groups that stands in the way of them removing humans from the beacons

[00:21:13] so we're talking like medieval trade guilds yeah exactly trades guilds yeah which is what

[00:21:19] Dune is based on but they just evolved to be the rich people kind of yeah so yeah so we find out

[00:21:25] that the QTA and ISA developed the GWIB technology together the gravity wave beams that they're

[00:21:31] getting high off of the whole time so that's interesting to note and yeah I just have to

[00:21:38] say it's timely the final last week tonight with John Oliver episode that came out the week that we're

[00:21:45] recording this it had a deep dive into why it's dangerous to have a personality like Aleph Elon

[00:21:54] Musk in charge of such essential technology uh that's being supplied to the government so

[00:22:00] if anyone I think you can just find that bit on YouTube if anyone's curious it ties in

[00:22:08] a lot to what we're seeing with the whole Aleph situation in this show and what I assume is coming

[00:22:13] next season yeah is that the character in the book at all by the way or is he no no like I said

[00:22:20] zero characters in the book arguably Halon is the protagonist who is not named but that's like

[00:22:26] the most similar character and then the only other character that showed up on a one-for-one

[00:22:31] basis is Rocky okay so there's no there's no but I guess what I'm saying is there's no sort of Aleph

[00:22:38] equivalent you know or like arc business nope nope okay no in the in the book the book's like only 180

[00:22:47] pages so it's doesn't it's mostly from the perspective of the protagonist and the people

[00:22:53] that he meets at his own beacon and we're aware of the larger war because he took part in it

[00:22:58] but yeah we don't really get the business interest at play okay and so yeah the fourth group in this

[00:23:04] world is uh the column as we said so this is a fringe group that seems to have formed around a

[00:23:09] sort of worship of these relics although I guess no I guess they didn't form around the worship

[00:23:13] of these relics I guess that came in later and we'll talk more about their motivations as we go on

[00:23:19] but as they yeah I mean it seemed like it started off as a political group that became a religious

[00:23:25] group in discovering the relics but then I wonder is it the group overall that's religious or is it

[00:23:32] here because his girlfriend got him into that yeah because when the when the two other people show up

[00:23:38] they obviously don't care they don't seem all that interested no in the relics so yeah that's a good point

[00:23:44] but if this stuff the key are saying sounds oddly like what Milan was saying in episode five

[00:23:51] but it's clear that the QTA and the column are at odds so

[00:23:55] it's interesting but it's also sometimes that's true in real life sometimes the groups

[00:23:59] that are closest in ideology are the groups that fight the most viciously like definitely yeah

[00:24:04] if you think about like Protestants and Catholics or Sunnis and Shiites you know yeah

[00:24:08] especially when it comes to religion um how large do you think the column is if they've

[00:24:14] started a whole war that's gone on for I don't know it seems like a hundred years

[00:24:18] but it's got to be a it's going to be a fairly um sizable organization I wonder whether there are

[00:24:25] like column colonies out there whether they're whole colonies planets um systems that have gone

[00:24:32] over to the the column I would assume that if they're mounting a conventional war against

[00:24:38] the ISA there must be um but you know these guys are waging sort of these guys are waging

[00:24:45] sort of interstellar terrorism so are we meant to understand that that that this is a conventional

[00:24:54] war between armies or is this I think this is something we might find out in future seasons

[00:24:59] is this more like an insurgency counterterrorism can mean I'm assuming I'm assuming this is a

[00:25:07] guerrilla war and they're not trying to take on the military directly as much as

[00:25:12] I mean they're doing strategic but they're like the bits and pieces of combat footage we've seen

[00:25:17] seems to be like a fairly stand-up but we haven't seen we've seen them on planet doing a mission

[00:25:24] but we haven't seen just straight on battle there's not like yeah but yeah yes yeah so we know that

[00:25:31] they say later uh when they see a ship coming from the vegas vega system they think that must be

[00:25:37] column so they must have like a base there absolutely yeah like I said I think control of that

[00:25:44] column sympathetic colonies or maybe even like groups of colonies probably yeah um well so

[00:25:53] now that keer is listening to Bart Bart begins his first story uh so this is the episode that

[00:26:00] gave us basically everything we said we were hoping for in the last breakdown starting with

[00:26:05] the very first beacon 23 keeper dr re avalan keralina Bart Bartchik Bartzak

[00:26:13] wherever what what has she been in alisha I've seen her in something but I could not

[00:26:18] for the life of me um think what and I thought going on IMDB would be cheating oh why would

[00:26:24] that be cheating I don't know that's what I do what do you think I spent so much time making

[00:26:29] these notes on um I don't know I haven't really seen the stuff she's been in but she's got like one of

[00:26:38] those faces that yeah like I know her from somewhere I know I did yeah she's she's been in a lot of

[00:26:45] stuff but to be honest like I mean the only thing I know I see that I know is X-Men apocalypse and

[00:26:51] I don't know what role that is okay black mosa movie out um I don't know yeah she's got that's

[00:26:57] very pleasing symmetrical face apparently normally darker hair but yeah so this is Dr.

[00:27:04] Riavalan and we learned she basically put Bart together and gave him that name and made him who he

[00:27:10] is by choosing options in the ISA's AI builder menu so it's kind of like a character creation

[00:27:16] menu in a video game did you get that sense too yeah and I love the fact that Bart doesn't have

[00:27:20] an avatar because the most true representation of Bart is the beacon itself yeah that was a

[00:27:27] really nice touch yeah exactly I there is a default avatar option though I paused and looked at all the

[00:27:34] lists obviously but uh the default avatar option I'm really wondering what that would be so that's

[00:27:39] one of the things I hope we get a flash of another beacon to see because the other the other

[00:27:43] avatar options were historical celebrity or biblical so all of the just first of all

[00:27:51] all the worries above AI using celebrity forms come true so I guess the actors should be striking

[00:27:59] over this yeah no I've just I've just got I've just got this idea of scores of beacons being

[00:28:03] run by by Taylor Swift now I find that the biblical one is an interesting one um religion

[00:28:11] seems to play a big role in this world are you surprised by that um no but I mean how would

[00:28:17] you make a biblical avatar how do we know what Moses looked like you just what you're

[00:28:22] actually saying is he would be charmed and tested it yeah we're back to celebrities again

[00:28:28] I know yeah I know some people are surprised when in sci-fi there's religion because they're

[00:28:33] advanced science users but I think it's just religion is sort of an intrinsic part of

[00:28:38] humanity especially when you're in a situation of isolation um yeah there's a hunt for meaning

[00:28:43] in the vast nothingness and as we know from dune that religion is absolutely a means to exert

[00:28:49] control over populations yeah uh Bart said by the way at this point I was born under a lucky star one

[00:28:55] might say if the closest star hadn't died 300 million years prior which doesn't make sense to me for

[00:29:02] a few reasons like for one when we use this expression we're not talking about our son

[00:29:06] but now I'm just nitpicking yeah well I don't think Bart I'm not sure Bart quite gets metaphor

[00:29:15] no that's fair uh and we find out Bart's it's not a model name like we thought it's just

[00:29:20] chosen from a list we hear him referred to as a theta series in this episode not a beta series

[00:29:26] like Aster called him in episode one but I'm guessing Aster maybe just slightly misremembered

[00:29:31] things and Bart was silenced at the time so he couldn't trust her uh but the final selection

[00:29:37] that Dr. Avalon makes is Bartholomew no avatar admin type 001 operator none personality none

[00:29:47] detector default definitions common learning default extraversion outspoken so Bart really

[00:29:55] kind of built himself the only features she gave him were his name and his chattiness

[00:30:00] yeah well that's a that's a reasonably good place to start yeah I like the idea that Bart

[00:30:06] built his own personality yeah I think that's probably a big part of what makes him unique

[00:30:13] what makes him different from other AI I mean we again we've only seen really him and Harmony

[00:30:19] and Aleph but we know that Bart is different just by the way that Harmony responds to him

[00:30:24] she's constantly like dude what is wrong with you and of course yeah that's after he was messed with but

[00:30:30] yeah we also find out about Dr. Avalon that she grew up in a coastal area one of the last humans

[00:30:36] Bart would meet born on earth so she's the one who brought the lighthouse photo and it's implied

[00:30:43] that it was one local to her growing up or reminded her of that at least I think you just

[00:30:48] reminded her of that I don't think it was necessarily local to her but somebody else

[00:30:53] framed it in the intervening period because she just tagged it up on the wall

[00:30:58] yeah well we also saw it later in between this time and the quote-unquote modern time

[00:31:05] it was framed in the living room when Sylvie was there so maybe Sylvie framed it and then

[00:31:11] someone else took it back upstairs yeah but she puts it up in the GWB because

[00:31:16] she to her Bart was making the metaphor that the the sea of space like the space is the sea to her

[00:31:23] remembering growing up in the edge of an ocean like that but Dr. Avalon soon notices a strange

[00:31:28] light whooshing by in the sky but Bart doesn't detect anything she sees a sphere of growing rocks

[00:31:34] swirling around a central light that we left Halen and asked her looking at in the present

[00:31:38] timeline on episode five but Bart still detects nothing and he's getting worried about its keeper

[00:31:46] she's becoming addicted to watching what will become known as the artifact spending 27 hours at a time

[00:31:52] in the cupola watching it without even realizing it but after prodding from Dr. Avalon Bart realizes

[00:31:58] it is weird how nothing this space she's staring at is this is an entity Bart he's designed to

[00:32:06] detect dark matter of all things and he still cannot see anything where his keeper says this

[00:32:11] artifact is so he starts to look for that absolute nothingness that absence of even space

[00:32:17] and track it and he notices it's not random there's a pattern to its movements so yeah as

[00:32:23] we've discussed in previous episodes the AI can't see the so-called artifact and I guess this

[00:32:27] is how they figured that out yeah I like the idea that you you see it by not seeing it

[00:32:34] it's the dog in the night that didn't bark it's the thing that didn't happen it's the thing you

[00:32:39] can't see yeah it's the gap it's the negative space it's then it's yeah it's negative it's

[00:32:45] negative space and yeah I like how Bart gets all sort of philosophical about it because

[00:32:51] yeah you shouldn't be able to see nothing or at least the when you do see nothing it should

[00:32:57] be genuinely random whereas this is actually like you say it fits up it fits a pattern

[00:33:05] absolutely yeah and so Avalon also thinks she has a fog horn at some point do you think that's the

[00:33:11] artifact digging into her memories yeah I think it probably is but yeah it's interesting Bart's

[00:33:17] looking at it from the perspective of data and Ri is operating on faith she says I know it's coming

[00:33:23] back I just know you have to trust me and yeah even if she doesn't understand how she knows so that's

[00:33:29] playing into this whole day is in Makina situation in this show so Dr. Avalon dreams she's standing

[00:33:38] outside the lighthouse in her picture looking out over the water at a light coming toward her

[00:33:44] Bart wakes her up just as she's about to open the bay doors and go outside she snaps to

[00:33:49] puts on her spacesuit and takes the picker out instead over Bart's objections she takes off her

[00:33:54] helmet inside the picker but in her vision she's in a small boat on that sea outside the lighthouse

[00:34:00] steering toward the light and then she disappears into it the picker floats in space empty and

[00:34:05] Bart can't find any trace of her so what do you think she went into the artifact as uh

[00:34:12] Astros talking about later I'm not sure I mean I think there's a possibility because there was

[00:34:18] nobody ever recovered so I think she sort of became one possibly like merged into the artifact

[00:34:26] yeah um and if that's the case the only thing that gives me pause is if that's the case

[00:34:34] why wouldn't the artifact send back a human being it had merged with as a messenger

[00:34:41] I don't know that it can full of doing that I don't see I mean there's it sends back memories

[00:34:47] of the people communicates with but I you know later on Halen seems to think you can go in and

[00:34:53] come back out but I was like oh you sweet summer child I don't think that's an option

[00:34:59] I think it's a one-way ticket yeah but that's what I'm saying it has to be because otherwise the

[00:35:05] entity the aliens whatever they are would have had an easier way to communicate with humans

[00:35:11] they could just have sent an emissary again this is very deep space this is very deep space nine but

[00:35:17] they could have well yeah an emissary back to explain the situation but the emissaries that

[00:35:23] they're sending back are these visions like for um Halen in previous episodes they had his old

[00:35:28] friend Gashad speaking to him or then they even just said like hey I'm a rock look at me I'm talking to

[00:35:36] you yeah I think it's it's a good thing it was with Halen that the space boys learned that humans

[00:35:44] are fragile to quote Rocky but yeah because Avalon would not have survived that space no

[00:35:51] no she definitely wouldn't and the panic in Bart's voice is yeah yeah what are you doing

[00:36:03] I know this is not how humans work um but it does like so the fact that she was absorbed by them or

[00:36:10] whatever happened and they still didn't seem to know that humans were fragile does that mean

[00:36:15] her conscious she's lost like these these bits of human knowledge I don't know

[00:36:24] yeah no I think we need to we need to circle back to that yeah something gonna be a season two question

[00:36:31] yeah also it's interesting that Avalon dreams she's at that lighthouse so I just had to note

[00:36:38] they built that set huh yeah so I have a feeling we might see that set at some point maybe somebody

[00:36:46] else is gonna have hallucinations too expensive to only show us yeah exactly and Bart tells Kier

[00:36:54] that he believes what he calls relict come from this artifact and wouldn't Kier like a nice frothy

[00:37:01] beer while he listens to Bart's next story don't mind that the beer is clear Bart's out of

[00:37:05] dyes since he hasn't had a keeper in almost 10 years one spark tells Kier that the woman who set off

[00:37:11] the bomb and beacon 24 died in the explosion Kier says he'd rather like that drink after all

[00:37:17] and he pauses the bombs countdown so I'm really glad that they showed that you do need supplies to

[00:37:23] feed the 3d printers like the ink I referred to in the beacon premiere breakdown so

[00:37:29] um glad we're keeping with it um yeah and it sounds like Kier's girlfriend's the one who

[00:37:34] got him at least into the religious side but do you think she's the one who pulled him into the column

[00:37:39] um yeah probably because I think I think I think actually the religious side of it probably is

[00:37:47] the column I think it's probably a central sort of tenant of the columns belief system as it's

[00:37:53] developed yeah I don't know because I mean the artifacts couldn't that they seem to be obsessed

[00:38:00] with they couldn't have existed before Grisha made them you know I mean sorry the the relics

[00:38:07] the rocks the individual rocks that they were talking about no I I guess not but I think the

[00:38:12] the relics I think the way they interpret the relics is sort of confirmation of the

[00:38:19] belief system not the belief system came from the came from the relics okay sort of it's

[00:38:27] just a chicken and egg thing the the relics are confirmation of they take the relics as

[00:38:33] confirmation of what they believe not not that what they believe is based on the relics

[00:38:38] well that's how I understood it anyway all right well I guess we'll we'll see how what we

[00:38:43] learned about that in season two but the fact that Kier's girlfriend seems to have gotten

[00:38:47] him into it explains why he's a bit less of a zealot when we see him in this episode but

[00:38:52] when we see him after 10 years in jail it seems like he's really leaned into that celletry yeah

[00:38:58] he's where he's a believer he's wearing all white I mean that's yeah that's it's cold code

[00:39:07] he's looking very cold and yeah we also find out as you alluded to there's someone named

[00:39:14] Marcel Oaken a socio-futurist they say who was name dropped here and we hear a bit more about

[00:39:22] him in in these episodes and I expect we'll hear more in season two but he says the belief that

[00:39:27] humanity's evolutionary purpose is demonstrated within society is the point of the column so

[00:39:32] here he translates that translates that as we exist only in our relationships with each other

[00:39:38] we mean something when we're connected if we keep expanding soon we won't even know who we are

[00:39:44] and yeah that we're getting too dependent on corporations and AI spread out like this

[00:39:49] so the goal of the column is to stop human expansion through space and yeah that seems to be why

[00:39:55] they're blowing up beacons all over so these far-flung colonies die and humanity stops trying to set

[00:40:00] them up yeah and I mean I think also his point is that the expansion was going too quickly anyway

[00:40:06] that these colonies these colonies are dying because there being these planets have been

[00:40:12] colonized without enough resources I mean the only colonies we've seen dying thus far are because

[00:40:18] they didn't have supplies because the beacons were blown up but we'll see if there's more than that but

[00:40:23] so far it seems like the column is really the one causing the deaths that they're lamenting

[00:40:28] it's true but also I yeah this is where it seems to overlap with Milan's collective

[00:40:35] consciousness goals you know he's talking here's talking about we're only mean something

[00:40:41] when we're connected and when we keep expanding we don't know who we are so

[00:40:46] yeah that seems to argue a bit for collective content I can see why

[00:40:50] that would start to buy into the whole idea of the artifacts

[00:40:55] no I disagree with you I disagree with you a bit there because I think what Milan is talking about

[00:41:02] is the idea of fusing humanity together into a single collective consciousness

[00:41:06] what column are talking about is social relationships right but so what I'm saying

[00:41:12] is that Milan's idea is the more extreme version of that

[00:41:18] like you fusing social relationships so much that you become a single collective consciousness

[00:41:24] kind of but I think the column would say actually that society in order for it to exist

[00:41:31] has to be made up of individuals like the genius of building communities is to account for and

[00:41:40] find a place for individuality whereas Milan wants to obliterate it but I mean I think you and I would

[00:41:46] say that but we haven't heard the columns say anything like that yet I'm not saying it's not

[00:41:49] possible well we haven't heard them suggest anything like that yet like because they seem to at least

[00:41:55] I mean in this is not unique to the column obviously but we learn later they want well

[00:42:00] we know already they they ask people to sacrifice themselves to subsume their personal

[00:42:05] interest to their collective goal yeah I guess the we know that the column believes the relics

[00:42:11] contain a warning from an alien civilization and so yes we know they're trying to talk to

[00:42:16] Aster, Halen, Avalon etc although it's still not completely clear with their messages although

[00:42:22] Aster and Avalon seem to understand it uh so I'm definitely looking forward to finding out

[00:42:27] well first of all yeah I want to know how the column connects back to the characters on

[00:42:32] this beacon other than obviously we know that Kier showed up before and now he's back

[00:42:39] but obviously there must be a connection further back than that that they would even know about

[00:42:43] these relics yes so Kier is starting to get annoyed with Bart's mind games so Bart launches

[00:42:51] into his next story to distract him and I love how he says I promise the next part of the

[00:42:56] story will answer all your questions and I felt like that was directed at the more impatient

[00:43:01] wink to the audience yeah just just be patient it's coming regulations for beacon keepers have

[00:43:09] changed through the years we find out with some advocating for the removal of human keepers

[00:43:14] altogether as I said but the ISA and unions refuse that but after some unfortunate events

[00:43:19] as Bart puts it with solitary keepers couples were allowed to be jointly assigned to a beacon

[00:43:25] as long as they were sterile but despite testing sterile the young couple keeping the beacon in

[00:43:30] this story Farout, AJ Simmons and Grisha, Sidney or Auzarov Meyer are unexpectedly expecting a child

[00:43:38] Bart advises them they must either resign their post or terminate the pregnancy

[00:43:43] and Grisha and Farout talk him into keeping their secret but he warns them that one day

[00:43:47] the ISA will find out and arrest them and possibly take the child away

[00:43:52] but they say they've got five years before the shift ends to figure it out

[00:43:56] so yeah one thing so I was thinking about this whole idea about removing the human element

[00:44:04] and I guess it's true Bart definitely did this job for at least a decade on his own

[00:44:11] so I guess it's possible in the book the reason they say there's a human keeper

[00:44:15] is the protagonist says I'm the meaty center of this rusted metal popsicle out here on the

[00:44:20] edge of space I'm here because they haven't made a computer yet that won't do something stupid one

[00:44:25] time out of 100 trillion seems like good odds but when computers are doing trillions of things a day

[00:44:30] that means a whole lot of stupid and I'm supposed to be smart enough to sort them out

[00:44:35] yeah I mean that's why I assumed there were human keepers in this version that you need

[00:44:41] somebody just to check that the AI is working you need somebody you need somebody as like

[00:44:48] almost as an insurance policy yeah if the AI goes wrong there's literally somebody to push the button

[00:44:55] yeah yeah exactly why do you think it was so important to the ISA that keepers didn't have

[00:45:00] kids on the beacon I assume just because it was like you wouldn't need the but I was thinking

[00:45:08] about this because the first thought was you wouldn't need the the reason is you wouldn't

[00:45:12] need the medical facilities but you still need the medical facilities if either one of the

[00:45:15] beacon keepers were injured so that doesn't seem likely um probably not the healthiest environment

[00:45:23] to raise children but I can think of worse right I mean I was wondering if it could be the GWB

[00:45:30] because Bart says later if the ISA found out about about who turns out to be Astor, Parsem,

[00:45:37] they would want to study her yeah so maybe the GWB would have an effect on like development

[00:45:43] that seems plausible yeah yeah I hope we get more answers on that one do you think that the

[00:45:49] artifact had something to do because Grisha was supposed to be sterile she was tested and

[00:45:55] yeah on the run up to Christmas we uh we might be looking at immaculate conception

[00:45:59] you think that it's possible that Astor's father isn't Farout but is the relic it's

[00:46:05] I mean I mean actually I was gonna I was gonna come to that in a second because the instant

[00:46:09] those two actors come on screen you instantly work out what the twist would be because if those

[00:46:14] two actors had a child that she would look like Lena Heading I mean oh right it's a really

[00:46:20] weird so you're saying that her parents are her parents no I'm saying oh did you worked out that

[00:46:27] Parsem was Lena Heading yeah because like it's a really good it's a really good piece of casting

[00:46:32] because you put those two people together yeah the child they're going to have would look very

[00:46:37] like Lena but I wonder if they did something with whatever was making Grisha sterile to yeah

[00:46:43] so yeah well because she said because like from the ISA's point of view would you be happy

[00:46:50] of one part of sterile or would you insist that both had to be like there's an extra

[00:46:55] piece of insurance I mean she said specifically I'm sterile but I would assume one would be

[00:47:01] enough generally if you can't have kids you can't have kids yeah but yeah I hope that we find out

[00:47:09] more and we also get to see Bart get his drone form the theta not the beta series again designed

[00:47:16] to last forever for root says and Bart says he knows that the baby will be a girl and he says he

[00:47:23] has no idea how profoundly this child would change him oh and jumping ahead we see Bart playing

[00:47:31] hide and seek with a nearly five-year-old Parsem Matilda Ligol her parents are planning their escape

[00:47:37] on a supply ship a few months before the end of their shift and Grisha is not happy with the

[00:47:42] backwater options left open to them to escape to but as we all know from adult Aster they do

[00:47:47] eventually settle on Menelaus or at least Grisha and Aster do yeah um by the way this

[00:47:54] scene is so wholesome I could hardly stand it like oh the hide and seek it's just yeah there was a lump

[00:48:01] in my throat the size of a hen's egg yeah no they have to give us the sweetest Bart before they kill

[00:48:07] him yeah it's just so cute poor Bart yeah poor Bart and yeah it seems like Menelaus is the worst

[00:48:17] of the worst like the lowest of the low the worst place you could yeah they didn't out of the

[00:48:23] options they discussed that was like their last resort option that was even worse than the place

[00:48:29] to where the drinking water tasted like graphene yeah exactly and it's around this time that young

[00:48:36] Parsem starts to see the artifact developing a fixation with a similar to Dr. Avalon's but

[00:48:42] she also starts chanting in an alien language and she's saying something like

[00:48:46] mishmash yeah I mean although so the the names of this family and the alien language here

[00:49:02] they feel like he breaks yeah it seems it seems Hebrew or Hebrew adjacent

[00:49:13] yeah so well we also have so Parsem is what was what is the Persian Jews are called

[00:49:21] and Faroot sounds similar to Farouk which is a common Arabic name which means to

[00:49:28] separate or distinguish between right and wrong um and Grisha is also an interesting name so of

[00:49:35] course Shadow and Bone fans are immediately going to be like oh because like the witchy

[00:49:40] characters in Shadow and Bone or the Grisha but there is a lot of discussion about whether

[00:49:44] those Grisha and those books are Jewish coded although the name is really the Russian name that

[00:49:49] used to be more for boys and now use for girls has shut up a lot in the past like literally

[00:49:56] two years it's I looked up the prevalence of the name for girls and it used to be

[00:50:01] that there was like about five million boys or girls with that name in the world

[00:50:05] and now oh since 2021 there's like 20 million women named Grisha or girls yeah babies is that a

[00:50:13] Shadow and Bone thing do you think probably yeah but it is but anyway it's interesting um when I was

[00:50:20] trying to look up like the words that she's saying the word mishmack which it's most often it's a

[00:50:25] name but I did find it linked to an old Yemeni Hebrew text where it was interpreted to mean

[00:50:31] listen which sounds a lot like what the space for is we're saying to Halen last episode so

[00:50:37] I have to assume obviously the language is made up it's a kanlang you know a constructed language

[00:50:43] like a Valyrian or or um Klingon but generally these are based on existing languages so I would

[00:50:50] love to hear from anyone who does speak Hebrew and or Arabic on whether they see any

[00:50:55] connections with any of the names or the words that we hear in this language

[00:51:01] and yeah Grisha asks what her daughter's singing but at this point it's funny I have to wonder if

[00:51:06] they put two scenes together because at this point her daughter's just like monotone chanting

[00:51:11] but later she does like saying the words a bit more yeah and Bart claims during this part that he

[00:51:17] does not experience emotion per se but his various responses have evolved over time so I don't

[00:51:24] know I think I think Bart's wrong I think he is experiencing emotion oh he's definitely experiencing

[00:51:30] emotion yeah like there is joy in Bart's voice yeah he's playing hide and seek with her I mean that's

[00:51:37] just and he says he changed his life yeah yeah he may not think he's experiencing emotion but he is

[00:51:43] and this is presumably after the whole silvy thing so he definitely was experiencing emotion then

[00:51:49] yeah definitely no so Farout is fascinated by the artifact as well but Grisha is only scared of

[00:51:57] the effect it's having on their child who is obsessed with staring at it and strain begins to grow

[00:52:03] between the adults as Farout tries to understand what the artifact might be communicating he's

[00:52:08] certain that this is humanity's first contact with alien life Bart who can't even see the thing

[00:52:14] is definitely with Grisha on this one and Grisha wants to find a way to leave earlier than planned

[00:52:19] worried their daughter won't make it another four months like this she's been going absolutely

[00:52:24] feral trying to get outside and they've even resorted to sedating her Farout keeps coming up

[00:52:30] with reasons that they need to wait like that they will be charged with their election of duty

[00:52:35] but it's clear what he really wants is to study the artifact more and yeah at one point

[00:52:40] Parsom even kicks her mom in the face to get her to stop pulling her away from the window and then

[00:52:45] shows no remorse this is like a complete switch has been switched and this is where we hear also

[00:52:51] yeah we'll be lucky to bribe away to menelouse so this is how we know it's considered worse than

[00:52:55] a secular eight which is where the drinking water tastes like graphene or baruni where

[00:53:00] there are violent protests from anti-seddlers yeah although I don't get that because like

[00:53:06] Parsons says if they didn't want to live if they were protesting about me on a colony why are they

[00:53:12] on a colony well I don't know because I don't want to bring up current events too much but it

[00:53:18] reminds me of people within Israel who aren't necessarily happy with Israel but you're born

[00:53:23] there and that's I guess yeah and Keir says I didn't know AI could lie and Bart says I have

[00:53:29] programming of course but I'm affected by others and learn from my experiences so yeah we

[00:53:35] questioned where he learned it and you were saying he learned from experience and there we go confirmed

[00:53:40] yeah it also reminds me of what my friend Precious said her royal bubbliness said in episode four

[00:53:46] about what it means to be human so that that kind of feels like the core theme of the show

[00:53:51] to me looking back in the season like this is a show about what it means to be human

[00:53:55] yeah I think if the show has a theme it what does it mean what does it mean to be human and also

[00:54:03] I think alongside that what's the nature of loneliness I think there's a lot about the show

[00:54:09] it's about people looking for connection with other people with the universe with yeah I think

[00:54:18] it's the thing I keep coming back to with Haylen and Asta is that they these people

[00:54:23] have been brought together by the artifact but they've also been brought together I think by their own

[00:54:28] loneliness and their own sense of being sort of isolated from the rest of the world basically

[00:54:34] no I agree yeah I think I always love a found family story and maybe that's also what I like

[00:54:41] about this show or the elements of found family in it so Grisha finds the hidden files and Dr

[00:54:47] Avalon's experiences with the artifact and Farout adds his calculations to hers he realizes that the

[00:54:54] artifact is trying to take parson but he has like this smile when he says that it was like Farout

[00:55:01] yeah I didn't mind you I can't remember the characters name I should have looked it up have

[00:55:06] you ever seen the James Cameron movie the um the abyss which one oh the abyss oh um I actually

[00:55:12] think that's one like I feel like I've seen it but I probably haven't I know it's the underwater

[00:55:18] one yeah it kind of reminded me of Michael Bain's character in that now Michael Bain's character

[00:55:26] in that is trying to kill the alien not communicate with it but there's something about the work

[00:55:30] there's something about the look on the guy's face um that really reminds me of Michael Bain's

[00:55:36] performance in that film so I wonder if that was something the actor drill on because

[00:55:42] the physicality of the performance is very okay okay oh interesting but I can say what they're

[00:55:48] trying to achieve is completely different but it's yeah yeah so Farout wants to use

[00:55:55] wants to use his daughter parson as a means to communicate with the artifact which is the last

[00:56:00] straw for Grisha and she bombs the artifact out of the sky and it falls apart into individual

[00:56:06] glowing blue rocks the relics the column are looking for and these individual stones

[00:56:12] Bart can finally see so we learn AI cannot see the relic can see the individual parts of it

[00:56:19] yeah oh and also that they so Farout delivers the um the coldest line which is what would our

[00:56:27] lives even mean anymore if you said your life wouldn't mean anything to me anymore and it's

[00:56:32] just like but perfectly fair but yeah yeah yeah absolutely um I mean but that was also he's he was

[00:56:41] so far gone too like the the way he was just not caring about the well-being the fact that their

[00:56:47] daughter had changed so much yeah Bart cared more than Farout did and I think that was because of this

[00:56:54] artifact clearly has like a powerful um influence over yeah it's almost like

[00:57:02] it's not quite possession but it's almost bordering on yeah yeah I mean with Halon they kind of border

[00:57:09] they kind of all the way they cross that border line actually yeah yeah and they got him to cross

[00:57:14] the galaxy but I did wonder like how far did these rocks get scattered because how did some end up

[00:57:20] over where Halon was where they picked him up I assume they must have got picked up by passing

[00:57:26] ship maybe got there by themselves yeah I suppose that's part of the backstory we'll see because we

[00:57:32] still haven't completely seen what happened beyond Halon seeing a bunch of blue sports floors coming

[00:57:39] out of a wrap I mean they could just have like been sucked into like the air intake of a passing

[00:57:44] ship or something I don't know or I mean or they picked them up to study them and took them so

[00:57:49] yeah uh so the column started their war about ending human expansion and I guess his relic religious

[00:57:58] element came later then after yes so for roots he's mad at his wife for blowing up the artifact but

[00:58:05] is his daughter's laughing again and playing around and acting normal but because Grisha fired off a

[00:58:10] bomb ISA will be coming to check in and Grisha says this is when she says nothing means more to her

[00:58:16] than her daughter including her husband yeah ouch yeah ouch I mean I'm like I say perfectly justified

[00:58:23] but the way she does your life wouldn't mean anything to me yeah if she died I don't care about

[00:58:27] your life like yeah ouch I mean I guess that's you know if she feels like her husband is playing

[00:58:34] roulette with her with their dog yeah absolutely absolutely she would be more justified in walking

[00:58:41] out on him but ouch that's a call yeah but they seemed in love at first I mean they seemed in love

[00:58:46] you know before before the artifact so the artifact is not bringing people together it's tearing them apart

[00:58:54] but Bart he knows Parsons won't remember him in the future because she's so young

[00:58:59] so he prints her a special necklace with a pendant in a crystalline form so this

[00:59:04] is the one we see her wearing as an adult she said her mom gave it to her but it was

[00:59:07] actually Bart who gave it to her and she gives Bart a thank you kiss and her mom gives

[00:59:12] her a new name for their life on the run Aster

[00:59:25] but then I wonder like how he saw the crystal pattern or where the crystal pattern came from

[00:59:30] because the rocks hadn't been studied up close yet right could they have could the artifact somehow

[00:59:39] affect him affect AI as well yeah we know they can't see it but leave it like an after image

[00:59:45] yeah or somewhere in his subconscious well because you know Harmony is saying later I feel

[00:59:52] like everyone here starts to lose it at some point including maybe even her she including

[00:59:58] Bart obviously and she says maybe even including myself so I wonder if the artifact does also

[01:00:03] somehow affect AI yeah I think there's a good chance that it does I have a question though about

[01:00:09] the changing so we asked her callix is a cool name but considering nobody knew Parsom existed

[01:00:16] did they have to change her name yeah no that doesn't entirely make sense

[01:00:21] that was obviously to keep it a secret from viewers fine except like you say I walked out

[01:00:26] within like two seconds yeah I remember it was like there's a preview with a kid in it I was like

[01:00:30] oh that kid must be Aster yeah this was not yeah I'm not sure this was as clever a reveal as you

[01:00:36] think it was but it was so cool I love this episode it's one of my favorites

[01:00:42] Bart admits he admits to Keir that he knows where the relics are and he says he'll tell

[01:00:48] his next keeper but for now Bart's done stalling he called the ISA when Keir showed up and

[01:00:53] now they've arrived to arrest him Keir decides he'll set off the bomb after all at least be

[01:00:59] reunited with his partner but Bart has long since disarmed it he swears he meant every word he said

[01:01:05] though and that he learned from Keir Bart will think on and share what Keir said to him and he hopes

[01:01:10] Keir will also take his imprisonment time to develop his own ideas which apparently he does but

[01:01:16] again it's like when Bart killed Milan you know you just kind of only made the situation worse

[01:01:21] in a way yeah and okay so this also pisses me off even more at Solomon so Bart says he'll tell the

[01:01:30] next keeper where the where the relics are so that means he told Solomon so all of Solomon's findings

[01:01:37] were thanks to Bart telling him and still Solomon kept him in the dark and treated him badly

[01:01:42] you know just we'll we'll yeah we'll get to Solomon we'll get don't worry I've got I've got thoughts on

[01:01:50] Solomon I just noticed like Avalon and this couple trusted Bart and he proved trustworthy and

[01:01:56] I just I think there's something in there about how when you distrust people they're

[01:02:03] more likely to behave in a way that proves that distrust and when you trust people they're

[01:02:08] more likely to behave in a trustworthy way yeah and yeah the last line of the episode is he says

[01:02:16] there is no weapon it's powerful as an idea boom it's a good line it's a good line it's true

[01:02:26] it's a bit heavy-handed but it is very true yeah yeah pen is mightier than the sword and all that

[01:02:31] so where does Keir fall for you on the Halen Solomon scale?

[01:02:38] I think he falls fairly heavily towards the Solomon end of the scale yeah do you think?

[01:02:46] Yeah he is trying to blow up a beacon. Yeah I mean at the start but then he he does listen.

[01:02:53] Yeah but I don't think it's like I don't think he from what we see in the next episode I don't

[01:02:58] think any of his ideas have like fundamentally changed I think I think he has a more elevated

[01:03:07] sense of himself in the next episode and a more elevated sense of destiny but I don't think he's

[01:03:14] any better person. He doesn't think his encounter with Bart changed him for the better

[01:03:20] okay and yeah I think the ends don't justify the means. Okay I'm a little softer on Keir than you are

[01:03:31] but yeah he's a complex character and I like that about him I found him an interesting character

[01:03:35] okay did you not find him an interesting character? I did but I did I just found him

[01:03:41] a bit more of an ordinary I found him more of an interesting character in the next episode

[01:03:46] where he's had through 10 years to brew on the ideas of this. But I'm talking overall yeah

[01:03:53] sorry I'm saying overall I found him an interesting character. Yeah but I'm saying in this episode

[01:03:57] he's really more of an audience than to get Bart's just the next part of the story.

[01:04:03] That's true and he's also a little bit buzzed by the end of the episode as well.

[01:04:07] Well yeah I don't know this seems like a guy who can handle more than two beers but

[01:04:11] I think three I think. Yeah still okay so the next episode is episode seven titled

[01:04:19] Entransmission and you said you didn't like the sound of this title and you were right.

[01:04:28] This episode broke but it really did. This was a tough one. The director was Greg Beeman

[01:04:36] who he's been directing since since the 80s and he's best known for work on shows like

[01:04:41] The Wonder Years, Jags, Smallville, Heroes and Falling Skies and the writer was Richard Khan

[01:04:48] who's the actor turned writer who also worked on episode three. This episode opens with Bart's

[01:04:53] excitedly welcoming Solomon, Stephen Root to the beacon who promptly shuts down his joy.

[01:05:00] I love the idea Bart. I think it's a surprise part. I like somewhere I like to think that

[01:05:06] Bart had looked into Solomon's personnel file and found that he liked classical music

[01:05:12] and that was why that was that was why that was because he was playing in the background but

[01:05:18] it's so cute. It's like the cutest Bart's ever been but he's been alone for a long time. He's

[01:05:24] so excited to have a new beacon keeper and Solomon's of course the worst. We discovered that even

[01:05:30] more in these this cluster of episodes but he's so richly complex I have to say because you don't

[01:05:36] expect a foodie who likes to wear that much color to dislike fun. Yeah and also but I mean like Stephen

[01:05:43] Root is absolutely chewing the scenery it's in the best possible way. It's a magnificently

[01:05:49] hammy performance. Oh I enjoy it. I kind of I have a hope basically everyone who dies I'm

[01:05:58] like I hope we get flashbacks or some other version. Well I mean I hope Bart is backed up on

[01:06:06] the cloud somewhere. Yeah exactly because he had all of that memory scooped out maybe it was put

[01:06:12] somewhere. Yeah you would think with AI this powerful they must have a version of the cloud.

[01:06:19] Well especially because Solomon would want to have those like he would a lot of this stuff

[01:06:26] he would be scooping out would be the memories around the artifacts and he would want to keep that

[01:06:30] so maybe he just kept it all. Yeah maybe but anyway I hope he's in a really really really

[01:06:36] really hot corner of hell being force fed airline food for eternity. So speaking of why we're mad

[01:06:42] at him Solomon asks asks where Bart's system Root drives are and he's basic he basically

[01:06:49] gives him a lobotomy while scooping out the majority of his memories that made him

[01:06:53] the bot that he is today. So yeah I think this is definitely true of humans is that if you take

[01:07:00] identical twin studies and you put them in different situations the differences between

[01:07:04] them are their experiences their memories it's what makes you an individual and that was taken away

[01:07:09] from Bart. Yeah I mean in a sense he actually murders Bart because he takes away from what

[01:07:16] makes Bart. Yeah exactly which was exactly his goal because apparently Bart's tendency to

[01:07:24] side with his keepers has caused the ISA to dub him unreliable and the cruelest thing is like

[01:07:31] the last thing he tells Bart before he loses his memory of the family that he had loved

[01:07:36] is that Farout was arrested and tattled on Bart so it was like yeah you lost your you know

[01:07:45] your temporary beacon daddy's gone and oh by the way he turned code on you as well.

[01:07:51] Just Solomon is just the worst like I say hottest corner of hell being fed airline food for eternity

[01:08:00] possibly you might to watch Clarence on repeat. Oh Clarence it's such a fun bad movie it's like

[01:08:07] the broom so we know from Astero of course that she and her mother Grisha made it to

[01:08:14] Menelaus but her mother died there in the collapse but yeah so it was I'm taking my internet points

[01:08:19] by the way it was Solomon messing with his code. Yeah internet points well done Alicia.

[01:08:25] But I do wonder they don't say just pointing out they don't say what happens to

[01:08:30] Farout when he's arrested so I'm looking for a follow-up story on that.

[01:08:35] Yeah but I mean if we do get a follow-up story that would be cool but I don't think

[01:08:41] Farout has much left to contribute to the plot. Well but I wonder well I'll talk about it in bed.

[01:08:50] We do get a we get this really lovely montage then of Astor Lena Heady and Hailey and Stephen

[01:08:57] James taking turns to watch the artifact or sleep in the same bed so this is maybe my favorite

[01:09:03] sequence in the series cinematically what did you think of it? Yeah I like this

[01:09:09] sequence and I like the way that they are sort of sleeping in the same bed but there is nothing

[01:09:15] the least bit sexy about it. Yeah it's just a very casual intimacy. It's just not played that way

[01:09:21] and I think that's absolutely right and yeah the way they're sort of kicking each other away you can

[01:09:27] yeah although I hope they change the sheets really regularly on that bed because that's

[01:09:32] going to get stinky really quickly. And I have to ask what happened to that second mattress?

[01:09:37] Yeah I always think you don't have to do this there's another mattress. But I guess it's just easier

[01:09:44] maybe they like that casual intimacy. Yeah maybe it's cold and they've only got the one duvet.

[01:09:51] Yeah I mean it doesn't seem like they had any sort of sexual relationship but they definitely

[01:09:56] felt like they were a bonded pair in some way. Yeah I like the fact that the way it was shot.

[01:10:04] They were sleeping together they were not sleeping. Yeah and they got closer and

[01:10:10] closer until Haley ended up on the floor. Yeah but yeah so the QTA still hasn't arrived because

[01:10:16] didn't Harmony say at the end of episode five that they were like. Yeah I mean I guess it could

[01:10:24] still mean weeks away if there was a I guess you know the storm was going to end in 14 hours

[01:10:28] but maybe. Oh okay. But maybe they were still maybe they're still like a week or so away

[01:10:36] because this is definitely going on for days. Yeah but one day Harmony Natasha Mumba tells

[01:10:40] Halen that his ship the Amboina has reappeared again drifting engine dead and in 12 hours it

[01:10:48] will be close enough to investigate. So I had to look up the name Amboina and actually

[01:10:54] I didn't recognize the name but I do know this story because it's a horrific piece of Dutch history.

[01:11:02] So the Amboina massacre happened in 1623 on the Ambon Island in Indonesia and it was when

[01:11:10] the Dutch East India Company tortured and massacred 21 men after accusing them of spying for the

[01:11:16] rivals the British. So interesting name for them to choose for that ship and I guess

[01:11:22] whatever I'm wondering why the ship was drifting back to them is that should we just take it like

[01:11:28] shifts you know just happen to be drifting in that direction or could it be possible that

[01:11:34] someone somewhere gave it a push back in that direction. I took it that the artifact probably

[01:11:39] gave it. That's what I was wondering yeah. Yeah because it seems it seems a bit improbable

[01:11:45] that it would just drift you know in the whole infinite vastness of space. Yeah it would drift

[01:11:51] back in that direction by itself. Harmony seems surprised so yeah and the the the other interesting

[01:11:58] is where is Solomon because there's no corpse. There was a corpse. Oh we saw the corpse. Did

[01:12:05] we see corpse? Okay shut my mouth completely. I think I caught like just it quickly the first

[01:12:15] time I watched and then the second time I watched it. I watched it twice and I missed it all together.

[01:12:21] We also learned that there are more incoming ships which could be any of the various players

[01:12:27] and asked her annoyed that Halen is talking to Harmony and not watching the artifact.

[01:12:32] She goes barging up there and she sees a vision of a younger version of herself and suddenly she

[01:12:37] remembers being a young child on this beacon. And I wonder if these gravity waves by the way that

[01:12:46] make humans loopy if the space rocks are attracted to them somehow if they have some sort of

[01:12:51] effect on them. Yeah possibly. But in any case it doubles down on the trippiness we've got

[01:12:58] like the Gwibh highs and we've got the space for lunacy working together. Yeah so yeah so

[01:13:03] Aster at this point really is sort of flying she is clearly tripping walls. She's tripping

[01:13:09] past balls what's that she's I have no idea what tripping past balls. Tripping jump ropes I don't

[01:13:16] know. But then when Aster's vision clears artifact is gone and Aster's not happy because

[01:13:23] Halen left it unattended so she goes charging downstairs to look through the old notebooks

[01:13:27] and she realizes the old chests there belong to her family. So that's why she was lingering

[01:13:35] oddly over these clothes a few episodes ago it wasn't about Halen's suit it was her dad's clothing.

[01:13:41] Yeah plenty of payoff. Yeah exactly just gotta be patient. So Aster fills Halen in

[01:13:47] and shows him the nick she left on Bart as a small child Harmony skeptical though and

[01:13:53] she thinks Aster might be delusional. What do you think of Harmony in these episodes where do

[01:13:59] you think she falls on the Halen DeSolomon scale? I'm gonna pass on that question because I don't

[01:14:09] think it's fair to put Harmony on that scale because I think as we find out in a bit I don't

[01:14:19] think Harmony is acting entirely of her own free will. No but I do think underneath that she still

[01:14:27] has like she insists in this group of episodes she insists that she is loyal to Aster and I do

[01:14:35] I'm inclined to believe her on that although she does also say of course AI can lie. I think if

[01:14:40] it were entirely up to her she would be ride or die with Aster but it isn't.

[01:14:47] And like I say I would be reluctant to put her on a hero villain scale because I think in order

[01:14:55] to be on that scale you have to be active your own free will and I don't think Harmony is

[01:15:00] or at least not entirely. But yeah I mean I think it's she's not like the winter soldier

[01:15:05] for Marvel fans who just has no idea what its real identity is. I think it's she can be a hero and

[01:15:13] still be restricted by villainous agenda it's just about how like we see for instance later we see

[01:15:22] Bart is instructed to lock Halen in and he can't go around that instruction so he finds another

[01:15:28] way to help him by giving him a hint. Yeah I mean I know I have a tendency to default back to Westworld

[01:15:35] but in this instance I think it's merited because yeah of course what Harmony what Harmony reminds

[01:15:41] me of is one of the Westworld hosts in the sense that they have the ability to learn,

[01:15:49] they have the ability to adapt, they have the ability to go off script but there is

[01:15:55] parts of their core programming that sort of burns so deeply into their personality

[01:16:00] that they find it exceptionally hard to break that and I think that's the situation that Harmony is in.

[01:16:08] But I say yeah I say she reminds me of Maeve specifically because Maeve does find a way

[01:16:13] to break that and I still think Harmony is going to. Yeah Harmony might get there but

[01:16:19] she's not there yet. No and she's saying a lot of things in these episodes too like

[01:16:28] keeps trying to get Astor to surrender which I know that's her programming and she doesn't

[01:16:33] she's kind of half-hearted about it at times but she still keeps coming back to it like

[01:16:37] then goes to Halen like you have to get Astor to surrender to the QTA. Yeah so yeah so Harmony

[01:16:43] confirms she can't see the rocks anymore now that they've reformed into the artifact and

[01:16:48] one of the incoming ships arrives and it appears to be a stolen ship coming from Vega so again a

[01:16:54] known center of column activity and it's here out of jail a decade after his last visit to the

[01:17:00] speak-in and he asks for parsim and says he has answers for her about why she was drawn back

[01:17:07] to this place. So over everybody else's objections Astor lets him enter the beacon.

[01:17:13] Were you glad to see him back when you watched his the first time? I mean I was surprised I

[01:17:19] honestly didn't know we were going to bring him back within an episode. I thought we were going

[01:17:23] to see him again but I didn't think they were going to bring him back within an episode.

[01:17:27] And what was really cool is you know the women to understand there's at least 10 years between

[01:17:34] these performances and the way the actor delivers he does deliver two very distinct

[01:17:40] performances you absolutely believe that this character has been on a sort of spiritual

[01:17:47] journey over the last decade. And compliments to hair and makeup too. Yeah and compliments to

[01:17:54] although I think they're also the costuming because I'm turning up in that all white

[01:17:59] costume it's like really really sinister. He got that at Colts R.S.

[01:18:05] Yeah it sort of gave off quite strong sort of righteous gemstones energy.

[01:18:11] Okay I hear a lot of good things about that but I haven't watched it. Yeah you should.

[01:18:15] My sister loves it. I do like this exchange though Harmony says the column is a huge

[01:18:20] threat and Astor says so is QTA and Kier says very true. I love Kier's deliveries and I

[01:18:28] do think that even though he's not like one of the good guys obviously but I think he's not

[01:18:39] like Solomon who's just Solomon's a psychopath. Oh yeah that's Solomon's irredeemably bad.

[01:18:44] Yeah. I think the thing is Kier is doing bad things for what he perceives to be a good reason

[01:18:53] because Solomon is just doing them because he can and because it's yeah. Solomon just doesn't care.

[01:19:00] I think I do think Kier cares. Yeah Kier might be doing the wrong things for the right reasons

[01:19:05] and Solomon just doesn't care about anything but himself. And I love also Kier says is this a

[01:19:11] hostage situation? He's like oh okay I get it and Halen's like no you don't get it.

[01:19:15] And Kier's like yes I do I'm not judging it's hard to meet someone out in the asshole of the

[01:19:20] galaxy. True. So Kier surprises them by knowing Bart though Bart doesn't know him anymore and

[01:19:30] knowing that Bart makes a delicious beer this time with Dyes and other aesthetic enhancements

[01:19:36] and it turns out that Kier's distracting them so his cohort Saldana, Jess Salguero and Finch,

[01:19:43] Daniel Malik can sneak into the station. Yeah well where did you think of these people?

[01:19:49] Oh yeah I mean Kier and his henchmen Kier plus two because as soon as Kier knows who Bart is and

[01:20:00] Bart doesn't know who Kier is, that's I think the point at which Bart starts to put together

[01:20:07] that something's gone seriously awry here somewhere along the line because Bart tries

[01:20:15] to dismiss it. Well because he thinks also like those those records hacked him so he can blame

[01:20:21] a lot on that but he's like no it's more than that yeah. I do like the Bart being able to produce

[01:20:29] a tasty beverage. Yeah I'm not quite sure why Kier bought along the two others like it seems

[01:20:38] because his whole what he wants out of the situation is going to rely on us to cooperate

[01:20:45] so yeah I'm quite sure. I'm assuming it wasn't up to him because they do not seem to get along.

[01:20:52] That's true actually but yeah and I have to say I really dislike this couple and not in like the

[01:20:57] fun way. No I don't like them either. Like I felt like they didn't have the nuance and depth

[01:21:04] that the other characters did they kind of see more like crude stereotypes. Yeah I mean

[01:21:09] in fairness it's not so much even crude stereotypes they're just bog standard henchmen.

[01:21:14] Yeah I mean I'm I think they must be there so that we see the softer side of Kier in contrast

[01:21:23] but for me they detracted a little bit from Kier story although I have to say in my second

[01:21:27] watch I softened on them a lot more. Yeah because they are in a relationship

[01:21:32] yeah with each other they do have like moments where they're fleshed out as characters a little bit

[01:21:38] but like their entire ammo is to come onto the station and just kick things and it's like

[01:21:44] yeah why are you here what do you want to achieve. And it's not about the actors because

[01:21:50] because like I know Daniel Malik from other things and I like him as an actor I don't

[01:21:55] I'm not familiar with the actress but I'm sure she's lovely but it's not about the actors

[01:21:58] it's just about the way the other characters have been written with so much more nuance and shading

[01:22:05] that these two kind of stuck out like a sore thumb to me. Yeah I know I agree with that I think

[01:22:12] it's like yeah you've managed to write even characters that have very brief screen time

[01:22:18] as being three-dimensional these guys are just henchmen they are just there to be henchmen.

[01:22:25] Yeah and what did you think of the whole neck port? Yeah like what was what was going on with the

[01:22:32] whole neck port? Well I mean that does connect in with for instance what we saw with the hacker

[01:22:37] in the from the record crew in the second episode. Yeah I suppose because he was in his chest.

[01:22:43] Yeah but I mean I guess different places for different things. He wasn't getting like the

[01:22:47] liquid shots. Yeah but that's that's his thing so I wonder what is this drug that he's like a junkie

[01:22:54] for? What is that doing? It wasn't doing him any good at all. And then also the other question I have

[01:23:00] is at some point like he takes something painfully off of that port it looks like a little sort of

[01:23:06] disc tiny mini disk and then he puts it on Bart and I guess that helps him hack Bart but

[01:23:13] I guess maybe it makes a connection okay now I'm getting it as I'm talking through it I'm getting it

[01:23:18] so I guess it kind of makes a wireless connection that helps him control Bart maybe in addition to

[01:23:24] her getting the ring. Okay um but anyway that's I won't harp on my feelings about them they kind

[01:23:33] of dampened my feelings about these two episodes in the first watch but on the second watch much

[01:23:40] less so which is a good thing because I did see on IMDB they're back for the start of the next season

[01:23:46] which makes sense. Yeah but they're still there. Yeah so but I do have a question like could

[01:23:52] in Bart or Harmony detect there were three people in the ship or maybe they I mean who knows you

[01:23:57] can have technology that cancels that out head cannon. Give me information unless they're

[01:24:01] directly asked for it. Yeah well I don't I Harmony would say if she thought there was

[01:24:07] something that was threatening them. Yeah. So Keir speaking of that Keir again says I thought AI

[01:24:14] couldn't lie and Harmony clarifies that's a crude stereotype AI can lie but she says it's Bart's

[01:24:21] memories that are the problem right now. Yeah so while we've got fiddle and faddle sneaking

[01:24:28] around the station everyone else is confronting Bart about his memory issues and yeah Keir says

[01:24:36] Bart you are a wonder this coming from the guy you got thrown in jail for a cold 10

[01:24:41] like that kind of makes me like Keir more like this is one of the reasons why I'm softer on him

[01:24:47] but then Tweedle and Deedle attack out of nowhere and Keir's like be cool you're blowing up my spot

[01:24:52] when I was making progress and stupid and stupider are like er derp but it's been like a whole 10

[01:24:57] minutes and how have you not done all the things. Yeah exactly let's go ahead and slow

[01:25:04] the whole plot down instead with a pointless hostage situation so yeah they try to hack Bart's memory

[01:25:10] but what memory and Keir wants to get his own plan back on track he knows Aster can communicate

[01:25:17] with the artifact but Pistle and Gristle think that the only way into someone's head is by

[01:25:22] smashing it open and they say a lot of inane things and Keir is much more patient with them

[01:25:28] than I am as a viewer and Saldana tells Keir I don't know if that came across but I promise I'll

[01:25:37] turn it down but okay so here's one of my theories is do you think maybe Keir met Feroots in jail

[01:25:45] and this is how he knows things about Aster like extra things. Yeah that hadn't occurred to me

[01:25:54] but yeah that is a good theory I'm liking that. I'm sticking that out there for season two we'll see

[01:26:02] if I get my internet points enough. Yeah now here's a building off of that taking that and building on it.

[01:26:09] Okay do we think Aelith kind of ensured that the two of them did meet? Hmm I could see that

[01:26:19] I mean because I do wonder because sometimes we haven't seen Keir and Aelith talk but I want

[01:26:25] to see them talk because I feel like their philosophies are kind of dancing around each

[01:26:30] other and I want to see I think by talking to each other we will get a better definition

[01:26:35] of what each individually believes you know. Well because even if the philosophies don't line up

[01:26:41] functionally they want the same thing they want to be able to communicate with the artifact.

[01:26:48] So it really doesn't matter at the end of the day where the philosophies are coming from

[01:26:52] the same place because ultimately they want the same outcome. Yeah true true true.

[01:26:58] So Saldana contacts headquarters on the QT to say the base is secure and Haaland is noticing

[01:27:05] that his ship is starting to get into range. I love this where Keir tries to I don't know

[01:27:13] confront Aster and she jokes him and he's like stop stop you know you're the hostage right?

[01:27:22] Yeah don't care. Yeah classic Aster. And then yeah he says to her that message you're after

[01:27:29] millions of people are waiting for you to find it so I guess that means the column has millions

[01:27:34] of members. Although I just took that as like humanity in general. Although I mean humanity

[01:27:41] now on a single planet we have eight billion so I imagine. Yeah so members yeah must be trillions.

[01:27:49] Yeah so probably it's like but yeah I just took that as like a species to it would be a species

[01:27:56] defining moment but yeah it could be more specific it could be the column more specific

[01:28:00] way I guess. So then Bart remembers a subroutine that detects absence so this is the one that

[01:28:07] he built with Dr. Avalon to help her track the movement of the artifact and he uses it to probe

[01:28:13] the empty spots in his own data. He finds the research from before and concludes what Grisha

[01:28:19] did to the artifact altered it and now that it's reformed it's no longer following the same

[01:28:24] patterns he uses this information to recalculate its path and predict its next appearance.

[01:28:30] So yeah he lies though and says he's remembered which is really sad and heartbreaking

[01:28:36] but he's just actually extrapolating from the data he was able to dig up.

[01:28:42] Bart, you're crying about him all through the holidays. Yeah so Saldana goes to free Halen

[01:28:49] but he's already freed himself she's oddly fond of him she offers him a place with a column

[01:28:55] but Aster shares Halen privately she's on his side just playing along here however over here's

[01:29:01] shaking his faith in his messiah figure. Aster has a jokie aside about trying to achieve total

[01:29:07] consciousness and do you think that's playing along or do you think she's really buying into it at

[01:29:12] this point? Oh no I think he's playing along. Okay then we get the closest we'll ever get maybe

[01:29:17] to a Bart mini romance this season at least as Harmony tries to comfort Bart and he tries

[01:29:24] to explain the anger he feels at the emptiness he finds inside himself so I guess at least he's

[01:29:30] finally mad at Solomon that's a pro yeah but that's awful and there's a heart breaking line

[01:29:38] I feel rage towards Solomon and yet still I mourn him. Oh yeah and Bart thinks he doesn't have emotion

[01:29:45] Bart is just like hugely conflicted at this point and like Harmony does her best but she's not

[01:29:53] particularly empathetic towards what Bart needs. No I don't think Harmony experiences emotion

[01:30:00] quite the same way Bart does. No I get the sense that Harmony is much younger than Bart is.

[01:30:08] Yeah well I mean I guess yeah because she would have been born after Aleph was so that's after Bart

[01:30:15] but also I think it has to do with the fact that Bart's first mother Rhea Avalon she left his

[01:30:23] she left his personality more open all she said was that he was extroverted

[01:30:27] and his name was Bart and then he was allowed to build himself and I think there's something human in

[01:30:33] that. Yeah and you think Harmony is much more. I think yeah I think Aleph built all of his AI very

[01:30:42] specifically. Yeah okay I think that might yeah I think that's probably right. And yeah so Harmony

[01:30:48] says Bart you need to stay in control what you're describing is a pathology and so this word

[01:30:53] isn't quite used correctly for our day but I'm just going to say language may have evolved in the

[01:30:58] future but she's basically just saying he sounds mentally ill which makes me ask like did you

[01:31:04] just meet him Harm? Yeah and also I don't think what Bart is feeling is pathological. No. I

[01:31:12] think what Bart is feeling is perfectly justified. But that's from her perspective she's like you

[01:31:17] sound like you have the sickness of humanity in you. Yeah yeah I hadn't thought of it that way but

[01:31:24] yeah from Harmony's point of view yeah because she talks about like frustration and what Bart's feeling

[01:31:31] is way past that. Yeah way more complex too yeah it's rage but it's also with that dark lining

[01:31:39] of remorse and sadness morning. So Saldana says Kier's time is up but Kier says they've made progress

[01:31:50] and Saldana tells him AI like Bart are the enemy and yeah she just wants to grab Aster and run.

[01:31:59] Kier says Okun was very clear on this and he gets interrupted do not quote that shit to me

[01:32:05] so this tells me yeah obviously he knows a lot more about the scripture and there may be a

[01:32:09] because she's, Koli also said something about not trusting AI so there's obviously some sort of

[01:32:15] popular prevalent distrust of AI that's not baked into the religion per se it's more on

[01:32:23] the societal experiential level. Or maybe Koli was was you know column curious column adjacent

[01:32:35] had read some column stuff. Could be maybe. Yeah she's brought up later by Saldana who's like oh who's

[01:32:43] at who you have this partner you were running around with yeah while they're arguing Finch

[01:32:50] announces the QTA has arrived and we learn the beacon has a drone shield but the cutters so the

[01:32:56] fighter jets of the QTA Luke you pointed out that's an old type of ship on the sea they randomize their

[01:33:03] attacks to confuse the drone shield and Saldana she wants to try and run but Halen says they never

[01:33:10] make it and Harmony wants Aster to surrender to the QTA again over and over and Halen wants

[01:33:18] him and Aster to take the picker and get to his ship and get out of there but Aster refuses to

[01:33:23] leave with him also and she says she's not the type to ask him to stay so he decides to get the

[01:33:29] picker and go. Were you did you did you think like they might be actually separated here?

[01:33:36] No I didn't I didn't think Halen I didn't think Halen would really leave Aster and also

[01:33:41] Harmony let it go surrender is not an option. I feel like that's got to be baked into her because

[01:33:49] at another point she's like I have to tell you this to surrender but I know you're not gonna listen

[01:33:55] because she's going through the motions and Bart said he informed the authorities but I'm not

[01:34:00] so if he says the authorities does that mean that I would think that meant the ISA but then

[01:34:05] the QTA showed up but then again we know they work together so I'm wondering what the chain of

[01:34:11] command is here. I just assume at this point that the QTA has beaten 23 under like permanent

[01:34:20] surveillance so the fourth or fifth attempt the QTA is made. True true and we know why

[01:34:29] there's a very good reason why and obviously that's come to a head now that the artifact

[01:34:34] has just appeared in the sky and everyone can see it you know everyone who's not AI can see

[01:34:39] it sorry I didn't mean to be AIS and yeah Bart he apologizes to Halen and says that Halen was

[01:34:48] right about Solomon and Halen is a good guy so they have this really nice kind of last moment

[01:34:55] together where yes like I said before Bart he was given that direct order by Finch I guess

[01:35:01] that he can't countermand he so he can't open the doors for Halen to leave but he gives him

[01:35:07] a tip he says if the pressure alarm goes off the doors will open automatically if you're looking for

[01:35:13] a heavy object there's one right there so Halen bashes some pipes and he's free to go so yeah

[01:35:19] that's why I say even though he has this programming holding him back he Bart you know he

[01:35:26] he worked he found a way to work around it and I'm gonna use a wheel of time term but

[01:35:33] the I said I are these sorceress women who can't lie but they find ways to manipulate the truth anyway

[01:35:39] use so that was an I said I moved there okay you're not breaking your oath but you're finding a way

[01:35:45] around it and yeah and then Halen says thanks Bart I'm sorry I didn't meet you at your best

[01:35:53] and Bart says me too maybe we could have been friends and I need that alternate reality where

[01:35:58] they get to be friends yeah yeah I need backup Bart next season yeah bring back Bart yeah bring back

[01:36:05] Bart hashtag yeah we know the season's already filmed whatever is happening is happening but it was a

[01:36:11] nice talk between Bart and Aster too and where you know she's telling him it's just as empty out

[01:36:17] there but sometimes people leave because staying is worse but I had this like heartbreaking thought

[01:36:22] like do you think Bart thought about this when he decided to go in his own way yeah I think he did

[01:36:30] well but now Lena Headey starts to get some insight into Bart's anger problems and we got like a great

[01:36:36] side-eye moment there so everyone on the beacon starts to realize the temperature is rising

[01:36:41] they realize it's Bart overheating and Aster understands he's not trying to hurt them

[01:36:46] he's killing himself he believes the great version of himself Aster and Keir remember existed but

[01:36:51] he can't be him again there is nothing they can do to stop him and he is gone so I just have to

[01:36:58] pause here and say like this is super heavy and if there is anyone who's feeling like this who's

[01:37:04] feeling truth in those words I do really urge you to reach out to the people in your life to

[01:37:09] google your local suicide hotlines please don't be like Bart because like him you too will be

[01:37:16] missed more than you realize Bart didn't know that Luke and I were going to be morning him

[01:37:20] all through the holidays yeah people he doesn't even know so yeah Bart says humans tell themselves to

[01:37:28] find purpose but stories are meaningless to him he finds purpose in data so there's something

[01:37:33] interesting in there but I feel like Bart's selling himself a lot of he's selling himself a

[01:37:40] lot of stories in the end to be honest yeah I think he is I think it's I think this is a

[01:37:47] this is a rationalization of the pain he is in not like a true expression of what he's feeling

[01:37:56] yeah which is a very which is a very you know human very human thing to do

[01:38:02] absolutely but yeah I don't think it's a I don't think it's a true representation

[01:38:07] of Bart's feelings I think he's trying to he's trying to justify his actions

[01:38:14] to not not even to Aster and Halen but just to the world at large but I don't think

[01:38:21] I don't think what he's saying is emotionally true no and I mean he says he can't remember

[01:38:27] his past but I feel like deep down he kind of does in his clinging to those abandonment issues

[01:38:34] from like Avalon leaving him and Sylvie turning away from him and Faruth's ratting him out and Solomon

[01:38:40] of course because you know he's he asks Aster he's like why should I have faith in you so you

[01:38:45] can disappoint me and delete me when I disappoint you yeah this feels like he somewhere down there

[01:38:51] he remembers what happened yeah I think that's right and we even see Harmony try one last time

[01:39:00] from inside the AI space although like I started in my second watch I got this conspiracy theory

[01:39:06] like what if she wasn't helping him we saw them repeat the scene where she says listen to the sound

[01:39:11] of my voice but we never see what happens after she says that so yeah but what we do here is Bart's

[01:39:18] last words on the outside I only want to help be a part of something but I'm always the outsider

[01:39:23] I'm done being the weak link this is just too hard and he goes black so yeah we have the tragedy

[01:39:29] of Bart and I have to I was waiting for it to play out like Hamlet but it didn't quite so the summary

[01:39:36] of Hamlet from the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust is the ghost of the king of Denmark tells his son

[01:39:41] Hamlet to avenge his murder by killing the new king Hamlet's uncle Hamlet feigns madness contemplates

[01:39:47] life and death and seeks revenge his uncle fearing for his life also devises plots to kill

[01:39:53] Hamlet the play ends with a duel during which the king queen Hamlet's opponent and Hamlet himself

[01:39:59] are killed so you know I obviously thought in this analogy Bart is Hamlet who perhaps more than feigned

[01:40:07] his madness and Solomon seems like the ghost father telling him to avenge his death and kill

[01:40:12] the new king Halen but then yeah this definitely does not end with a duel between between Bart

[01:40:19] and Halen it ends with quite the opposite of that and also fewer people died in this version so it could

[01:40:25] have been worse yeah it could have been worse but it was still pretty bad yeah but did you do you see

[01:40:32] Hamlet parallels in Bart's story um no no not really okay well in any case fingers crossed there's a

[01:40:42] ghost of Bart as in a backup yeah I really hope there is a version of Bart somewhere in the

[01:40:48] cloud and then there must be because you wouldn't create um an artificial intelligence that complex

[01:40:59] and not have a way to not have a backup of it not have a way to restore it should it should it

[01:41:06] um be corrupted or should it fail now the interesting question is how far back does that

[01:41:12] backup go does it go back as far as the time before Solomon messed with Bart basically well I mean I

[01:41:21] guess the backup I would assume would be Solomon taking it out of the central system so hopefully

[01:41:29] it would be Bart up to that point where Solomon messed with him yeah this is just wishful thinking

[01:41:36] I will be holding my breath until April F. Y. I'll be I'll be I'll be holding it with you so yeah

[01:41:42] so I did look at like the IMDb cast list but they don't even have I know for instance Stephen

[01:41:48] James is coming back it's part of the announcement but he's not even listed on there so we can't

[01:41:52] trust anything that's on IMDb right now okay so meanwhile Halen makes it to a ship and he finds

[01:41:59] the corpse of Solomon Goodriddance he also finds one of those rocks and this must be the rock he

[01:42:05] originally got the spores from that traveled with him and um as one of the QTA cutters gets

[01:42:11] through the drone barrier a rock that rock I'm assuming goes flying through space in the other

[01:42:18] direction and you know we see at the beginning of the next episode it reunites with the rest

[01:42:22] of the artifact um we don't know though if this makes the artifact whole again or if there

[01:42:27] are other missing pieces so yeah I guess some characters die off screen good riddance but

[01:42:36] maybe hopefully more Stephen Roode and flashbacks anyway just for funsies only if it's him getting

[01:42:41] repeatedly kicked in the nuts oh maybe he had a horrible time collecting those rocks yeah hopefully

[01:42:48] yeah hopefully yeah because you think about it you know that was just his purpose he he gathered

[01:42:53] all those rocks and then died yeah it wouldn't have been pleasant I and I guess and it's interesting

[01:42:58] they didn't talk to him it doesn't seem like or maybe they just got him to gather them but yeah

[01:43:04] that's that's true they don't see it wasn't like they wanted him to join them maybe they can sense

[01:43:09] you know good people he's about it they certainly have the ability to um to watch people so

[01:43:18] yeah definitely clearly or it seems like maybe they can see inside well we know

[01:43:23] Halin has some living in his brain so that would make sense that they could communicate with the

[01:43:27] rest of the colony I wonder if we would find out that because I was wondering remember I brought

[01:43:34] up in the book um Halin or sorry the the protagonist the Halin whatever counterpart

[01:43:40] was the only one who could get high off the Gwib and so I was wondering if Aster might maybe

[01:43:46] she also has spores in her brain it's basically what I'm trying to say maybe they all somehow got

[01:43:50] spores in the brain who got the but then Kohli would have to too anyway just putting on the table

[01:43:57] yeah so Harmony she's starting to think that this beacon makes everyone lose their mind

[01:44:01] maybe including herself since she can't explain any of it and she tells Aster surrender again

[01:44:07] but she knows she won't so she drops it and she says their beacon is the hope

[01:44:12] that one day they will both understand what is happening here so again assuring the audience

[01:44:19] right yeah yeah um I don't know there's just a weariness in the way Natasha

[01:44:25] Mumba delivers that line like I am done with this yeah yeah I am so done with this

[01:44:33] like yeah I'm saying the thing I'm saying the thing Aster sees the colony members fighting

[01:44:39] and she goes up to the Koopala to stare at the artifact again which has reappeared

[01:44:44] and Halin sees the cutters zipping toward the beacon so he takes off after them in his ship

[01:44:49] wasn't that engine supposed to be dead or just off yeah I thought it was supposed to be dead but

[01:44:55] I think plot control I'm prepared to give them the benefit of the death now that's fine that's

[01:45:00] fine it was just off I guess yeah so and that's the end of the episode they you know I'm really

[01:45:05] glad they released them both at the same time because I was really felt like it was a mid-episode

[01:45:10] ending yeah yeah I wonder if I wonder if they'd looked at the calendar worked out when yeah I was

[01:45:18] going to be ready and sort of plan that in advance yeah because at first I thought the

[01:45:23] finale was going to be dropped on Christmas Eve which you know it is what it is but it does seem

[01:45:28] like it's better for the show that it's not on a holiday when people are probably going to

[01:45:33] be watching other things yeah unless they're going to do a special okay so the final episode of the

[01:45:40] season episode 8 adamantine so the word adamantine just really means unable to be broken

[01:45:47] so that's not to be confused with wolverines adamantium claws which is the name of a marvel

[01:45:54] metal that's clearly based on this root word this was directed by tessa blake and she directed

[01:46:01] episodes of a bunch of different things like a million little things is the name of a show with

[01:46:05] a 4400 american horror story riverdale etc and the writers this time were again sack pen and iris

[01:46:13] steven bear we've talked about them lots before so we start with ester up in the cupola

[01:46:18] communing with both the artifact and her inner child and keer is fanboying about it

[01:46:24] and saldana is freaking out about the arrival of the qta and um this is when we start to see

[01:46:30] this motif of a door opening with a light beyond that ester seeing in her visions yeah so it seems

[01:46:37] like esters version of what avalan saw with the light beckoning her and the little boat across the sea

[01:46:41] yeah we you hit the nail on the head there with beckoning these are both yeah these are both

[01:46:46] visions that are summoning the person having them to go somewhere to do something but we're

[01:46:52] not quite sure what i mean i it seems to be that this whole idea of entering the artifacts

[01:46:59] when we saw hailing be lured outside when they tried to learn to lure parsom young ester when

[01:47:06] they tried to lure avalan it seems and then eventually they did lure avalan and when she

[01:47:11] just like disappeared from inside the picker yeah so yeah finch is suffering so saldana gets him

[01:47:18] goes to get him more drugs and runs into ester in the kitchen and we find out ester and coli

[01:47:23] were infamous and saldana is disappointed in what she sees before her ester of course has zero

[01:47:28] fucks to give about what saldana thinks about anything and keer the born again colimer is

[01:47:35] quoting his scripture about how the moment of communion is supposed to be fraught and turbulent

[01:47:40] to the annoyance of everyone else uh harmony keeps offering to help but they keep ignoring

[01:47:45] her not trusting her but saldana thinks they do need halan so they're glad to let him in

[01:47:51] when he returns after a little light fire action with the cutters so we got an action

[01:47:56] scene what did you think i actually thought this one worked quite well it worked it worked much

[01:48:02] better than the one in uh the one in episode two and actually for all of for all i was a bit concerned

[01:48:09] about the i think justifiably concerned about the special effects um from that scene in episode

[01:48:15] two i really don't think they've had any any major issues with them since no no i agree it was

[01:48:23] just that i think because there are certain things like the the space stuff is easier to do because

[01:48:30] it's all about when there's interactions between you know live action people and things and

[01:48:37] the vfx that's where it gets trickier where it starts to look unwell yeah that's fair but yeah

[01:48:43] since there was a little action i have to share my favorite action scene from the book

[01:48:48] which it's kind of similar but so we have the protagonist basically the book version of halan

[01:48:53] is trying to distract a ship of the rift aliens called a reaper ship to help other people get away

[01:49:01] so the reaper races my way no shots fired yet claire is halfway to the asteroid field

[01:49:08] moments before we pass i throw my ship to the side attempting to ram the reaper the rift pilot

[01:49:14] is fast he flits to the side and out of the way but i'm spinning sideways rotating as i barrel

[01:49:20] forward and i extend at the sampling arm tucked under the nose of the boat reaching out making

[01:49:25] my craft as long as possible just want to touch to make contact at full speed to let this beast

[01:49:32] know that i pose a threat for him to concentrate on me there's a clang as the sampling arm hits

[01:49:39] the reaper's trailing wing a racket i slam against the side canopy the crappy nasa restraints giving way

[01:49:47] not meant for this stars flash in my vision and then a hiss an alarm as the cabin begins to lose

[01:49:53] pressure cold leaks in a hole rupture the constellations become a blur as the life boat

[01:49:59] spins in space and i have one brief moment of lucidity left in which to wonder if i did more

[01:50:04] damage to my enemy than to myself just that angry hope before a bulkhead gives way in my life boat

[01:50:11] and all that pressurized air rushes out taking me with it as i cartwheel through the ruptured hole

[01:50:17] and out among the lonely and quiet stars my lungs begin to burn they say you can survive in the

[01:50:23] cold vacuum of space for nearly a minute if you hold your breath icy tears glaze my vision

[01:50:29] and i wonder why anyone would bother so that's for me was uh i have to give that point to the book but

[01:50:37] i have to point out the protagonist did not have um he did not have implants but he did

[01:50:43] survive this yeah sorry okay what did you think about this action compared to it was a similar

[01:50:50] it takes place outside the beacon uh similar sort of situation i thought it was i thought it

[01:50:55] was fine i thought it it sort of it filled up a couple of minutes it's it's not kind of where the

[01:51:01] focus of the episode no is like beacon no but i meant the book version show but it was fine

[01:51:08] yeah no i meant the book version oh the book sorry um the the book version yeah i mean i take it

[01:51:16] the the the protagonist ship is not as well armed as hayland no it's basically he's in

[01:51:21] the lifeboat which is the book version of the picker so that's why he talks about that retractable

[01:51:25] arm yeah yeah i mean i imagine it's the picker fighting against this big alien ship yeah he how he

[01:51:32] has um he how he has a way of painting pictures with what's a very sort of visual um writer

[01:51:41] yeah i agree so but in the show astro can't explain to kier what it was like to commune

[01:51:46] with the artifact and he says what did it tell you quiet so i guess this quiet thing it's another

[01:51:52] thing of this listen thing they keep saying listen quiet and saldana tries to hold hayland up at gun

[01:51:59] point demanding he take them out of there but he calls her weak and just takes the gun with

[01:52:04] like barely a blink i think that was very embarrassing for her hayland's back on his

[01:52:10] gun to get asked her to go with him schtick kier says it's his destiny to witness whatever

[01:52:15] is about to happen and then hayland gets the hard news about bart and then he asks if harmony is okay

[01:52:22] isn't that a nice thing i think that that's it's just one line but it tells you a lot about hayland

[01:52:30] yeah and who hayland is that his his first reaction is sadness for bart and his second

[01:52:37] reaction is all the people around me okay yeah exactly and he also invites her to go with him

[01:52:46] and astor um which there's several times where it talks they talk about harmony going with him

[01:52:52] and astor and it made me think of the title of the third episode why can't we go on as three

[01:52:57] yeah still i mean the three in that episode is is the third person in that episode is coley but

[01:53:04] right but yeah like the third person actually is is harmony you like right always been or

[01:53:13] or hayland depending on which way you look at it yeah yeah depending on whether you want to go

[01:53:18] probably yeah yeah yeah yeah so harmony's still stuck on surrender but hayland thinks their best

[01:53:25] bet is to run and sardana and finch are done with this whole rock messiah thing kier is on

[01:53:31] and they want out now but they want to take astor as a hostage to negotiate for safe passage and

[01:53:38] astor meanwhile wants hayland to come with her into the artifact she says a piece of him is already

[01:53:44] there what do you think that means i assume it means that when those spores possessed hayland

[01:53:52] they may have like transmitted his memory his personality maybe even if you want to get

[01:53:57] better physical a piece of his soul back to the back to home base basically back to entity central

[01:54:06] yeah entity central yeah yeah um do you think do you think that's though he'll find he'd find

[01:54:13] his old friend gashad there like because she was there also with the spores and they said

[01:54:19] rocky said i was there with you and gashad so do you think i think he would find some part of her

[01:54:27] but i what i guess what i don't know is are we just talking about they have access to hayland and

[01:54:34] gashad's memories or do they have some or some part of their soul as you put it personality

[01:54:41] like yeah some part of the the metaphysical self that is caught up in the entity or is it just

[01:54:48] they have access to what they experience because those two things aren't the same thing but i also

[01:54:54] wonder is there any individuality in there or does it all just dissolve into one collective being

[01:55:03] yeah i don't think we have enough information to know that yeah and then the mothership arrives

[01:55:09] and it's alif himself not a copy of him and harmony wonders why he'd take such a risk

[01:55:14] harmony tells aster not to tell her anything about her plans because harmony is incapable of keeping it

[01:55:20] from alif so like serious Darth Vader arriving like i was doing the dun dun dun dun and then instead

[01:55:31] of the breathing it ends with an inhaler yeah exactly sorry i have an asthmatic catamense

[01:55:37] so much for the inhaler's last days um and yeah she says he is alive as am i and we find out they're

[01:55:45] called quantic ai so yeah again it's this question still lingering from i know i'm happy for it to

[01:55:52] linger i'm sure it's going to be addressed in season two but that same question from the

[01:55:57] end of episode four when melanne died what are these these ai they claim to be alive as well

[01:56:05] as computers are they different from ai like bart yeah i again i think that's that's like

[01:56:13] you're absolutely right it's one of the big questions for season two i really don't again i

[01:56:20] don't think we have enough information to to hazard a guess yeah but we have as you put it the asma

[01:56:27] rules uh that hermene cannot defy her maker yeah i still think she's gonna find a way

[01:56:33] to break away from him but and she also can't help palin it's not just can't defy it if she also can't

[01:56:41] help palin or asthrin in any way she can't like provide any insight to them yeah that does that's

[01:56:49] another reason why it seems like barts may be a little freer than her yeah i definitely think

[01:56:54] even though he he has a direct order not to help palin he finds out he's able to come up with

[01:57:00] a workaround i mean i i tend to think this is just because i tend to sort of come at that from a

[01:57:08] point of view that bart is just older than she sees had more time to develop um strategies and harmony

[01:57:15] well but i still think it's that we saw you know we saw that his maker so to speak his makers

[01:57:23] kind of the isa but his makers also dr avalan and she left most most of his parameters open

[01:57:30] yeah i think it'll be an interesting question where the harmony can get there in time

[01:57:37] or whether harmony is is what she is yeah no i think that's she might break my heart in the end

[01:57:44] maybe maybe i'm really gonna grow to trust her and then she breaks my heart or maybe we have

[01:57:49] you know and uh mave like ark from westworld but the thing is if the thing is if she does

[01:57:55] break your heart it won't be her fault she won't no i know do it that will be the tragedy of it

[01:58:02] yeah exactly yeah it'll be a alif breaking my heart yeah yeah and kia points out that

[01:58:10] alif has gained a million versions of your conversation he says to aster and in every

[01:58:15] version you lose which is such a good point that he has this ability to just like you know

[01:58:22] not to bring up marvel again but i'm always going to do that like dr strange going through all the

[01:58:27] possibilities in his head and okay this is the one that works because he has that computing power to

[01:58:33] do that whereas humans just don't have the time yeah aster starts seeing visions of her young

[01:58:40] self looking at her adult self in a gown standing by that open doorway of light and

[01:58:46] hailing crouches beside the kid version and whispers something in her ear what did you

[01:58:50] make of this hey hailing in a very nice cardigan yeah okay yeah in a very nice assailants cardigan

[01:58:57] and also lean ahead he is wearing that gown oh yeah absolutely yeah tattoos on full display

[01:59:04] yeah i have no i have no idea i mean i guess this is how she knows part of him is already in there

[01:59:10] yeah it's the way the way he crouches down in this prison area i get the sense that whatever

[01:59:16] you said it was comforting yeah i think he said i think we hear later something like

[01:59:21] it's gonna be okay yeah which also makes me i have there are several things um that make

[01:59:28] me wonder if they're going to explore the linear linear error maybe not so linear nature of time

[01:59:35] next season because we have this whole crouching whispering thing happening before we actually

[01:59:42] see aster die so oh interesting it's all gonna get a bit time you think it's gonna get a bit

[01:59:48] time why me wibbly wobbly okay but yeah so then tweedled and tweedled dumb get a message from the

[01:59:55] qta home base and they want them to sacrifice themselves and they are not keen on this plan

[02:00:02] especially not saldana um so i have to say this is also when i identified with saldana i'm like

[02:00:07] yeah seriously yeah all right you think you want you want us you want you want us to become

[02:00:13] suicide but once you come here and be suicidal you're a bit so i'm not willing and then yeah we

[02:00:19] get hippie professor harry aliff here now i thought this was really interesting yeah the hair well

[02:00:27] yeah because not just the hair but he's aged why why would why would an ai and an ai whose personality

[02:00:38] is based on a guy who doesn't think very much of the human race or doesn't think very much of

[02:00:48] this version of the human race anyway why would he choose to care about his appearance

[02:00:53] why would he choose to age yeah that's a very good question is it just literally that

[02:01:01] presumably everybody the qta knows he's ai he's not fooling anybody into pretending he's human

[02:01:09] no no no they know i thought that was because that didn't make me that didn't make me think back

[02:01:15] to malan and maybe maybe malan's sort of maybe malan's disdain for humanity doesn't extend to himself

[02:01:27] you know it's it's a form of vanity yeah i thought that was really interesting which is very human of

[02:01:34] him yeah yeah so he's playing verbal chess here with aster and aster finds out that aliff

[02:01:41] also knew bart so it's like this whole show is like the six degrees of bart separation

[02:01:48] and um he neglects to mention that bart killed him but it's interesting because

[02:01:54] this whole killing to transcend thing like maybe maybe aliff is even um thankful for it now yeah

[02:02:02] and maybe that also like he's not the one who kills aster in the end but maybe he's also

[02:02:09] might have wanted it in a way you know like uh harm or sorry like kia said he's gamed it out

[02:02:16] a million different ways every way this could play out and probably he thought maybe kia will

[02:02:20] kill her and she'll be forced to commune with the yeah with artifact because because he doesn't

[02:02:28] well he doesn't want aster to be the first person the first human the first corporeal entity

[02:02:34] to be in contact with this thing he wants to be that book well but he can't do it so i feel like he

[02:02:39] actually does want aster to do it because she can and he wants that information he wants yeah i still

[02:02:45] think he's trying to work out a way in which it can be him yeah i mean i'm sure he would like

[02:02:51] that but i don't he obviously has no idea of how it's possible yeah what do you think about his

[02:02:58] bringing up marvel again already um so you have the watcher who says like i watch everything

[02:03:03] but i cannot intervene and so that's why he says bart was outside my purview i couldn't help him

[02:03:08] yeah even though he was a cool ai yeah yeah i'm i'm calling so much bullshit so mad

[02:03:15] who's who's worse alif or solomon uh just uh to alif's argues his own point he says my actions

[02:03:26] are inaction so not based on cruelty i cherish humanity oh yeah well what would you freaking do

[02:03:36] it's no it's gonna be it's it's got to be solemn solomon has to be the worst because at least alif

[02:03:44] has the kind of quasi justification that what he did what he thinks he's doing is justified

[02:03:52] solomon's just doing it because he can't he's solomon is that kid that pulls the wings off flies

[02:03:57] yes i feel like he probably he probably got out the magnifying glass and lit bugs on fire

[02:04:02] yeah he did he definitely did uh um aster says she'll tell him she'll tell alif what he wants in

[02:04:11] exchange for halen's full pardon and release but alif points out the artifact controls aster more

[02:04:17] than she controls it but she does care about him like more than coley she definitely cares about

[02:04:23] hailing more than and it's interesting how to see how alif refers to melan as his makers

[02:04:30] and sees him as weaker but it reminds us that this is not the same man who bonded with silvi

[02:04:37] yeah but that man is in the assailant yeah he's the base of the code i guess yeah

[02:04:44] yeah part of him in there and uh halen says a harmony says again aster's a great liar and i just

[02:04:49] wanted to say i love that you and i were talking about aster being a great liar in the very first

[02:04:55] episodes before the character started saying it yeah i think that's a that's a good sign of

[02:04:59] character writing it is it showed us before they told us yeah and then we've got okay loopsy and poopsy

[02:05:05] are building a bomb together and they're not interested in kia's opinion on it oh you like that

[02:05:12] one the best luke's laughing very hard okay so kia is advising against the interests of the

[02:05:24] column um i guess the column isn't really about this religion it feels like that's more his or maybe

[02:05:31] it's just the way any religious group or any like idealistic group you have the zealots and then you

[02:05:38] have people who join for like it feels like this couple joined because they like blowing things up

[02:05:44] yeah and i think they have a i think they have a justified gripe against qta and and the

[02:05:50] sort of they don't like the society they are in but i don't think they entirely buy into

[02:05:56] kia's worldview of how to make society better that's not what they're there for they're there to

[02:06:02] they're there to attack the society that exists and yeah i don't think that's contradictory

[02:06:07] like organizations like the column always attract those two archetypes of people so

[02:06:12] yeah it's true yeah yeah because it's oh it's like any any body that's allowed to exercise force

[02:06:19] is going to attract people who have feel like violence is the way to get out there

[02:06:25] so following alif's orders harmony locks moxie and proxie in the airlock and begins to suffocate them

[02:06:32] like bart once did to him but the moment he looks away she lets them out and tells them to collect

[02:06:37] kia and get out of there so this tells us alif can't look everywhere at once or maybe he just

[02:06:44] intrinsically trusts harmony that he doesn't feel like he has to watch her yeah and i think it's

[02:06:49] i think it's also at this particular instance he's probably using an uncommon amount of computing

[02:06:55] power to sort of focus on the conversation faster and to run you know scenarios right i think it

[02:07:04] frankly doesn't matter and the artifact i'm sure it doesn't matter to him what happens to moxie

[02:07:10] and flopsie yeah that's true he doesn't care about them for sure he just doesn't care what happens to

[02:07:16] that one way or the other yeah that's true although i mean i guess he wanted her to eliminate them just

[02:07:21] because they could be kinks to cause yeah but if he gets what he wants there'll be infinitesimal

[02:07:29] yeah kinks in the road i guess we'll see how mad he is about it next season yeah i feel like this

[02:07:35] is also support for the harmonies and evolution of hope mumba voice theory just putting it out

[02:07:40] there yeah i think that possibility is is looking stronger than it did before this episode

[02:07:47] and then he says to harm he says to harmony during this by the way yours like as in harmonies and

[02:07:51] asters is a truly successful relationship i'll be sure to acknowledge you for service uh and she's

[02:07:57] like i'm not finished am i and he's like no i need to learn stuff from you but i'm wondering if

[02:08:03] he already knew aster was finished and that's what that was about yeah and also makes me wonder

[02:08:09] like he's just is he just pairing his pet ai with people he feels like need to be watched

[02:08:16] yeah the longer this goes on the worse i'm feeling about harmony sorry but i mean i think

[02:08:28] i do think that anything she i do think she ultimately wants to be loyal to aster

[02:08:36] yeah and anything she does against it is because she is literally forced to so i'm really rooting for her

[02:08:44] to break away from her programming but i think that could take a while

[02:08:49] i don't think with i don't think whether if that happens in season two it will be something i think

[02:08:56] toward the end maybe that's like the payout of season two yeah maybe that's like the pay off at

[02:09:00] the end yeah so halyn talks tough to alif and alif says he's calling the military on him and halyn

[02:09:07] finally agrees to try asters way for a 24 hour trial and harmony included harmony we'll go with

[02:09:15] them to communicate back although i don't understand how they think that's gonna work yeah no that

[02:09:20] like harmony she can't even see the thing yeah no i didn't get that yeah but it's very nice

[02:09:26] i wanted to take her um and keer discovers asters box of family stuff and he decides he

[02:09:32] doesn't like asters way after all so uh he shoots her forcing her to merge her consciousness with

[02:09:39] the artifact out of desperation and she goes through the door into the light yeah i mean

[02:09:46] the one thing i think we can say with absolute certainty is that asters physical body is dead

[02:09:54] mm-hmm yes she is she's um keer shoots her with one of these grav gun things she hits her head

[02:10:02] quite hard on um a metal surface she falls down and there is blood everywhere and halyn is

[02:10:11] cradling her he's shouting for harmony um and just you know the light has gone out of her eyes she is

[02:10:16] physically dead yeah uh actually so i read that death of that book character scarlet last episode

[02:10:27] and i thought that maybe that's what koli was kind of standing in foreign away but actually in the

[02:10:33] end i do think it is aster who is scarlet yeah uh the dying in his arms and you know killed

[02:10:40] and you know killed out of uh a last minute betrayal by someone you kind of thought you trusted

[02:10:47] it's really sad also before that she says halyn i choose you in every universe

[02:10:54] yeah i know platonic or not that's a really nice uh and i think i think it is i think it is

[02:11:00] platonic i don't know yeah i mean i guess they in the end they're not going to consummate

[02:11:06] it now that's for sure that well i don't know who knows yeah who maybe we get more salaris on this

[02:11:13] thing they got physical bodies but yeah i another reason why they made me think about the scarlet

[02:11:19] character from the book is that she's delivering a message on behalf of an alien race in this

[02:11:23] case the alien race is not the rift it's the you know space force yeah so what were your thoughts

[02:11:31] overall on uh this ending on the landing in this place other than being very glad that season two

[02:11:36] is coming i mean i certainly i certainly didn't see aster's death i mean partly that's because it's

[02:11:43] it's lina heady it's the uh it's the biggest name associated with the show i i really was

[02:11:50] surprised do you know if um lina heady is attached to uh beacon 23 for season two i mean

[02:11:58] we got the preview where we got some teases of her but i'm honestly not expecting to see much of her um

[02:12:05] i yeah she wasn't one of i know that steven james has been made an executive producer for

[02:12:12] season two and she apparently is not on that list it could be that they're hiding things from us

[02:12:17] but i'm thinking she's she's gone into the artifacts we're gonna see her backstory more

[02:12:22] we know because we have the casting for teen aster but there's another another character that

[02:12:29] they're pushing forward as the main character with um natasha mumba's back and steven james's back

[02:12:37] yeah because in that very short teaser you referenced there is a woman in a space suit

[02:12:43] um yeah yeah it's like um yeah the actress's name is ellen wong and the character's name is iris

[02:12:53] okay so again not a character from the book because none of them are but except maybe halyn and rocky

[02:12:59] um but i'm wondering if maybe she'll end up being the claire character since obviously that's

[02:13:05] no what's gonna happen with aster but yeah so i think for myself i didn't the last episode was

[02:13:14] not my favorite of the season but i didn't dislike it i think there's a lot of interesting things

[02:13:18] that happen and i'm very excited that we are going to get some answers so soon yeah i'm really

[02:13:24] glad we don't have like a two-year wait for the next season um yeah so so the first episode will

[02:13:32] be first episode season two we will have kia we will have halyn we will have spick and span

[02:13:43] and we will have um harmony yeah and alif and alif yeah yeah yeah and then we'll see

[02:13:52] we have a lot of definitely have a lot of thoughts from the community on the end of this

[02:13:56] season all over the place on this one and we also we're gonna run through a few more of our final

[02:14:01] thoughts and a preview of what we know about season two will be right back after this break to talk about

[02:14:07] that the quantum tunneler has new messages all right jumping right into the feedback we're gonna

[02:14:15] begin with stew duv 71 says pre episode six great episode of the pod about our last episode thank

[02:14:22] you stew uh summer reflections i like luke's take on the qta tripping itself up by sending

[02:14:28] multiple people to the beacon however we got strong vibes that the qta is a corporation we have

[02:14:33] contemporary examples where factions within the corporation world can end up in conflict

[02:14:39] proceeding with our own agendas uh classic left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing

[02:14:45] deho waylon utani i mean i think my point is everybody goes on about how efficient qta is

[02:14:53] and how inefficient the isa is and i i actually don't think i actually think that the truth is

[02:15:00] probably a bit more complicated than that yeah fair enough uh he says in episode four i twigged

[02:15:05] that hope stated that melan created the beacon so a lot of keepers before so silvi missed the

[02:15:11] info on how many keepers are been perhaps bart is wiped between keepers could explain the different

[02:15:17] aspects of bart and how he interacts with the okay so this again this was written before the

[02:15:20] latest episode so now we know why bart has a different personality and uh although he's

[02:15:27] does still have that through line of being a homicidal little bugger as stew puts it

[02:15:32] um so he says another nod to the biomechanical tech like the life pod and the wrecker hacker's

[02:15:39] interface when melan talks about evolution of man and machine the synergy the event horizon

[02:15:44] he's definitely referencing the singularity which you flagged in the transhumanism angle

[02:15:50] i haven't read the beacon 23 book yet uh thank you i did ask through that going to wait for

[02:15:55] this series to play out and then go for a read so yeah i mean i guess you might not want to be

[02:16:00] confused but also it's it doesn't really interfere because they're so very different

[02:16:07] after episode six he said that was a really good episode and i think it cements this as

[02:16:11] a cut above the average sci-fi series the way they are using the self-contained tail type

[02:16:16] approach to give key exposition is gripping stuff luke will be happy with the amount of exposition here

[02:16:22] we have the link between the artifacts and the rocks why aster has been drawn to the beacon

[02:16:28] i'm assuming the war between the column and the colonial authorities and still lots of mysteries

[02:16:34] to learn more about looking forward to how they're going to bring this season to a close

[02:16:38] and then yeah stew let me know that he wasn't able to share thoughts about the finale due to

[02:16:42] a loss in the family so i just wanted to say that our thoughts are with you and your wife stew

[02:16:47] thank you so much for being one of the brightest lights in this community and we look forward

[02:16:51] to hearing your feedback if you're up for sharing it at a later date and um that goes thanks for

[02:16:56] everything steve and um yeah um you were like you were not those thanks for we do for the

[02:17:03] community yeah and for everyone else by the way just because the season is over it doesn't mean

[02:17:09] we're done talking about this show so please do pass on any feedback you might still have

[02:17:14] so we had from uh david medina at david medina on twitter after episode six he said they totally

[02:17:20] redeemed themselves with today's episode told you i'd watch episode six and i was rewarded

[02:17:25] best episode i'm now back on board beacon 23 so many so many answers i was craving and they

[02:17:32] delivered and the answers were good i love a harmony origin story this episode is was what i

[02:17:38] was wanting and waiting for it's one of my favorites too um abby said after episode six

[02:17:44] what a mind-blowing episode more and more the show feels like the story of bart's and his

[02:17:48] experiences with humans and aliens asters backstory revealed wow i'm guessing everyone will be

[02:17:54] falling in love more and more with bart slash chopper chopper being a star wars reference to

[02:18:00] another um murderous robot bart watches and learns and emotes loved that last line about

[02:18:07] the power of ideas that said still no idea uh what this turns out to be about at this point i've

[02:18:14] given up on pretty much any hope for a book equivalent character ending up on screen hey hey lennon rocky

[02:18:21] although they might still go with the human versus alien and the whole trolley problem there

[02:18:26] just very much changed in delivery no fierce looking cuddly pets no riff instead the swarm

[02:18:32] it's it is amazing that the show keeps reminding me of so many other sci-fi novels uh expense old

[02:18:38] man's war the swarm solaris everything except beacon 23 lmao i uh okay so then after the last

[02:18:50] two episodes she said i what so asters proto molecule now or what they keep calling that alien

[02:18:56] entity artifact is it just me or is it kind of a misnomer yet is went and checked with several

[02:19:01] dictionaries um hayland did some cool expensing and my heart breaks for bart if only there would be

[02:19:09] a way to turn off the oxygen before solomon again or was that a left was solomon under his command

[02:19:16] um hayland went out to collect some missing rocks from solomon ship to rejoin with the

[02:19:21] artifact as they keep calling it did some cool space fight almost heard captain holden saying

[02:19:27] fire up the pdc's amos looks cool yes but still reminds me too much of the expanse seems more

[02:19:34] of an ai versus human conflict still the alien entity just a means for the factions to obsess

[02:19:39] about and uh nominally find purpose i understand that hayland and aster are supposed to have

[02:19:45] gotten close but it feels a bit sudden the whole dr strange line of need you in every universe

[02:19:51] do you agree no i don't think it's strange i think it's i think it makes sense with what

[02:19:59] aster is experiencing at that particular moment yeah i think it's an intense experience like we

[02:20:05] see them just being consumed by the artifact and sleep and nothing else and yeah aster has

[02:20:12] good reason to think that it's i guess they probably feel ultra connected because they both

[02:20:20] have this connection to the artifact and like i guess that means coli didn't have such a connection

[02:20:25] to the artifact no i think it's i think we can safely say i mean coli wasn't there very long but

[02:20:34] neither hayland nor aster had to be there very long to to have that connection with the

[02:20:40] artifact so yeah i think it's more likely that whatever the artifact does it wasn't doing it to

[02:20:45] coli mm yeah um so abby goes on the ending what are we supposed to think about it theorize to the

[02:20:52] new season i'm sure aster will get protomolecule as in the aliens will fix her somehow but it

[02:20:59] won't be her anymore uh favorite episode i like the flashbacks getting some answers is nice favorite

[02:21:05] character is bart sad face or crying face definitely definitely yeah i mean i don't know i

[02:21:12] don't know that the aliens will fix her i think that we saw in the preview for the next season flashes

[02:21:19] of asters face on the computer screen but i don't think we'll get her body back in any way i don't

[02:21:27] even think we'll actually get her real person back no no no no um no i don't think we'll get

[02:21:33] a physical um a physical version of aster i can't see that at all i don't know if she's

[02:21:40] an individual anymore really we're just like a face they use to communicate with him

[02:21:46] yeah it could be either well like we really don't know so abby's prediction for season two is

[02:21:54] hayland picks up with the alien connection he used to be connected to it's why he's in the

[02:22:00] beacon no and i think he still is connected they're still in his brain and she says these

[02:22:04] last two episodes he seems a bit of a normie regarding the pulsating watchma gig um yeah i guess

[02:22:11] he was no longer falling over with visions i guess because they got him to do what they wanted

[02:22:15] him to do which was like the opening of the antenna so that they could all fly out

[02:22:21] quince at quinn 30960 says i'm loving the show i'm not sure if i have a favorite character yet

[02:22:28] i'm really enjoying the story i'm loving the mystery of it all i like how it's not just a simple

[02:22:33] story there are lots of layers to it i'm hoping for more of the same next season i'd like to know more

[02:22:38] of the world and more of the characters so yeah agreed yeah um mir i am white at vader girl says thank

[02:22:47] you guys for turning me onto the show only from your tweets did i hear about it i'm glad i found

[02:22:53] it i'm excited to listen to the podcast the deep dive definitely team haylan but bart seems to be

[02:22:59] hacked or suffer from a virus as harmini discovered bart is compromised by something and yeah i guess

[02:23:06] she sent this probably before the last two episodes yeah i hope season two is more widely

[02:23:11] available and yeah and is given a bit more of a given given a bit more of a push yeah i mean

[02:23:17] i'm waiting for because i'm an mgm plus subscriber in europe and what i'm waiting for the american

[02:23:23] shows to come to the european version because i still haven't watched from either yeah i was gonna say

[02:23:28] the european version of mgm plus doesn't offer you much well it's it's like the leftover stuff from

[02:23:35] lionsgate which i like you know because that's where the great is here and that's where i like

[02:23:40] a bunch of those um you know period shows but and there's a bunch of old stargate stuff and

[02:23:48] stuff like that but uh yeah i want the new mgm plus shows come on so mark at mark all 84 says

[02:23:58] that's bart's emotion decisions seem to be based more on emotions which is odd for an ai maybe

[02:24:03] the artifact said some sort of impact on him or someone tweaked his programming well so we know

[02:24:08] someone tweaked his programming he says i really enjoyed the series so far i like the

[02:24:12] fact that there was already second season in the works the only thing i don't like is that it's

[02:24:16] only eight episodes episode six answered a lot of questions and has a big reveal at the end

[02:24:21] i'm team haylin not team bart i do not trust that ai i feel he is compromised well i'm curious

[02:24:28] mark please let me know what you think after you watch the finale he says bart's a fun character

[02:24:34] but i would never trust him his perception of haylin murdering the last beacon keeper and paranoia

[02:24:38] makes him too much of a wild card can't wait for the next episode i hope uh to see a refocus to

[02:24:46] the present timeline i'm curious as to what happens next well yeah mark please let me know

[02:24:51] once you see the episodes i do know that mark accidentally watched episode eight before episode

[02:24:56] seven and was confused but then made a mistake so i'm curious once you watch the episodes in

[02:25:01] the correct order what you think kgbt plus at indifer says my theory is whatever kier saw made

[02:25:08] him kill aster because he realized that the artifact is some kind of portal which will

[02:25:13] lead to further expansion also aster said something about her choosing haylin in every

[02:25:18] universe my favorite character is aleph also my favorite technology and the first episode with

[02:25:25] him is also my favorite the column and aleph have opposite agendas it's like the evangelists

[02:25:32] and open ai the column are against human expansion to space ie against technological progress while

[02:25:39] aleph is the head of a corporation responsible for that expansion and by itself he is the product

[02:25:45] of such progress so that's a good point yeah this is the same person who brought up that

[02:25:52] harmony was likely an evolution of hope so keep your theories coming kgbt plus

[02:25:59] lina heady stan at meniskin 24 says the last two episodes were by far my favorite ones although

[02:26:05] i'm honestly a bit disappointed in the way they made aster find out about her past and true identity

[02:26:10] they didn't give that enough time and she was also way too chill about it with coley it felt

[02:26:15] like she was trying to suppress her real feelings but in this case she just found

[02:26:19] out her whole life basically was a lie and she's just like i was born here duh that home sire talk

[02:26:26] was brought up a lot first with aleph and now with aster it makes me think the artifact flashbacks

[02:26:32] also gave an insight into the future in that last scene might be a kind of death for her but also

[02:26:38] a quote unquote betterment she might even be above aleph now yeah i think so yeah i think that's

[02:26:45] that's pretty much on the money and the whole messiah thing being uh like an insight into the

[02:26:51] future that's giving me dune vibes yeah definite vibes there yeah and i was thinking about her

[02:26:58] being like so chill about the response from you know about figuring out that her whole childhood

[02:27:05] was erased i'm wondering if that's just a combination of the gib juice you know calming

[02:27:11] down her brain and also the control of the artifact that makes her be like oh okay well that's normal

[02:27:16] that's fine yeah i think we haven't gotten to the bottom of how the gib the gib and the um the

[02:27:25] artifact interact with one another because i like your idea from early ron that like the gib might have

[02:27:31] sort of you know the the the artifact might be being affected by the gib yeah i think that's

[02:27:39] that's quite a cool idea yeah i hope i mean i think it's interesting i like when all the

[02:27:45] pizza is tied together yeah uh okay so switching over to discord and if you want to discuss with us

[02:27:52] on on discord and uh contribute to the discussion here then there's a link in the show notes

[02:27:59] and koko colburn said just finished episode five and we'll catch the podcast for three to

[02:28:04] five tomorrow really appreciate the coverage elicia and luke i read the book twice but was

[02:28:10] struggling to get into the tv series until episodes three to five it's different enough from the book

[02:28:14] that once i let go of needing it to match i could enjoy the tale being told looking forward to the

[02:28:20] next episode so koko please let us know what you thought yeah what you thought of the finale

[02:28:27] but yeah it's definitely i think in general whenever it's an adaptation i try to

[02:28:33] dissociate the two versions in my head to not drive myself crazy but obviously it's still

[02:28:38] it's like a fun game i'm playing where i'm picking out like the smallest things like oh i see that's

[02:28:43] definitely from the book rocky sim said after episode six just watched the latest episode of

[02:28:50] beacon 23 i don't trust bart i got some silo vibes from everyone's different perspective of

[02:28:56] the bright light and space with the relics for a second i thought i was i was thinking maybe

[02:29:01] bart was projecting the image and manipulating the people on board it's interesting so yeah i guess

[02:29:07] that's not what happened in the end yeah that's definitely not what happened in the end

[02:29:12] so after after the last two episodes um they continued i'm kind of confused after

[02:29:17] watching the last two episodes i assume aster died and is in quote unquote heaven with the rocks

[02:29:22] the artifact seems to cause certain people to go mad or to become addicted to the artifact

[02:29:28] is it real or is it a result of people being unable to manage being alone on the beacon for so long

[02:29:33] the picture of the guy in the lighthouse being protected from the waves has some type of meaning

[02:29:39] part of me was thinking is that the guy dreaming this whole thing yeah so i i guess

[02:29:45] this is actually a central question of the book these things that are being brought up about like

[02:29:49] whether things that are being seen and experienced or just a product of being alone for so long

[02:29:56] are actually happening like the talking rock yeah and the question of the meaning with the lighthouse

[02:30:04] picture i mean the meaning in the book i think is mostly like the meaning here where it's used as

[02:30:10] a metaphor to reflect on regularly while getting high yeah i think the whilst getting hot is

[02:30:17] important yeah it's like getting stoned and you know yeah talking about you know man yeah you

[02:30:24] know what if it just rock just no it's a rocket just is a rock but i think i think rocky you're

[02:30:33] asking the right questions i think you're asking questions the show wants you to ask and it's it is

[02:30:38] more it is more about like letting you ponder these philosophies there are answers they're

[02:30:45] they're doling them out but um i think they want to want to ask questions so sub zero said

[02:30:51] f six was good another standalone like f four but i connected more with this one than with four

[02:30:57] maybe because of how they chose to tell the story with bart as a narrator or maybe because this is

[02:31:02] the second time they've done it and i'm more accustomed to it either way it worked for me

[02:31:07] and i was thoroughly engaged i've been a bart hater throughout this show i don't like the version

[02:31:13] of bart that aster and halen are interacting with all the murderous tendencies aside can't

[02:31:18] really hate him for that and still love chopper i just find bart whiny and irritating nails on a

[02:31:24] chalkboard that said that said episode six is somewhat rehabilitated has somewhat rehabilitated

[02:31:32] my opinion of bart or at least i understand better why he's the way he is such a tragic figure

[02:31:37] hence the shakespearian references i think the little girl was very good although kids

[02:31:42] turning creepy kind of weird to me out they've they've laid out a lot of pieces to the puzzle

[02:31:47] i'm looking forward to seeing how they tie it all together yeah um for really i'd like to know where

[02:31:54] there is thoughts on on bart are the same after episode seven and eight yeah uh after after that

[02:32:00] ending oh god that ending for at least so said after episode six episode six was great aster

[02:32:08] backstory i'm surprised bart didn't recognize her more revelations on the comet in alien life

[02:32:14] forms more politics it's getting so good and after episode seven and eight my husband thinks the

[02:32:21] artifact is a hallucination or not real that said very puzzling last two episodes eager to hear the

[02:32:27] podcast i can't believe aster is dead maybe the same thing happened to her that happened to malon

[02:32:32] but with the artifact she said she saw halen in the artifact i wonder what that means

[02:32:38] i felt really bad for bart solomon wiped his memories which is very disturbing i get qta found

[02:32:45] out he was a murder bot or doing things against his programming i thought this season overall was good

[02:32:50] just nothing completely answered my favorite episodes were four and five i really enjoyed the

[02:32:56] backstories the world building and uh bart's background barba hersey and steven root were

[02:33:02] great that said my favorite character is aster i really hope she isn't dead tech wise the ai 3d

[02:33:09] printer and drug rooftop was pretty cool also if you're super rich you can die and your consciousness

[02:33:16] can become an ai was that what happened to malon not sure i like the column and their whole

[02:33:21] message in quest two episodes deep lots to think on yeah definitely lots to think on

[02:33:28] yeah so that was uh that was the end for the feedback for now for season one

[02:33:34] luke any final thoughts but were your favorite episodes of the season

[02:33:38] um i think probably episode four okay and episode seven because it broke my heart

[02:33:49] yeah okay fair yeah i think for me four and six i like the backstory although i really did

[02:33:55] like all the stuff with hayland and aster too so it just the standalone episode stood out to me

[02:34:02] um who's your favorite character and why is it barb we are it's bar it hasn't been bar i mean it

[02:34:08] just it just transparently is but i mean i do like the way this this um this season has kind

[02:34:17] of evolved over the eight episodes after the first couple of episodes i very much thought

[02:34:22] this is going to be a two-hander with right hayland and aster and bart and harmony just chipping in

[02:34:31] like a bit of exposition every so often but i love the way that harmony and bart have become

[02:34:39] fully fleshed out fully realized characters they're not just there to provide information to

[02:34:48] the protagonists they are actually protagonists in and of themselves um and i think it's gonna

[02:34:55] it's going to be a very different i'm not i'm not saying worse i'm just saying different

[02:35:00] i think it's going to be a very different show without aster and bart in in season two because

[02:35:07] harmony harmony and hayland they have interacted but not all that much yeah it's gonna force them

[02:35:16] together more and ask them yeah so i think i think tonally it could be a very different show

[02:35:24] yeah i hope um if bart doesn't come back i hope there's another character that one of the new

[02:35:30] characters captures that energy yeah um what's your favorite tech i like the the i like the

[02:35:37] 3d printer okay i like the idea that you can just yeah make anything yeah i'm gonna go with

[02:35:44] the personal ai that sounds so useful and also i want it's like a best friend and uh helper built in

[02:35:52] i want i want i want solomon's i want solomon's kitchen like now we know that he is actually dead

[02:35:59] yeah you know if this if this i mean oh hayland doesn't appreciate it if there's something

[02:36:04] off his effect because i want his pots and pans yeah fair hayland's definitely not gonna cook

[02:36:10] so here's how mgm plus describes season two the official description is beacon 23 is now a little

[02:36:17] more than a prison with aleph on board and the artifact provides more questions than answers

[02:36:23] without a clear path forward the inhabitants of beacon 23 must rely on each other but their

[02:36:28] conflicting agendas may get in the way and um beacon 23's uh so glenn matzana matzana the

[02:36:35] showrunner for season two says beacon 23 season two ups the game more action more mysteries more

[02:36:41] twists and exciting new characters it's a thrill ride i can't wait for the audience to see it

[02:36:46] now that's interesting because does that imply that aleph becomes a sort of main character

[02:36:53] then he's not i don't know the episode yeah i don't know because um because he's not when they

[02:37:00] talk about uh they said glenn matzana says and joy blake by the way is the other uh showrunner for

[02:37:07] season two and they say that james will return obviously alongside natasha mumba and ellen

[02:37:14] wong who plays that new character iris so they make it sound like those are the three main

[02:37:18] characters for season three although there are more obviously and we know i can't see i can't see

[02:37:26] kia and fiddle and faddle lasting all that long yeah i certainly can't see kia lasting all that long

[02:37:33] because hayland's gonna kill him well yeah yeah no i can't imagine he's gonna be cool with what happens

[02:37:40] no hayland's literally gonna rip him apart this bear happens

[02:37:45] what did you think of the trailer for season two oh it's it's only 30 seconds long and it's

[02:37:51] right it's a teaser flashy image flashy yeah okay it's a teaser trailer so the only things

[02:37:56] i the only things i really picked out of it were um iris that we're gonna get another person turning

[02:38:02] up and the harmony looks like she's having some kind of um episode it looks like she's having

[02:38:10] maybe some sort of technical malfunction right she's doing like that version of the thing where

[02:38:15] she blips out except she's not quite blipping out she's just sort of like losing resolution

[02:38:24] okay um what stood out to me was it seems like some version i don't know if it was a video from

[02:38:31] from the past of aster or if aster was somehow communicating through the technology yeah through

[02:38:39] the screens and she's she's asking hayland to listen to her or yeah which which is what the artifact

[02:38:46] keeps saying to hayland over and over and listen to me listen to me um but i don't know yeah i don't

[02:38:53] i'm not holding my breath to see lina heady that much um but yeah we'll see and i'm also noticing

[02:39:00] that in the teaser that there's themes of loss like we hear we hear harmony talking about

[02:39:06] loss a lot so and this is obviously going to pick up with dealing with the loss of aster and barth

[02:39:14] is there anything you hope they do differently in season two no i mean i i i do feel like it's

[02:39:22] gonna be a very different show anyway for for reasons i've already talked about so

[02:39:28] so new show i think this could this could feel like tonally i would expect the season two to

[02:39:36] feel quite different to season one yeah okay yeah i mean i guess i i hope it doesn't get too

[02:39:45] different um but i'm i'm curious because again new show runners uh a lot of the cast is new

[02:39:53] it'll be interesting to see yeah we're gonna get answers though in april 2024 so benefit of

[02:39:59] filming both seasons back to back yeah we don't have that we don't have all our lungs away yeah

[02:40:05] and imdb is currently listing nine episodes for season two with episode nine labeled luan casca

[02:40:12] which means east or monday in irish so take all of that with a grain of salt because it's imdb

[02:40:18] and a new one can just insert random information so i'm not trusting anything till announcements

[02:40:25] for the studio but interesting yeah um and obviously this is not the last time you'll hear us talking

[02:40:30] about beacon 23 of course we'll be back to discuss season two in april but we'll also be talking

[02:40:35] about it as long as you guys are so again please send in any feedback you might have uh the any

[02:40:41] thoughts you have on this season um and yeah there might be a bonus interview coming your way

[02:40:47] too about this season um meanwhile here in this feed watch out for oh actually by the time this

[02:40:54] comes out you'll already have the winter holiday special uh where luke and i we had a really good

[02:41:01] time talking about is a wonderful life and a bunch of variations on that especially luke's favorite

[02:41:07] forever clarence he's put his head in his hand and so also look out on the uh book club silas ins

[02:41:18] will get a another holiday freebie which will be an audio drama linked to that episode and here

[02:41:25] we're going to be picking back up with the dune novel uh ranking the most iconic scenes based

[02:41:29] on feedback collected and also yeah you can catch up with the intro app in the meantime about

[02:41:35] frank harbert's life and how and why the story is created and what we'll be covering in the series

[02:41:40] and that's going to be followed with episodes covering the hodoroski documentary the 1984

[02:41:47] lynch movie the sci-fi mini series and of obviously villanove's part one and part two

[02:41:54] after that we'll finish the series with some previews of what we might be able to expect

[02:41:58] from part three uh the book it's based on and how that's been adapted before and yeah i've

[02:42:04] heard that um villanove said that the so part three isn't officially greenlit but he said that the

[02:42:12] script is almost done so that's a good sign yeah i think they i think i read somewhere they're aiming

[02:42:17] for 20 27 release yeah we talk about this forever yeah we'll make sure you're ready yeah and we

[02:42:28] want to hear your notes about any and all of the above of course so please email us at will

[02:42:32] shift dust podcast at gmail.com or check in on twitter you can find me on twitter or blue sky

[02:42:40] or other social media at alisha cb and luke i am just loop middip and i'm only on twitter and blue

[02:42:48] sky and the book club so we have the beacon 23 book breakdown already there if you want to

[02:42:56] check it out we've got the uh shift breakdown will come out uh so you'll find the link in

[02:43:01] the show notes for that book club and if you enjoy this episode please share it with friends who are

[02:43:06] might also be in a beacon 23 and we really appreciate any five star ratings as they make a huge difference

[02:43:12] in helping us get more people to find the show meanwhile on the lower hounds network we the

[02:43:19] mc universe we're covering what if so there'll be a recap episode of the first season of what if

[02:43:26] and then after that season closes we'll be obviously getting into that and also covering echo in january

[02:43:33] and there's also one shot for the doctor who 60th anniversary special the creator rebel moon is coming

[02:43:40] up uh there's an one from a couple of the guys from david and brandon about the new netflix movie

[02:43:46] leave the world behind with marcia leigh and um julia roberts and also book nook and star wars

[02:43:54] movie watch through including the star wars holiday special so if you want to hear the guys roast that

[02:44:00] you can find that in the lower hounds speed um yeah properly howard is on hiatus which you can dig

[02:44:05] through their backlog of fun coverage of horror movies and sequels uh you don't really need to

[02:44:12] watch the movies and the properly howard guys and the lower hound guys are getting together to

[02:44:16] do this severance pod so you can find breakdowns for season one season two coming soon and uh

[02:44:22] luke how are things going with uh my podcast it could be said uh the first part of our review of the

[02:44:28] year is now i think we'll be recording part two uh sometime this coming weekend so that will probably

[02:44:36] be up in that week between christmas and new year excellent well wishing you all at home a happy

[02:44:45] new year and we'll be back in your ears until then we'll just be here morning bart and waiting

[02:44:50] for astrid to lead us to the next phase of human evolution a new star wars journey begins in the

[02:45:11] place all good journeys begin at well the beginning this star wars day i'm excited to introduce the

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[02:45:29] following the sequel trilogy this is a podcast for both star wars super fans and complete newbies

[02:45:35] listen to the short intro episode now to hear how it works and what to expect over the coming

[02:45:40] weeks as we set the stage for the new television series the acolyte which we will be covering

[02:45:45] with weekly breakdowns subscribe to the star wars canon timeline podcast wherever you listen to

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