The Stars Our Destination

A mini-series has to have a time to look into the heads of the characters once in a while. I know with the short attention spans out there, if there isn't some sort of overt action every two minutes they lose interest. Here we get to see what the consequences of the Panama incident are for individuals. On the one hand we have the loss of life and the judgment made by a small group; on the other the fallout in individual societies. The people are panicking, even though what they fear is 400 years in the future. Meanwhile, a plot is hatched to circumvent the attack. When is too soon? What sort of technology is available to even do what they have planned. One sort of sweet thing is the young man with the death sentence (pancreatic cancer) viewing the beauties of the world in the time he has left.

This show has had issues before but they are amplified now that it's mostly become a melodrama about uninteresting characters and petty issues. Many characters don't seem to actually care about the events that just unfolded or the impending alien invasion. They are too busy being involved in their own personal problems rather than putting all of it aside. The narrow focus on the 4 scientist friends group drama is mind numbingly boring to watch at times. Saul and Will are often uninteresting at best. The Jin and Auggie characters are very arrogant and entitled.

This is extremely off putting as most of their esteem is completely unearned. They do their level best to show you how foolish, naive or immature they are. These characters are not believable as the elite and accomplished scientists that they are supposed to be. They act morally superior and make derogatory remarks against Raj and Wade (who are actually trying to win a war of survival) while acting like spoiled children and moody teens. It is completely out of hand and they are in need of adult supervision (along with the writers apparently).

The writers seem incapable of actually making these characters behave intelligently. They can't decide if they should grace humanity with their unique knowledge or do...nothing. It's unbelievable that these 2 can't be replaced. There are 1 million physicists in the world and millions of other intelligent people that apparently don't hold a candle to an alcoholic that never does any work but somehow produces cutting edge fibers or a physicist that has nothing going for her other than a BF out of her league. Auggie doesn't even run the company that makes the fibers! Meanwhile Raj and Wade are out there actually making a difference.

Nothing of interest happened in this episode. They spent a lot of time on mr cancer, who doesn't look that sick, and his love for one of the others, who he rightly points out is stupid to pursue.

This ep was a student drama.

Apparently this one group of friends holds all the keys to the future, how amazingly talented and important they are.

I can't see anything special happening in the last 2 episodes so I guess this show couldn't keep it up and keep it interesting even though it showed good promise and sparks of interest, it turned out to be little more than hipster youtube video shallow thoughts that didn't stand much thinking about. I don't know if I can be bothered finishing the series now.

This is the lowest rated episode of the season and yet all the negative (and accurate) reviews are being downvoted. Strange. I guess only fanboys read reviews.

Anyway, if this were edited down to 22 minutes (the length of half and hour network tv) it would be a good episode. Keep the stuff that moves the way plot forward and get rid of the relationship stuff.

Episode summary: The "giant eye" formed in the sky by the San-Ti Sophon causes panic in the global population, leading to turmoil in major cities. Jin Cheng visits the imprisoned Ye Wenjie, questioning her about the need to attract the San-Ti to Earth.

A very heartwarming episode.

Wade and the Planetary Defense Council gather a group of experts to discuss how to intercept the San-Ti fleet. It is established that if a probe were to reach at least 1% light speed, it would intercept the incoming ships in 398 years, giving Earth two years' advance knowledge.

The story between Will and Jin goes to a whole new level. Besides all the great story, visuals, and characters sometimes it's enough a few beautiful moments well edited.

Maybe this isn't the best episode of the season but the last 5 minutes of the episode was maybe the best one.

Will, have a nice trip out there between the stars.