A Girl and an Astronaut

This had so many elements from the original Top Gun film but with a Polish space twist. I am prefacing my review with a qualifier in that I am not a fan of Science Fiction, my husband and most of my friends are however, which means I watch a lot of it...and enjoy very little (with few exceptions like the first season of Altered Carbon and Dark). I did enjoy this six episode Polish sci-fi series.

The story is told through two different timelines...2023 and thirty years later 2053. 2023 establishes a friendship and rivalry between two Polish elite fighter pilots (Niko and Bogodan), who are selected to participate in an international space program being run jointly by an Elon Musk-like character with money, Poland's Air Force, and Russian scientist. One of the pilots will be sent on a solo mission into space using a newly developed "stealth" technology and testing a cryogenic process all in preparation for an eventual trip to Mars. Niko and Bogdan couldn't be more opposite, Bogdan is disciplined and in control...training, not drinking, etc while Niko is wild and reckless getting drunk and playing the field. They both fall in love with the beautiful Marta who is DJ Stardust, newly arrived back from London and rooming with Niko's sister, Karolina. Mart seems to have trouble choosing between the two... In the 2053 storyline Marta and Bogdan have an adult daughter and have been married for 30 years. They seem to be having some struggles with their marriage when Niko's spacecraft arrives back on earth and he didn't die in an explosion like Marta and the world was lead to believe...and he hasn't aged a day!

I did read some of the criticisms of the film...I for one loved the soundtrack which had some great retro-songs in it like the appropriate Flock of Seagulls' "Space age Lovesong" and I didn't mind the classic cars with the tape deck, I didn't see it as a problem as I had an appreciation for them...oh! And people wear retro clothes all the time, like I do. My husband pointed out that it might have been a clever tool, since most of the items were at least 30 years old, to help you keep track of the fact that this storyline was 30 years in the past even though it is 2023 (and not 1983) and the "current" time is 2053. Whatever the point was I didn't mind it at all.

I enjoyed some of the ideas for the future...the cross walks, the household AI...and I really loved the stealth technology. When the space shuttle reappears out of stealth mode was great! The insect camera is cleaver...as were a few other ideas like drones moving the shipping containers...remote heart/health monitoring...and adaptive prosthetics...there were some interesting and imaginative technologies.

I enjoyed all the testosterone heavy similarities to Top Gun, sorry not sorry.

Some of the cinematography is absolutely wonderful...I don't know if it was filmed by drones or how it was done, but the sky is almost its own character. There are some interesting (if a little one dimensional) villains.

I loved the two-tone mosaic at the mission headquarters which depicts a man falling backwards in space maybe past a planet. Absolutely stunning!

I thought both actresses playing Marta were beautiful, young and old. (But this does bring me to a random musing...I have really only seen two Polish productions, this and all three 365DNI films, and in both contemporary Polish women are portrayed as rude, bratty, overindulging, alcohol abusing, drug using sexually permissive exhibitionists who end up deciding they want to prioritize themselves ((aka choosing themselves)). As a woman, I am hoping that isn't really what contemporary young Polish women are really like.) Also, what is the Polish fascination with motorcycles, particularly women driving motorcycles?

Overall, I enjoyed this series (except for the actual ending...which I felt was unnecessary and inappropriate. I also thought it was wrapped up too abruptly...like there might have been a bigger story with the stem cells and the girl with ALS.). I thought is was sexy and a great feast for the eyes. The story had a few hiccups (like the end), but I can overlook that because I enjoyed the rest as much as I did.

It's a well thought out production, with good writing and execution. I enjoyed seeing what Central/Eastern Europe can do with science-fiction-ish storylines. I very much enjoyed hearing Polish spoken, with Russian as needed for the scenes which take place in Russia. Nice balance of humor and drama, with the two different time periods clearly delineated with different actors and actresses. That said, it was easy am d enjoyable to follow. It was not overpowering with intense action scenes; it has a nice balance between conversation and action. Sets and locations were all good. Nice work on the part of Polish Netflix! Looking forward to Season 2!

I don't get why everyone is so bent off about this show? It's literally labeled "sci-fi romance", and that's pretty much exactly what it is.

It's gorgeously shot, like truly. The effects are brilliant. It's one of the most realistic takes on the future/future technology (some aspects at least). I was also really impressed with the actors. The actors have good chemistry and the plot is unique. I think it is definitely worth the watch. There are a few plot holes and I definitely wanted more from the last episode. I think the show would have been even better if it were 8 episodes instead of 6. The buildup of the first 4 episodes was great, but it felt like they ran out of time and rushed the last two. Overall I genuinely enjoyed the show.

There are few good things I can say about this series; good cinematography, good production design and good music. I live in Poland so I like the way they design how Warsaw will looks like in 30 years and creat a retro-futuristic city from those existing blocks from commie time.

The love-triangle plot is not new (imagine Pearl harbour set in 2023) and you could list like 157 movies/series that involve a dangerous Russian corporation working on a top-secret space project. Still with good writing, these storylines could be interesting and that's the problem because the screenplay totally sucks.

Imho, it all starts with the unconvincing character building. I can see a strong attempt to creat cool characters, unfortunately the result turns out to be the opposite and all the characters are unlikable, irrational and unstable. I don't understand why they do what they do and that makes them very difficult to root for.

Conversations are also unnatural, some scenes seem forced and characters behaviors so pretentious. There are so many questionable things in the series like all the characters still driving cars with diesel engines from 70-80's when it's supposed to be in 2050 something or the fact that the villainous Russian space corp head quarter looks more like a set for fashion photoshoot because it's full of young, model-beautiful and impeccably dressed scientists. I could go on and on about things that doesn't make sense in this series.

To sum it up, they've set up quite a nice background for the story, but then they ruined it all with bad writing.

This show is basically just a polish night time soap opera. The story is weak. The dialogue is weak. The acting is decent. Good cinematography all around. Basically it's just about people looking for sex at dance clubs. The spy thriller element makes no sense so it's just filler I guess. I give it 3 stars for the dance club music and a few other good songs and some good passionate love scenes between girls and astronauts, I guess. I mean that's probably the plot line. Girls who like astronauts and like dancing and then after go somewhere for sex. I believe that's the main idea behind this show.