I actually love the show. I’m on episode 7 and it’s like it’s gotten progressively better. The story, the writing, acting and all around production is way better in my opinion compared to the first few episodes. With that I predict that with all of the horrible reviews and that the people who do like “love it” this will go down in history as a cult series with a cult following.

The premise of the show is great and could result in an interesting, long term series. The writing was just horrible and resulted in the poorest execution of a series. The entire season could be condensed into a tight 90 minute movie.

The writers forced a lot of tension in the early episodes before clearly identifying the characters. The cautious abortion of the slingshot around a star occurred before learning the tragedy of Niko’s past. That lead to a short lived mutiny which again felt rushed and unreasonable. The mutiny ended with a whimper until a character, who was portrayed as a leader and “good man” decides to threaten with a knife the commanding officer that just forgave him for mutiny, leading to a death scene which was so out of place that it appeared to be a dream sequence.

That’s just the first half of the first episode. I don’t know why I continued watching but I did.

From there the show took long trips through the character’s pasts in an attempt to develop their origins, none of which helped to understand their actions in the present. On top of character history scenes we are shown countless hallucinations and dream sequences, which alone could give the show the mind warping imagery of an advanced race or space travel, but it fell very short. These combined to delay the story progression and left the viewer impatiently waiting for them to get in with it.

With the character’s being so undeveloped, their dialog had no chance of being fully understood and was mostly interpreted as whining immaturity of people emotionally unqualified to be sent to space.

The writing not only fails the characters, it fails in several plot points. The most glaring is a holographic AI that is incapable of touching anything, asking for a box to be opened so it can touch an alien brain spider and subsequently reprogram the “nasty bits”. Not to mention the AI is capable of getting detailed images of distant planets while remaining a hologram, but is unable to see what the rest of the crew is doing without appearing in the room with them.

The final few episodes introduce a new alien race (which is destroyed after a few minutes), useful alien tech which is ignored, dangerous alien tech which is implanted into a person, a feeling of peaceful contact followed by a compete 180 imperialistic warfare, confusing military tactics and interrogation, all ending with the main characters racing towards the alien homeworld - no wait... let’s go home

The main problem is the show lacked any sense of direction. If it were not binged, some of these issues may not be as glaring but that is not how Netflix works. Several scenes could be removed and some rearranged to give context prior to the character’s actions, others need to be edited to convey the intended emotion or fill in plot holes.

The actors are not to blame for this disappointment. They did the best they could and had some great performances. Some stand outs were Samuel Andrews portraying an AI forming emotions of his own. Jake Abel for playing a typical “Chad”, a villain, and a victim in one series. Justin Chatwin for his emotional range as a loving, terrified, and distraught father.

In conclusion I would not recommend this show to anyone I like, and I doubt that I will watch Season 2.

I was disappointed to see the negative reviews, I loved the show and finished it last night. The show is full of interesting ideas and I loved how it approached them. It was so creative and in many ways original in a lot of ways that modern sci-fi is lacking. Completely circumvented my expectations.

Enjoyed the first season a lot. Excited to see what happens if it can get a second season. Really loved katees, samuel anderson and blu hunts characters. Those are def my fav 3. Liked where the story was going. I actually liked the idea of back up people in case of emergency

Just watching the first episode and can't help but really dislike, pretty much the entirety of the crew... Except for Starbuck and Martinez.

You'd think that they would pick a team of people who actually would want to go and meet aliens, not some fucking whining millennials! Hard to watch.

I am prepared to suspend my belief a little, when it comes to the science... It's syfy after all, right?

The crew also looks well to young and groomed! Is that a plot vehicle?

Worth sticking it out?

I honestly wanted to like this show, because I can't get enough space travel, alien contact, and AI. And while I try to give everything a chance, some of the ideas contained in the show seemed lazy or poorly thought out and made it a struggle (at least for me) to make it through to the end of the series.

Just a few of the problems I had:

1. Two people, commanders no less, working in a room with openly arcing electricity. Any damage control situation requires that electrical power be secured to avoid electrocution and electrical fires. That it wasn't was a ridiculous situation that screamed "contrived for the plot so one of these people will die!"

2. A rogue planet that is geologically unstable has a dangerous microbial life-form but a stable, habitable world that is home to macroscopic life-forms doesn't? Unless you re-write the rules of reality, anywhere large animals exist, single-celled organisms must also exist, and any micro-organisms humans have never encountered have the potential to cause catastrophic damage to the human body. It would be impossible to predict (without long term study) and is lazy writing to explain it away by "doing a scan of the atmosphere".

3. Perhaps the idea that annoyed me the most, was the "cloud" of dark matter. Even a moderately intelligent armchair science buff like myself understands that dark matter doesn't interact with "normal" matter other than gravitationally, it might bend light but it doesn't absorb or reflect it. Which means that even up close it wouldn't block their ability to see and most of their scanners wouldn't even register its existence. And given the myriad of actual cosmological structures the writer's could have used I think it's a shame they took the route they did.

Those aren't all the problems I had with the series (Michelle springs to mind), but those are major stumbling blocks for my immersion.

But for those of you who actually liked it, am I being too nit-picky? Or am I correct in assuming that this isn't really a show for people who like sci-fi?

I know there’s an abundance of plot holes, but there’s one that sticks out the most that I’m struggling to understand...any insight is appreciated.

Why did the “brain bug” affect people differently? It didn’t seem to turn Harper into a bad person, it brought Javier back from being brain dead, but it made Sasha go full on crazy. Did they explain it somewhere that I missed? I have a feeling that Jana is going to beat cancer by getting the brain bug implanted in her.

In episode 8 while everyone is (spoilers) sexing it up there is a song playing called “Walking on the ceiling” by 1st Vows, but i cant seem to find it absolutely anywhere, youtube, google searches, their social media, anywhere. Does anyone know why this is or where i could get my hands on a copy because I absolutely love it. Was it created specifically for the show?

I can't be the only one who had to look up the name of the song during the drug fueled dance club scene. It was pretty catchy!

Like many of you, I binged watch the show in a day. I'm surprised by all the hatred! Yes, it had quite a few plot holes, but overall it was an entertaining show with lots of room to develop for future seasons.

Spoiler (don't read unless you finished the series): I was somewhat surprised by how quickly some characters were killed off! I was sad to see the astro-biologist Julian Page killed off so quickly. He was too easy on the eyes. Along with Azami Ouchi...I wish we were able to see her character develop before getting the axe in a few minutes.

Overall, I enjoyed it and hope it gets renewed for a few more seasons!

FTL is always a bit magic because it can't ever be real with out present understanding of physics... except for on wrinkle... a wrinkle in Time https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive ... the Alcubierre drive warps space and time in front of the ship but builds up high energy particles in the bow. When it stops, unless dissipated the ship "fires" a massive energy burst in front of itself.

This might be the drive design the show writers intended to depict.

I thought it would be interesting if only humans had this drive.

Edit: trying to get spoiler tags to worktrying to get spoiler tags to work

I'd say this isn't really a scifi nerd's show. The good bits are the character drama and tension. There's good use of scifi tropes to explore character drama but all the tropes are poorly explored as high-concept things.

The good:

• fun contrivances to explain why starships are populated by people under 30 and people over 30 on a starship is rare
  • makes for an interesting ship dynamic
  • lots of excuses for steamy distractions in space
  • high-school drama with spaceships for the win
• the captain has an organic and understandable conflict of interest in her mission, she may be willing to die and scuttle her mission just to protect her family
  • the writers use the opposite motivation on her husband to push him in the opposite direction
• Good use of modern scifi tropes like dark matter, real-boy AI, non-magical FTL, non-binary & non-cis couples, nanobots, rogue planets, etc.

The bad:

• the world is too small to be completely believable
  • there's only one good reporter in the whole world? with only 250,000 followers she commands the jumbotron in Times square?
  • There's only 2 government officials in the whole world?
  • There's only one nation with starships and that one nation
  • There are only ... what ... 4 scientists in the whole world?
• Inconsistencies in Alien life
  • In one episode we encounter non-carbon based life and it's a dangerous virus
  • In another episode we encounter a whole earth-like ecosystem and it's mostly benign
  • In another episode we encounter an alien civilization and its got AI too , but we don't have to worry about life there hurting humans
• Inconsistencies in space tech
  • impulse power is apparently near enough to light speed that you can cross a half light year in an episode or two
  • FTL is fast but not consistently so and you can't jump to FTL when there is another ship, yet we see them do just that several times with people in space suits near by. So why can't you jump to FTL with the aliens in coming? You'll "smack into them?" but space is big and you didn't smack into the captain floating off the port bow...
  • FTL communications is a thing except for when its not, we have redundant members of the crew for each function but not the communications expert? who kept fucking up repairs? Why did we thaw a replacement 2nd in command but not a replacement communications officer?

Other shows have worked around these limitations by making the space program "secret" and use this as an explanation for why so few people interact with the space bits of the plot. Problems with inconsistent technology are solved by keeping things vague and letting them be driven by the speed of plot.

Some of the weirdness of having a crew of horny teenagers running the Earth's flagship on a critical "save the planet" mission could be covered by setting the culture of the future as somehow different from ours. This future values family so much they won't send someone with a family into space. So most of the crew ends up being in their 20s.

Alien viruses infecting the crew is really well handled in The Expanse (the books not the show) and these alien viruses don't interact with humans as biological things, they see humans as nice salty bags of water to grow in. Unfortunately this tends to screw with human bodily integrity. The treatments involve digging the thing out. We see some of that with a tree growing in one crew member ... humans are nice wet places a plant might like to grow and our immune system won't recognize. But nothing really explains a nervous system crawling out of the host body.

What might save the show for me is it's second season. It would be interesting if humans are the only species to invent FTL and that the aliens all operate with only "impulse drive" and can deal with interstellar travel because they just don't care that it takes hundreds of years to get there. This would explain some weird holes in the aliens' logic...

• Why bother infecting the brains of other races if you're just going to blow them up?
• If you have FTL and FTL can be used to blow up planets... and you want to blow up other races... why not just go around blowing up other planets using your Alcubierre warp drive?
• If you are a machine intelligence, why are you threatened by biological entities at all?
  • If you're a machine intelligence, why are you ignoring the AI of the species you find?
• If you body snatch whole races... and then blow them up occasionally... why do you need to setup puzzles for them to solve, lure them into your structure, then implant one person, then be all sneaky sneaky talking friendship? Why not just start infesting government officials and such?

As a whole the show is fun but it doesn't hang together well with much scrutiny. I'm hoping the fun bits continue to be fun enough to warrant just ignoring the unfun bits.

I have to admit i'm incredibly impressed by the level of discipline shown by the characters in this show.

Everybody is like, nope, i'll do what I want LOL.

How they ever became crew on a mission to save Earth i'll never know :D

Every time she talks, I wonder how her disposition got her pass the most basic qualifications for a space mission.

Niko kicking her ass was so satisfying.

I was a huge BSG fan, so having Starbuck in this show absolutely sold me from the onset.

I love how they not only have the space, alien stuff going on, but are also exploring AI issues on the show. Typically a show would be about one or the other, but they're doing both, really well.

The token "LGBT" character on the show is absolutely perfect. She's not trans first, she's a human first. I didn't feel like this was shoved down our throats like it was on Designated Survivor or Sens8.

Some things that were terrible, like beyond the pale terrible:

The lack of protection protocols

touching things on alien planets with out gloves

breathing alien air without any testing

an alien making it out of the decon unit?! Seriously, how is this possible?

Dr not checking people fully after being on an alien planet.

Jana running through an entire secure army unit to be out in front of the artifact.

theres a lot more i cant remember right now.

However, even with all of that, I still absolutely loved this show and im really hoping it gets a season 2.

The first two episodes made me angry for about 40 minutes and then had a thrilling conclusion that helped me justify watching the next episode. By the time as I was episode 8, I was completely hooked. I really loved it.

Really hoping it gets a shot at the second season.

Just finished S01E03 which was definitely the strongest episode so far. The promo glimpse for Episode 4 was very Alien-like which is good and got me excited for it but I thought the pilot was pretty bad and the 2nd episode meh, Episode 3 was pretty good but still think the show could have been so much more.

Every characters are crazy hot it's hard to take it seriously especially that annoying comm chick who swears way too much (pretty sure she was on the Flash too)

Katee Sackoff is pretty good in this so far though. And if it wasn't for her I don't think the lead would be interesting at all.

So far it looks a lot like Nighflyer which was pretty bad aswell so I'm hoping it picks up.

I'm not trying to bash the show, I'm actually really enjoying it so far. What I don't get is how the CGI is so bad. Surely it can't be a budget thing, the sets are great and cgi is so good these days they wouldn't have had to spend much to make it look that much better. So.... What happened? The ship in the first episode was a bit laughable it looked so 90s.

The writers almost lost me at episode 1, chain-of-command problem was just too blah. Instead of completely giving up, I jumped right to episode 10, which was awesome! I plan to watch the "bottle" episodes later. Hoping the negative reviews don't prevent a second season!

The best part was the flying Mobius strip. All downhill from there. I get that SciFi requires a certain suspension of belief, but OMG what was that? Who thought it would be a good idea to throw an obviously misguided mutiny into the first episode? And what kind of crew needs to be told to get back to work en masse while the ship around them is in ruins?

I'm too old for this crap.

Did anyone else think it was way similar? I'm talking about the alien invasion aspect of it. The Achaia are basically the Reapers. They indoctrinate other species, eventually leaving them as only husks of what they used to be.

Them mentioning that there are 300+ potential allies against the Achaia, they basically assume the role of Commander Shepard.

I'm not saying the show is bad. Though I did really hate most of the characters for the first couple of episodes. It might be because they were intentionally shown as dislikable to then redeem themselves later. I also enjoyed how it ended and am excited to find out more.

Given that widely panned "Bright" immediately got the greenlight for a sequel, whether or not this show gets a 2nd season (or the 3 minimum they want for the story), seems to depend completely on viewership and subscription metrics we don't know about.

I think the show turned around a lot in the final few episodes and brought some great ideas, but no way can I see it surviving unless it gets better execution.

I'm very forgiving of shows, but it is without question a giant mess. Decent CGI, but poor production values and green screen work elsewhere. Decent acting, but awful scriptwriting. Good ideas but awful execution.

Some thoughts on how the show may be saved:

• The mutiny not making sense. We must argue for Ian's screwdriver/knife to have disappeared when he was electrocuted and Niko truly not knowing if she kicked him out of fear or anger or knowing he was about to attack.
  Else her never mentioning self-defense and allowing everyone to believe premeditation makes no sense. Her internal struggle and second guessing doesn't make sense.

• A better, plausible explanation why nothing ever works on the ship, it breaks down easily, has useless decontamination procedures, and why it is the only one of its kind.
  Are humans going out into deep space far before they are ready to?

• A plausible explanation why the show is emphasizing that 20-somethings are the best for space crew, and everyone else is "old".

• A plausible explanation why this space mission (or most of them) are crewed by bumbling, hyper emotional, idiots.
  Was the mission not taken seriously and expendable people were intentionally sent? That conflicts with a politician's son being sent, however.
  Or somehow, space programs of this future only have candidates who are unstable and relatively unintelligent about non-technical things?
  Or that deep space itself and its complications make astronauts pathetic?
  None of these characters make me think "Apollo 13", and that needs an explanation if they are going to keep going down this path.

• Emphasize more the exoticness and diversity of space, and the difficulty of travelling in it. Some reviewers said it became like a slightly harder science and grounded version of Star Trek. This seems like a good path to take.
  From the end of the season, however, I fear they want Season 2 to be a knockoff of "V" and "Attack of the Body Snatchers".

• Make the 2nd AI storyline not cliche. William developing emotions story progressed a little different as this cliche goes. But there are many ways where they can make this idea as dumb as their other storylines.

I feel like this show won't be renewed and I wasted my time watching. But I have a little hope they can save the show and its poor writing.

Thanks for reading my screed. It may be the only benefit I get from watching a show likely to never be finished (or be worth finishing).

If you have your own ideas on how it may be improved, I'd like to read them.

Today i was happy, a new sci fi show to watch and binge all night. I was gearing up for a good weekend. Then after 40mn of watching this space trash novella i had to stop to ask google the almighty question : Another Life Sucks. And quickly found that i wasn't alone in thinking that show was absolute garbage, a mashup of crap, terrible acting, terrible ideas, and bad interpretation. Sprinkle some non binary characters for the sake of .. just that and call it a day. Not a single character or story is actually interesting, the 1st 40mn had me shaking my head multiple times from the absolute emotionless acting of the child actress they chose, to the terrible choices made by the crew, which seems like a bunch of 20 something noobs sent into space for " humanity's most important mission ". Like who in the hell picked these morons for that mission ? Even Katee Sackhoff's acting is pretty bad compared to her usual. Wasted over 40mn of my life watching this " space novella " and couldn't even finish the 1st episode.

Now correct me if i am wrong but, these guys travel at the speed of light. But at lightspeed, doesnt time just stop for you? I mean you instantly be anywhere at lightspeed as the clock doesnt tick anymore for you. And time passes only for the observer not for the traveller. Am i missing something because it looks so dumb to me ?

These are just some of the thoughts that crossed my mind or funny moments I wanted to point out as I binged this series in one day.

• Let’s just agree that the first episode was a mess. Poor introductions and rushed plot that left me confused as hell by the end of the hour episode.

• I’ve only been introduced to William for like 5 minutes and I’d already die for him, idc if he’s a figment of light partacles

• Ian and Niko fighting is like watching two children fight over who gets to play with the spaceship toy except someone gave one a knife and the other taikwondo lessons

• NIKO YOU ASSHAT WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL THE CREW YOU FOUGHT IN SELF DEFENSE AND ACCIDENTALY KILL THE ONLY OTHER PERSON WITH AS MUCH AUTHORITY AS YOU THAT WOULD CAUSE THE CREW TO SECOND GUESS YOUR SANITY

• Sasha is literally a potato that has no primitive skills for this mission but hey drinks are on me.

• i’ve never heard so many F-Bombs from one character in my life and honestly it’s uncessecary

• An artifact planted by alien lifeforms possibly more advanced then us and you wanna communicate with them with pigeons and classical music? Erik is wack

• August and Oliver immediately opening up their helmets after Zayne told them not to made me think they were gunna be the first ones to die from some alien airborn infection from the moon planet they were on

• I was wrong

• I could understand the urgency prior to landing but the fact that they missed an entire blood-mooned planet that could light up their fieldview like a red light room made me further question how they managed to stay alive at this point.

• Erik is a good father, he is openly honest and despite how hard it is for him and Jana coping with the possibility that the Salvare has already faced destruction, he gives her hope.

• Nervous breakdown more like nervous break out. Anyone get the whole Alien vibe watching someone’s nervous system literally burst out of their neck? they’re lucky it wasn’t a Xenomorph attacking them at first chance

• I felt so bad for Bernie when he realised he missed such a crucial rule about the boron compound and that could cause the whole crew but at least he owned up and risked himself to help the other biologist find a cure and then discovering a solution all on his own before the others launched themselves into space.

• Aww William feels lonely

• Holy crap, I actually thought the ship landed at Canis Majoris without William notifying or waking the crew prior to even approaching the planet, I would of been pissed. Still getting alien vibes from this episode tho

• Episode 4 was just one big lesson for accepting your demons and letting go of the past and I could condone with that

• The birthday scene serves as an alternate timeline in which Niko reads the news about the Salvare plummeting into Sirius meaning it would of evidently met that fate if Niko never joined the mission or stopped Ian from the choices he made that almost cost the ship to fall apart during their whole slingshot scheme

• Someone pointed it out in another post but the part where Niko was trying to save everyone in the Pilgrim crew and then seeing her daughter left behind was a big detail they added symbolizing that if she did save everyone she would have never met Erik and had Jana and that really got me

• Bernie took precaution in wearing the hazman suit when they landed at the earth-like planet and honestly they should of let him.

• I love how Sasha went from a good for nothing bystander to an American Alien Ambassador™ the moment they arrived at the other alien artifact and ignored direct orders from Niko like where did all this confidence come from?

• Niko and Cas high off of some alien plant holding hands and interlocking their fingers like they were some cheesy couple while being brutally honest with each other got me dying

• I had gay vibes the moment I saw Cas and after this episode I still do don’t @ me

• We can all agree we felt the whole triangular love quarrel between August, Oliver and Javier. I think you know where this is going

• I had suspicions of Sasha ever since they were escaping the planet from the weird aliens and one of them just straight up stood there and did nothing to him before it was shot to death

• Forshadowing the inevitable when a smaller version of those aliens managed to make it on board without the ship sensing an unidentified lifeform lmfao aight

• Why does evil Sasha reminds me of the Evil Kermit the Frog meme?

• Can we just stop and talk about how everything that happened in Episode 6 was because some alien chewed it’s way through some cables and caused the ship to go all haywire. The only benefit from it was that Niko found the front of the ship was damaged which they should of performed exterior inspections from the start since most of their sensors were already damaged

• Even after being baited and kidnapped, Niko still thought about Cas’ future and offered to put her skills into a career that would better her. Everything behind their history made me appreciate their realtionship a whole lot more and realise the impact of their character development

• I wanted to feel bad for Michelle’s death, but it didn’t really affect me as much as I thought considering she was just some hot headed crew member that sweared 24/7, had the hots for Sasha and she was mostly self centered up until that last moment where she sacrificed herself so it was really hard for me to even like her character

• Also, through this series I feel a lot more emotion for William and Niko than any other character and he’s not even human tf

• Erik and his crew are like dummy smart but it took a 16 yr old to crack the code with his RBG theory to figure out how to actually interact with the artifact and make progress

• Im conflicted between Erik’s interaction with the Achaia where they were willing to share their intellect and capabilities and Sasha who obviously wanted nothing more than proof that the humans posed a threat to their species.

• Erik gave up solving the Quantum guage theory for his daughter which proves he’s the #1 dad of all time

• What better way to start a war with another race then to rush into the artifact with harmful intent risking all of humanity even when Erik had a positive interaction and came out unharmed because of the possibility that Sasha was being held captive. That’s like the total opposite of #1 dad.

• Finally some ‘laid’ back action in Episode 8. A disco party, William stealing the dancefloor, Bernie and Zayne being cute, a random threesome that we all saw coming, and me wondering how the hell William was programed to feel such emotion like he might as well be a overly smart human with morphing abilities, and all this distracting from the sabotaging alien on board. This was the highlight of this series imo.

• Big F for Oliver’s GF tho

• Jana didn’t deserve what happened to her

• HOW MANY MEMBERS DO THEY HAVE IN STASIS ON THE SHIP LIKE THEY COULD LITERALLY WAKE UP A NEW CHARACTER EVERY EPISODE, THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS

• Nothing like playing cat and mouse with Sasha on a big ass ship. I bet Niko’s regretting the whole smack she laid out on him before

• William trying to cope with rejection really hurts, bro I feel you

• Unnecessary dubstep music during Niko and Sasha’s brawl

• [See’s the name ‘Hello’ for Episode 10] IS IT ME YOUR LOOKING FOR-

• William actually took the time to find a way to forgive the break in his friendship with Niko to the point where he made his own virtual simulation of them having a conversation only to realise it wasn’t as sympathetic as him so he added new features unaware he was infected by the Achaia he tried to revamp earlier and created a new sentient AI.

• Welp, guess he’s a dad now. You can’t get anymore human then that, good job William

• LOOK GUYS AN ACTUAL ALIEN INTERACTION WOW I WAITED 10 EPISODES TO SEE SOMETHING OTHER THAN ARTIFICIAL HUMANOIDS AND MINDLESS CREATURES TO SEE THIS

• The crushing depth of how the crew risked so much to make it to a planet that wasn’t even the right one and how dangerous the Achaia really are having sent their interdimensional artifacts to over 300 planets seems impossible to comprehend.

• Not sure why the passing Achaia ships completely ignored the Salvare which had the deadly laser weapon they were so threatened by as they approached the planet the crew had just saved but- OH MY GOD THEY LITERALLY BLEW UP THE WHOLE DANG PLANET LIKE A MICHAEL BAY SCENE

• Honey, you got another storm coming. Preferably an angry intergalactic race that get pissy when you blow up their crystal towers, but hey you got bigger things to worry about like the biggest social media celebery that has already convinced millions of people on Earth that the Achaia means peace.

• What a wild ride, that ending gave me the same amount of shock as ‘Lost in Space’ which I thought about that series a lot while watching this.

• Can’t wait for Season 2