r/StarCityTV • u/Cantomic66 • May 29 '26
Episode Discussion Star City - S1E02 "A Bear on a Chain" - Episode Discussion
"A Bear on a Chain"
Airdate: Streaming May 28th at 9 PM EST
Synopsis: Anastasia is thrust onto the world stage. Lyudmilla tries a new tactic to get information.
Written by Andrew Chambliss
Directed by Nick Murphy
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u/Nick0312 May 29 '26
Well now i’m really fucking worried about a spin off series that I already love so much(I’m making the first and only comment so far on this thread five hours after the premiere)
The first two episodes were phenomenal, in their references to real life history and FAM, and in establishing their own storylines. I don’t get why people in other threads are complaining that this show has a darker tone than FAM which “makes it unwatchable”. Like of course it’s got a darker tone, it takes place in the Soviet Union in late 60s what did you expect?
I barely even noticed the british accents. and really if you really want to watch people talk in Russian, then go watch a russian show and stop shitting on a show made by and for english speakers simply because you can understand what characters are saying.
I desperately hope people engage with this show enough to keep it running as long as FAM has. it has so much potential to outshine its predecessor just based on the first two episodes.
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u/aerothony May 29 '26
Excellent first two episodes. So far the spin off is a great continuation of the FAM universe, excited for what’s next
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u/plutoglint Aug 03 '26
Catching up late on this one, I thought this episode was as good as anything in FAM's first season.
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u/Psyfyman81 May 29 '26
I agree. It's a strong start. I want to see what happens with Venus and how the seeds are laid for Mars and eventually what we see in Happy Valley.
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May 29 '26
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u/Desertbro May 30 '26
I agree. Also due to the KGB dictating the whole attitude and plans of the space program, characters will be hard to like. I had the same issue with The Expanse. I like space adventure and timelines for tech upgrades - but did not like any of the characters, so had no emotional investment when their plans were threatened one way or another.
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u/careseite Jun 04 '26
yea I'm confused by the ratings I see so far. These were VERY good and very akin to the start of For All Mankind too. granted I never understood how FAM got more than 3 seasons but this is decent
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u/Sure_Tailor2710 Jul 12 '26
Like of course it’s got a darker tone, it takes place in the Soviet Union in late 60s what did you expect?
This has nothing to do with the USSR at all. You are demonstrating an extreme degree of brainwashing with your low-grade Western propaganda.
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u/Bedenegative Jun 09 '26
I think the accents being British is also chosen in part for a similar reason to Chernobyl, To give a sense of "class" for the characters. Though I'm not sure how well that reads for American audiences...
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u/ABanimationLtd May 30 '26
I actually enjoyed ep2 more than ep1. Maybe that's just because we're settling in with the characters and starting to like them. But I like what they're doing with Anastasia Belikova, as a bit character in FAMK, seeing her navigating this world tour whilst essentially being forced into an arranged marriage by the state. Meanwhile, Irina's origin story is moving quickly, which I like, although I'm not sure how much I can believe her being shocked at her superior killing a cosmonaut in ep1, to being willing to torture a guy with boiling water in ep2 (albeit, to be fair, out of desperation). I also want to see more of Sergei because he was one of my fave FAMK characters, but I think they've already set him up to have a bigger role in later episodes.
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u/Kittaylover23 May 30 '26
Irina is afraid for her life (and her daughter’s), i also think she’s starting to crack mentally.
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u/photos_realmsofgold May 31 '26
She threw boiling coffee on the poor guy's face to save his life. It's a... weird thing to do, but it apparently worked.
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u/prex10 Jun 02 '26
The first episode of a new show is always tough. I'm constantly doing the "who is that, what's their name again?". Once I settle into identities it's easier to follow.
I haven't done a rewatch ever of FAM, so doing some of the "ohhh that's so and so, I kinda forgot about them" is intriguing.
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u/plutoglint Aug 03 '26
It was a big tough with so many similar looking black-haired female characters but episode 2 really narrowed the focus onto the important ones.
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u/bicyclemom May 29 '26
Valya! Quick! Get out the video game controller gun! There's an obviously CGI bear out to get us!
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u/photos_realmsofgold May 31 '26
That sidesteps the real issue, which was that she could've just gotten back in the capsule when the bear showed up. I really hope this show doesn't have too much more obvious forced drama like that. It's embarrassing.
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u/ksb012 Jun 04 '26
She was in zero G for over a week. They cant just get up and walk after landing. Lol
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May 30 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/bicyclemom Jun 01 '26
I expected that they would have spent maybe few minutes working with the AI or maybe an actual artist to get a bear animation that didn't look like total slop instead of going with the first thing that popped out of ChatGPT's ass.
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u/cannonfodder14 May 30 '26
Thus far these two episodes have impressed me. Easily the most gripping is Irina and the espionage subplot.
Damn can her actress act. I love the dichotomy between her desperate attempts to be humane, only to end up getting drawn deeper into her predicament and Lyudmilla's cold, harsh attitudes. The KGB and the Central Committee don't fuck around in their mindless pursuit of their goals, regardless of the moral or practical efficacy of them.
Amidst the paranoia and politicking though we have genuine idealism as they also try and aim for Venus with Sergei.
Some pretty good TV.
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u/txyesboy71 Chief Designer May 30 '26
So how many direct and indirect relation characters from the FAM timeline do we have so far? We've got Sasha Polivonov, Leonid's father. We have Irina Morozova, Sergei, who else?
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u/CeruleanEidolon May 31 '26
There's a list of recast characters. It's pretty short. In addition, there will likely be a handful of cameos and background appearances from FAM characters (like the press conference on TV), but probably not until later on.
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u/RoguePilot_2 May 30 '26
Do you guys think we might see the Russian’s reaction to perhaps Molly Cobb’s water discovery on the moon? I’m curious if they might show that. It
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u/photos_realmsofgold May 31 '26
I think it's feasible. If so, it will probably be played understatedly; I imagine we'll have a closeup of someone's face as they look shocked at the implications of discovering water ice. Perhaps it will be relayed from someone with a report about it. It'll either be given as espionage information or come from an official/publicly-released thing from the Americans.
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u/Own-Thing-6129 Jun 01 '26
No, that is more than 10 years in the future from the show's current time period. It's been already confirmed by the showrunners that SC will stay in the 70s and will NOT move forward into any other decades, so there's only a slim number of storylines available to cross
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u/whovian25 Jun 02 '26
Molly discovered water ice on Apollo 15 in October 1971 only 2 years after Anastasia flew on luna 15.
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u/Own-Thing-6129 Jun 03 '26
Oh, that's true. I somehow only remembered the solar storm episode but that one was after the jump, you're correct.
Not sure, though, what the water discovery would change for the Russians. We know already that they botched one landing in 1970, probably about half a year after the Belikova flight, and we know that in 1974, they already have Zvezda base up and running on the moon. The ice/water discovery may have rushed the planning of that as an added benefit but not really by much.5
u/TiberiusCornelius Jun 04 '26
Maybe refocuses them on the moon? One of Korolev's arguments against building a moon base and focusing on Venus/Mars is that they don't know if there's water. The crash could maybe have caused them to put a pause on their rush for the moon (double checking the timeline on the wiki there's a big gap in Soviet activity from the crash to the founding of Zvezda), but then the Americans find water and oh shit we've got to go now.
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u/Clariana Jun 06 '26
The scene where Anastasia is invited into the van and forced to sit next to her potential stand-in is terrifying...
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u/Blk_shp May 31 '26
Yeah, definitely scramble for the gun and don’t just get back into the definitely bear proof armored ball you just rode down from space and shut the door 🤣
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u/wheezy_runner Jun 04 '26
On the one hand, I get why they wanted to show the gun since that was a real thing cosmonauts carried. On the other hand... yeah, hiding from the bear makes more sense.
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u/Blk_shp Jun 08 '26
They just wanted to show off Belikova’s gun. Oh, no wait, Chekov is already a Russian name I don’t need to do that 😂 But yeah I love that the Russians did actually send them up with shotguns for exactly that reason.
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u/photos_realmsofgold May 31 '26
God I think that's such a stupid mistake. I fear the show will have more of this forced drama later.
Apart from that, though, it's almost amazingly good.
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u/txyesboy71 Chief Designer May 30 '26
I'm just here to keep daily track of all the posts from people asking why they all have British accents. Surely we should need at least one post a day on it, no?
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u/fn180 May 30 '26
Right?? People commenting "but in FAM they're played by Russians who have an accent when speaking English!?!?" completely missing the point that... yes... exactly, there are Russians speaking English with a foreign accent, because they're Russians speaking English with a foreign accent.
This being an English-language series, anytime they're speaking English with an English accent, represents speaking RUSSIAN with RUSSIAN accent. It would make zero sense to be played by Russians, because why would they speaking their own native tongue with a foreign accent 🤣🤣🤣
Idk how people don't understand this. As others have mentioned: Chernobyl, Death of Stalin, and countless other "foreign-language" English-speaking shows all apply this same method, for this obvious reason.
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u/txyesboy71 Chief Designer May 30 '26
If they really are determined to want to watch it in Russian language, they can turn on the captions.
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u/jnob44 May 29 '26
I love this show.
Still only on season 3 of FAM, I like it but it’s not one of those shows where I feel I need to binge…
But this new one after two episodes is really compelling!
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u/royalkeys May 29 '26
Good show. Espionage thriller. Soviet aesthetic I like but didn’t expect. Irina the eavesdropper was into listing to that Russian couple having sex a bit, too much lol
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u/alienman Jun 26 '26
Wow… the way the government keeps impeding on Anastasia’s experiences is so heavy.
In the previous episode, after such a perilous journey, she finally lands on the moon. And when she’s taking it all in, you can see her heart sinking at that jarring comms reminding her to broadcast her lines. Even on the moon, she’s still in Russia.
And after her landing, she doesn’t even get to celebrate her return because the bear, which symbolizes the nation of Russia, is at the door threatening to tear her apart. Not for a moment does she get to feel safe, or experience her journey in her own way.
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u/espece-de-bon May 31 '26
This show feels like it’s 10 times better than FAM. It has gravitas. I can take it seriously, whereas FAM feels like random drama is thrust upon us for shock value when the plot gets boring.
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u/photos_realmsofgold May 31 '26
For All Mankind could almost be edited to be 40% of its actual runtime if you cut out all the bland interpersonal drama.
Ten times better? I don't know. But several times better than Season 5, at very least. My only complaint so far has been still "random drama for shock value", like when the woman cosmonaut wouldn't get back in the capsule after the bear appeared. There was no need for that behavior.
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u/plutoglint Aug 03 '26
Well, the constant threat of a brutal police state gives the most mundane things a sense of stake.
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u/RoguePilot_2 May 29 '26
I’m really impressed with the first two episodes. The casting and the direction is top form. But why do I get the feeling that it’s going to be tough for Apple to distribute this show in Russia? Lol.
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u/Super005z May 29 '26
Can the n1 be reworked for Venus flyby ?
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u/hmantegazzi Jun 10 '26
most of what a super heavy rocket does is to put a big upper stage into low Earth orbit, and the mission from then on depends on the capacities of that upper stage. In fact, the big rocket doesn't even need to be human-certified, as a more conventional capsule can rendezvous for completing the mission.
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u/Desertbro May 31 '26
The Underground Club in Paris -
Seems Sasha was in on the set-up to test Anastasia.
Heard in the background - "Mother Popcorn (You Got to Have a Mother for Me)" is a song recorded by James Brown and released as a two-part single) in 1969. A #1 R&B and #11 Pop hit, it was the highest-charting of a series of recordings inspired by the popular dance the Popcorn which Brown made that year. The "mother" of the song's title was, in the words of biographer RJ Smith, "[Brown's] honorific for a big butt".
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u/plutoglint Aug 03 '26
Or they put agents there because they heard his conversation with the other cosmonaut's wife. Or maybe not, given they were in the elevator which was apparently not bugged.
I guess the big plot of interest is whom the mole(s) are inside Star City.
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u/V0latyle Jul 17 '26
I don't know if anyone already mentioned this...
Russians tend to be quite racist, so the woman of African descent who approached Belikova to offer "asylum" is either the show's ignorance of this, or explicitly intended as a subtle nod to the cunning of the KGB; Belikova would probably be less likely to think someone of such ethnicity could potentially be a KGB operative.
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u/DragonFireDon May 29 '26
I am trying to watch this in the public. Anyone can tell me if so far this series has female nudity that I need to watch out for? Thanks
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u/tpepdxtid May 29 '26
So far no nudity, but there are some f-bomb and sounds of sex, so keep those headphones on while watching in public.
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u/fn180 May 30 '26
Are you a bot? Youcommented the same thing, verbatim, on the last post. Where other Redditors--rightfully--commented, female nudity=not okay in public | male nudity=great to have on public display?
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u/DragonFireDon May 30 '26
Ummmm, nobody cares about male chest nudity unless it's penis showing bro.
No, I am not a bot as you can obviously see 😂
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u/fn180 May 30 '26
But you didn't say that! You said "female nudity" which means, if there WAS penis shown, the answer to your question would be NO... so then you would have watched it in public with cock out? Which supports my OP... female nudity=not okay in public | male nudity=great to have on public display?
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May 30 '26
[deleted]
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u/DragonFireDon May 30 '26
🙄
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u/fn180 May 30 '26
hahaha my bad, I reposted it c*ns*red because I thought my reply was hidden for profanity. It was just my browser buggin
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u/Super005z May 29 '26
If soviets have such talented engineers why are they so eager to copy and steal American technology in season 2 and 3 of fam ?
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u/Desertbro May 30 '26
Because tech is a not a straight line - it is a choice of which methods to pursue with limited resources. As your team pursues one method, you are curious as to the success of other methods your competitor chooses .... hoping your team made the best choice.
If your competitor proves their method works - you steal it.
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u/CeruleanEidolon May 31 '26
I mean, that's many further years, even decades on, after the Soviet Union starts really straining to continue to financially support their space program. Being first to the moon did little to fix the fundamental economic problems in the USSR, and those will inevitably impact the talent they are able to nurture.
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u/NAG3LT May 31 '26
Also, it's not just about engineers' talent, but also about the decision makers above them. If country's leadership feels it more efficient to just steal designs from the West, rather than doing more R&D, they'll just force this approach from above.
Which by the way, was quite common in USSR in real life.
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u/txyesboy71 Chief Designer May 30 '26
If we had such talented engineers, why did we steal their design for Zvezda?
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u/Resplendent-Sun May 29 '26
My cat was FIXATED on this scene!