I tried watching it.... I thought the premise was interesting, i.e. what if the Soviet's got to the Moon first, etc...

Then, pretty quickly, it seemed to become about woman empowerment and I just wasn't interested in an 20 hour feminist lecture... Not quite as compelling as the historical fiction elements, an alternate view of history...

I think "The Man in the High Castle" suffers from this as well. It drifts rather quickly away from the interesting alternative history, to the rather boring "Juliana" centred narratives... It becomes just another series at that point... Like any other show..

Also, I prefer mini-series. They're tighter, they force the creators to make choices and commit to them and there is less risk that they'll just string the story along for multiple years just to make a big TV show out of it...

@CheekyMonkey said:

I tried watching it.... I thought the premise was interesting, i.e. what if the Soviet's got to the Moon first, etc...

Then, pretty quickly, it seemed to become about woman empowerment and I just wasn't interested in an 20 hour feminist lecture...

It's not though. Yes, the entire first season is about "what if NASA was forced to train female astronauts for political reasons" but the women aren't marry sues, they screw up and have human faults, and the men aren't portrayed as evil toxic misogynists. By the end of the seasons it shows the male and female astronauts working together to achieve a common goal, which is how it should be.

Even the one character I thought was going to be the stereotypical man-hating feminist (Molly) gets put in her place and learns to be a team player where her and Ed (Joel Kinnaman) end up being trusted friends. Don't get me wrong they do have some "women oppressed" stuff in it, but it's minor and tempered by the fact the women are flawed and admit they need help from the more experienced men.

It's not perfect but it's not a total wokefest "men bad women superior" type show I was expecting it to be.

Sorry, but that sounds dreadful to me... What if the USSR and HR department of America had a Cold War inspired space race...?

I guess it's just not for me...

@cswood said:

@CheekyMonkey said:

I tried watching it.... I thought the premise was interesting, i.e. what if the Soviet's got to the Moon first, etc...

Then, pretty quickly, it seemed to become about woman empowerment and I just wasn't interested in an 20 hour feminist lecture...

It's not though. Yes, the entire first season is about "what if NASA was forced to train female astronauts for political reasons" but the women aren't marry sues, they screw up and have human faults, and the men aren't portrayed as evil toxic misogynists. By the end of the seasons it shows the male and female astronauts working together to achieve a common goal, which is how it should be.

Even the one character I thought was going to be the stereotypical man-hating feminist (Molly) gets put in her place and learns to be a team player where her and Ed (Joel Kinnaman) end up being trusted friends. Don't get me wrong they do have some "women oppressed" stuff in it, but it's minor and tempered by the fact the women are flawed and admit they need help from the more experienced men.

It's not perfect but it's not a total wokefest "men bad women superior" type show I was expecting it to be.

And this was done, because the Soviets were making gains in the space race, like a female cosmonaut, so needed to do something. Had the other guy been paying attention, the women weren't being taken seriously throughout the season and expected to fail, just like in the changing world of the 60s. The Nixon of that timeline intended the female astronauts to be for show and eventually wanted to kill the program, but Deke Slayton saw the candidates' potential and took responsibility. Even though female astronauts were in the series, the events in the show didn't revolve around them: the writers could've made them young males, with Molly Cobb being just as cynical about being dropped from the list in the earlier program.

I wonder what the other guy would think of the gays and lesbians in the show's background...

@Condottiero said:

And this was done, because the Soviets were making gains in the space race, like a female cosmonaut, so needed to do something. Had the other guy been paying attention, the women weren't being taken seriously throughout the season and expected to fail, just like in the changing world of the 60s. The Nixon of that timeline intended the female astronauts to be for show and eventually wanted to kill the program, but Deke Slayton saw the candidates' potential and took responsibility. Even though female astronauts were in the series, the events in the show didn't revolve around them: the writers could've made them young males, with Molly Cobb being just as cynical about being dropped from the list in the earlier program.

Agreed, although season 2 is turning out to be not as good as season 1. There are still good moments but I've been doing a lot of eye rolling this season.

@cswood said:

@Condottiero said:

And this was done, because the Soviets were making gains in the space race, like a female cosmonaut, so needed to do something. Had the other guy been paying attention, the women weren't being taken seriously throughout the season and expected to fail, just like in the changing world of the 60s. The Nixon of that timeline intended the female astronauts to be for show and eventually wanted to kill the program, but Deke Slayton saw the candidates' potential and took responsibility. Even though female astronauts were in the series, the events in the show didn't revolve around them: the writers could've made them young males, with Molly Cobb being just as cynical about being dropped from the list in the earlier program.

Agreed, although season 2 is turning out to be not as good as season 1. There are still good moments but I've been doing a lot of eye rolling this season.

Agreed. Season 1 was pretty decent. but season 2 is full of cringe inducing patriotic moments. The numerous character tangent stories goes nowhere or doesn't really add to the drama. I found not caring for any of the characters this season. Awful writing.

@jaseerabubakar said:

@cswood said:

@Condottiero said:

And this was done, because the Soviets were making gains in the space race, like a female cosmonaut, so needed to do something. Had the other guy been paying attention, the women weren't being taken seriously throughout the season and expected to fail, just like in the changing world of the 60s. The Nixon of that timeline intended the female astronauts to be for show and eventually wanted to kill the program, but Deke Slayton saw the candidates' potential and took responsibility. Even though female astronauts were in the series, the events in the show didn't revolve around them: the writers could've made them young males, with Molly Cobb being just as cynical about being dropped from the list in the earlier program.

Agreed, although season 2 is turning out to be not as good as season 1. There are still good moments but I've been doing a lot of eye rolling this season.

Agreed. Season 1 was pretty decent. but season 2 is full of cringe inducing patriotic moments. The numerous character tangent stories goes nowhere or doesn't really add to the drama. I found not caring for any of the characters this season. Awful writing.

There was nothing cringe inducing about the "patriotic moments" and the side stories were fine, with the exception of Margo Madison acting like Lisa Simpson. The Baldwin family drama in contrast, felt flat and existed just for melodramatics.