Apple TV+ 'For All Mankind' Review: Riveting space drama embarks on it's most ambitious journey yet
'For All Mankind' loves Isaac Newton's third law of motion. In fact, it bases the story on believing that an opposite reaction is inevitable. It banks on it. The premise of the opening season was all about the ignominy of defeat for the United States after the Soviets had a man walking first on the moon. There were consequences and it didn't end fully well. The series started off bold, and the time jump by a decade with every passing season shows that the creators — Ron Moore, Matt Wolpert, and Ben Bedivi wanted it all to be about how the actions in one decade would impact the other. And they did a darn good job at it.
The impact was felt in 'The Grey', the season 2 finale. It didn't pull any punches back, even at the cost of two of the key characters' lives. Now, Season 3 seems to take the same route. With eight episodes provided for review, the series does bring with it ample doses of action. It's highly ambitious, grandiose and most importantly, exceeds the expectations the previous installments set. So Mars being the mission isn't the whole story. It's just better. It's 1992. Tracy and Gordo Stevens (Sarah Jones and Michael Dorman) are now remembered fondly with a statue and a movie titled 'Love in the skies starring Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid.
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Ed Baldwin and Danielle Poole (Krys Marshall) eagerly await whether they will make the cut for NASA's maiden Mars journey. Director of NASA Margo Madison (Wrenn Schmidt) with her Silm Fast's is still quite the attention generator after she was known to be a Soviet asset. The space program has seen quite the changes. Shantel VanSanten's Karen Baldwin is now a rather big figure in space tourism. Ellen Wilson (Jodi Balfour) is on the rise with her political career. New entrant Dec Ayesa (Edi Gathegi) is pretty much Elon Musk with an obsession with space. His company, Helios joins the space race bringing in enough ripple effect.
Tracy and Gordo Stevens' sons Danny (Casey W. Johnson), a big name in NADSA, and Jimmy (David Chandler) who's delved heavily into conspiracy theory still aren't over the supreme sacrifice their parents made, and that shows how the show still carries over key storylines from the previous season. The latest season also explores the relationship between Danny and Ed which can be described as complex and strained at best. Danny's relationship with the Baldwins, especially Karen highlights the new edition. The soap opera elements work well to fill the void left by the action sequences but ensure it isn't over the top.
It's not 'The Martian' if that's what one expects from the Mars sequences. Hell, Arnold Schwarzenegger's 'Total Recall' doesn't come close to 'For All Mankind' as it just pulls out all stops when the Red planet storyline takes center stage. This one's a humdinger season, no doubts there. And with two episodes that perhaps will be better than the rest of the season.
'For All Mankind' Episode 1 drops June 10, 2022 on Apple TV+.