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'Moonbase 8' Episode 2 Review: Rook is homesick and Cap hunts down a prowler, how will they cope?

The 30-minute episode makes viewers lose interest in the first five minutes of watching it
PUBLISHED NOV 16, 2020
Cap and Rook (Showtime)
Cap and Rook (Showtime)

Spoilers for 'Moonbase 8' Episode 2 'Rats'

Episode 1 'Dry' started off to a good start for the Showtime series, but Episode 2 'Rats' dialed the excitement down completely. The 30-minute episode makes viewers lose interest in the first five minutes of watching the episode. 'Rats' took a different angle when it came to the second episode, instead of a crisis on the base, it was that plus an emotional one. Rook (Tim Heidecker) seems to be extremely homesick -- we even get a glimpse of his family members -- while Cap (John C Reilly) and Skip (Fred Armisen) try to figure out who's outside their base making a commotion. While the premise probably came from a place of logic, the delivery was absolutely terrible. We didn't laugh once.

After Rook makes a video for his family, of at least 20 it seemed, he gets homesick and feels invaluable. Meanwhile, Skip wakes up in the middle of the night to noises from outside the base and decides to wake up Cap. When Cap decides to go outside but fails to find anything, the trip realizes that their suit uptime is not good. If it were the actual moon, it would have been a life-death situation. At first, the trio thinks that it's an animal, but then Cap finds bicycle tracks -- so they spend literally the entire episode only for Cap to find a local man named Wally who wanted to recycle. It was probably the worst resolution to a crisis we've seen in an episode of what's supposed to be a comedy.

Rook's homesick plotline also fell short. When Cap hears Rook speaking to his wife about how he isn't appreciated on the base, and that it's time to come home, he decides to be much more inclusive of Rook. Rook -- a devoutly religious man -- is to spread God's word across the universe. Cap asks Rook to pray during morning breakfast and even gives him the credit for the "one of us should be suited up at all times" idea that Skip thought of. It was a ridiculous idea because when Rook was given the first watch, he couldn't even hear the prowler because he had his space helmet on. While Skip was working on an alarm system to find a way to catch the prowler, Rook lets' him and Cap know that he's leaving on the next delivery truck. Not to mention, his wife Sue is about to deliver their 100th (we don't know), child.

Cap decides to throw a goodbye party for Rook, in order to make him feel valuable so he can decide to stay. Cap also did it for selfish reasons, because if NASA cuts the project, he doesn't have a home to go to. The party is cut short hen Skip's alarm goes off and Cap goes out to find Wally who tells him to "let go of the illusion of control," because he was frustrated at everything. If you're wondering why the episode is called 'Rats', we have no idea either. The lab rat, Jeremy made an appearance for all of five minutes at the end of the episode. Oh, and yes, Rook does decide to stay. Why do you ask? Because his wife told him, "pray on it, before you rush home," so he does, falls asleep, and has a dream that he should stay. So, he does.

Will the trio cope you ask? They won't. They have zero skill or what it takes to work as a team, their ideas make you wonder if they went to school at all (who wears a spacesuit at all times? or suggests that people drink vegetable oil to keep hydrated), and they don't know what to do when its an actual crisis. They can't cope, because they simply don't know how to. Missing home should be the last thing on their minds if they don't know how to deal with a life and death situation on the moon. Not to mention, Cap's suggestion to help Rook's homesickness was to hug each other without a shirt on - it obviously did absolutely nothing for Rook. Also, we didn't need to see that.

The episode literally had no satisfying content, lacked empathy for people who actually go to the moon, had no character chemistry, arc, or dynamics, and had the wackiest climax. Don't get us started on the resolutions - it was as though an amateur wrote the ending.

'Moonbase 8' airs on Showtime on Sundays at 11 pm ET/PT.

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