Director: Alex Kurtzman
Writers: Alex Kurtzman & Jenny Lumet (Walter Tevis himself actually writes 3 episodes)
Producers: Adrian Kelly, Jane Maggs & Bill Wolkoff
*Intro Script*
Janae: What’s Up, Weirdos! I’m Janae
Amanda: I’m Amanda. And together we are
Both: Girls Go Books Deep
Janae: We take deep dives into the Fantasy & Science Fiction content you love the most
Amanda: Today, we’re catching you all up on what’s been going on, where we’ve been these last few weeks, and wrapping up our discussion on the last few episodes of Showtime’s The Man Who Fell To Earth.
Janae: So, hit that like button
Amanda: and stay tuned…
Janae: Hello Everybody! Thank you so much for joining the conversation today. Amanda and I are currently hating America’s bullshit, sulking at having to “Adult”, and finally finished watching The Man Who Fell To Earth so let’s have a conversation about it.
[what’s been going on]
Amanda: Now we’re going to do a quick breakdown of each episode we have unfortunately skipped in our podcast due to life reasons, and then we’ll discuss the different likes and dislikes, as well as possible plot holes Janae and I found.
Janae:
Episode 5
- Hatch & Edie get in deeper with the CIA
- Faraday meets his subconscious (Watt) & gets a history lesson which helps him understand the machine’s blueprints
- Justin loves working again but feels guilty
- We get the first glimpse of something strange going on with Josiah and he also gives Justin her formula that starts them on the road to success.
Amanda:
Episode 6
- Faraday records a love letter to his wife on Anthea, which in actuality is a love letter to humanity.
- We realize exactly how far gone Josiah is and why.
- Spencer & Dominguez finally narrow down where they should be searching for Newton.
- Possible Pressman Thorne Hole? – PT has been trying to buy OriGen for years and Edie finally gives in – but wasn’t this the same company Hatch tried to sell Patent 10 years ago when he was caught and fired by his sister? How/Why did that not go through, does Hatch know more than we think he does?
- We need to rewatch all of the scenes where PT is mentioned in the beginning.
Janae:
Episode 7
- We realize Dominguez is a double agent, but we don’t know for who yet.
- It’s 100% clear now that Hatch lied about stealing/selling P10 and I’m devastated. (But this is great foreshadowing for his sister’s deception. If he could lie for all of those years so convincingly, it’s probably something they both learned from their father.)
- Spencer sells out Finch to save his own ass and gain control of the mission. We finally learn his back story about his mother. (Sorry, Janae, not abducted by aliens)
- Are Edie & Spencer boning? Do they sleep together at the end of this episode?)
- Faraday hacks into the CIA’s everything, soaks up all of the knowledge about Spencer he can get his hands on, sees Newton use a sound to kill a bunch of Marines that were sent in on Spencer’s bogus-ass order, and listens to/deciphers the tone being broadcast by Newton. He’s been lying the whole time, Faraday is not ever going back home, he’s bringing all of the Anthean’s here to live (this being his main objective in the book.)
Amanda:
Episode 8
- What’s with the Queen Bee and all of the other bee references/imagery? Is this a hole? Was this forgotten about or was it not that important? Why say that the Queen bee is dying because Faraday is dying? Just to spur on the whole blood transfusion situation… eh.
- Josiah, Faraday, and Justin run for their lives, but first, they take steps to ensure the safety of Molly as well as the machine core + algorithm. (But why does he tell Josiah in secret to make sure that Newton gets the machine, even if Justin doesn’t agree?)
- They go to MaryLou’s rehab where they perform a blood transfusion. Clay finds them and hires mercenaries to aid him in a shootout with these women. Spencer kills ML and takes Justin, Faraday, and the Machine, leaving Josiah behind presumably to die.
Janae:
Episode 9
- We learn that the betrayal goes both ways in the Flood household. Edie actually pushed her father off of a cliff while her young son watched and hid the fact that the company was going to be given to Hatch 10 years ago.
- Dominguez at first assists Spencer in the interrogation/torture of Faraday and Justin in order to find out more about the Aliens, the machine, the algorithm, and anything else they can get out of them.
- We learn a more detailed past between Spencer and Finch, via Faraday and his deep dive into Spencer’s file. Finch is barely a mother, but the only mother he had after he was ripped away from his mother who was basically used as “Terrorist Fodder.”
- Dominguez ends up killing Spencer before he can kill Faraday after a whirlwind game of Russian Roullet for information.
- It’s revealed that Dominguez was a double agent for Pressman Thorne, and he is in fact Thomas Newton this entire time.
Amanda:
Episode 10
- Newton is bringing Antheans back to Earth, but now we realize that it’s just the Adepts. Not the drones.
- Faraday was always special to Newton, and he shouldn’t have been classified as a Drone, to begin with.
- Newton can think and feel whatever, but Faraday truly comes into his own big boy Adept pants when he listens, says nothing, and changes the plan to fit what he thinks is right.
- The plan includes revealing the power source to the world on stage at a media event. Allowing himself, along with Hatch & Justin to be arrested by the CIA in order to have a meeting and set the stage for what should and shouldn’t happen from here on out.
- They will be allowed to do what they please because if they are killed or come up missing within the next 10-12 hours, the specs for the power source will be released on the Internet for any and all people to see and use. Which would mean the collapse of the world as they know it to be. So either the USA can stay on top, with Hatch running OriGen and Justin running Pressman Thorne, and they can are kept happy and healthy with only Dominguez as their person of contact – or the info will be released. He will be allowed to leave in the spaceship that Newton built, in order to go back to Anthea and collect his people to bring them back to Earth with no recourse. The government has its hands tied as Hatch has explained to them in so many words. Edie has served her purpose, she is now totally out.
- We also see a moment between Hatch and Edie that says what she did was amazingly unawares because he’s only ever tried to protect her and love her, telling her that he would have gladly kept her secret for the rest of his life before leaving the house, probably for good.
- Ending Scenes – Faraday saying goodbye to Josiah *tears well up*
Josiah is the best, most beautiful, and well-adjusted character I have ever seen on a television screen. I want to say Thank you to the showrunners for his him. And then he has an almost exact goodbye with Molly as he did with his own children before leaving to go to Earth and they exchange gifts. (*full-on sobbing*).
- This was the most subtle love story ever, with their first kiss coming in the last 5 minutes of the show, right before he leaves for another world. The proverbial “shipping off” kiss, one to remember me by.
________________________
Both:
It was wrapped up very very well for a 10-episode mini-series. All of the questions are answered and the story closes while leaving room for inference – but it could have been left open in a couple of different ways just in case the show was even a little bit of a hit
1. He def could come back with his family and the Antheans – but there’s some sort of problem.
2. The ending song is just blasting the words in 5 years over and over at us…. I have a feeling this story is going to pick back up 5 years in the future, possibly on Anthea, how he convinces people to change in order to adapt better to Earth and Humans.
3. The seeds that Molly and Justin plant from Faraday. By the time he does come back to Earth, it could be the 8 or 10 years in the future could be a 3rd season (or the 5 but that seems pretty fast to me idk) The plants could be a major call back to the first season when they get here and it’s spread everywhere, creating a more comforting sight for them, a more pleasing atmosphere.
