Starting watching Another Life on Netflix - wow, can they hit any more cliches? SPOILERS

[Hussar]

New SF show from Netflix. Another Life. Pretty standard alien invasion fare. But, holy crap, could they have hit any more SF cliche's any harder? I want to like the show, but, good grief, the first three episodes featured EVERY SINGLE stupid cliche from SF. Let's see, we've got the second in command who's a hothead, who then mutinies in the first episode over blindingly stupid stuff. Then we have the science nerds who decide to take off their visors in the alien environment to get infected. We've got the smart science guy playing music to the aliens to communicate. On and on and on.

The premise of the show isn't bad, but, the writing is just freaking atrocious. Mind buggeringly bad. Three episodes in and I'm pretty much done. This is actually worse than Nightflyers and that was garbage.

Good grief, there are some really excellent SF shows on right now. Why on earth would anyone look at this and go, "Yeah, let's rehash the same tired old cliches of the past fifty years. That'll be GREAT!" Grrrr.

 

[Zardnaar]

That the one with Katie Sackhoff?
I think it's on my watch list but watching a different show atm.

 

[Ryujin]

I'm halfway through it. The effects are good. The sets are convincing. They picked good actors. That said, it reminds me very much of "Fear the Walking Dead", in that I just want to cuff every one of the characters on the back of the head for making stupid decisions. It also reminds me of ST:Voyager season 1 in that if I was in command, I'd have spaced the entire crew by now. I agree that it's very meme heavy; lots of SF tropes.

 

[Hussar]

I'm halfway through it. The effects are good. The sets are convincing. They picked good actors. That said, it reminds me very much of "Fear the Walking Dead", in that I just want to cuff every one of the characters on the back of the head for making stupid decisions. It also reminds me of ST:Voyager season 1 in that if I was in command, I'd have spaced the entire crew by now. I agree that it's very meme heavy; lots of SF tropes.

Yes, yes. That's it exactly. I have no problems with not really diving into the deep end of the pool for my SF. That's fine. I'm not particularly picky. But, that feeling of wanting to just smack the crap out of the characters for being blindingly stupid just makes me not enjoy the show.

I mean, take the mutiny. It makes zero sense. Hrm, the captain wants to take a detour that will add a few months onto the trip. Six months IIRC. But, there's no reason for them to hurry - the aliens have been on Earth for months and have done nothing. It's not like they're on the clock here. So, the 2IC mutinies, because, yeah, it's believable that the guy they picked for this ultra important mission is that mind bogglingly stupid and unstable. And, then, to top it off, the rest of the crew goes along with it because... reasons? Hrm, yeah, I want to go to prison (if not be executed) for mutiny because I don't want to add six months onto the trip? Seriously?

It's almost insulting that the writers want us to believe this.

 

[Ryujin]

Yes, yes. That's it exactly. I have no problems with not really diving into the deep end of the pool for my SF. That's fine. I'm not particularly picky. But, that feeling of wanting to just smack the crap out of the characters for being blindingly stupid just makes me not enjoy the show.

I mean, take the mutiny. It makes zero sense. Hrm, the captain wants to take a detour that will add a few months onto the trip. Six months IIRC. But, there's no reason for them to hurry - the aliens have been on Earth for months and have done nothing. It's not like they're on the clock here. So, the 2IC mutinies, because, yeah, it's believable that the guy they picked for this ultra important mission is that mind bogglingly stupid and unstable. And, then, to top it off, the rest of the crew goes along with it because... reasons? Hrm, yeah, I want to go to prison (if not be executed) for mutiny because I don't want to add six months onto the trip? Seriously?

It's almost insulting that the writers want us to believe this.

Hugely foreshadowed before they even got to the ship. Now, add to that the fact that they only had one ship capable of this mission, as stated early in episode 1, and the current commander of that ship was a hot-headed whack job? It doesn't sound like that means they only have access to one FTL capable ship, but perhaps only one long range FTL ship...?

The premise drew me in and I like Sakhoff as an actress (still think she should have been Captain Marvel, though Larson did fine), but now I'm watching to see if the train wreck I'm predicting after the events of episode 5 actually comes to pass.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Not watching the show myself, but thinking that show’s plot as described this is not reality, but instead an illusion created by a despair squid...

 

[Istbor]

Not watching the show myself, but thinking that show’s plot as described this is not reality, but instead an illusion created by a despair squid...

I wasn't going to post but you invoked Red Dwarf and I must commend you sir!

 

[practicalm]

Yeah, my wife made me stop watching after the first episode (at least I cannot watch it around her) because the writing is just so terrible.
Bad science where you have a ship capable of 96 LYs in 3 months but somehow needs gravity assist? (Don't even get me started on the dark matter cloud.)
Another one of those we have instantaneous communication from LYs away. Why isn't all of earth trying to figure out what the ship needs to do?
The mutiny was terribly cringeworthy.

Good to hear it doesn't get better so I can spend more time watching something else.

 

[MarkB]

Yeah, my wife made me stop watching after the first episode (at least I cannot watch it around her) because the writing is just so terrible.
Bad science where you have a ship capable of 96 LYs in 3 months but somehow needs gravity assist? (Don't even get me started on the dark matter cloud.)

It's not even a gravity assist. They didn't come into the system with a huge velocity, and then use the star to change course - they literally parked next to the star while they figured out what to do, then orbited it a couple of times, then parked next to it again while they argued and mutinied.

Another one of those we have instantaneous communication from LYs away. Why isn't all of earth trying to figure out what the ship needs to do?
The mutiny was terribly cringeworthy.

Good to hear it doesn't get better so I can spend more time watching something else.

Yeah, after watching the first episode that's pretty much the position I'm in too. Glad to know there's no point in spending more time on it in hopes of improvements.

 

[Mercurius]

I just finished binge watching the whole damn season. I concur with the terrible writing and glaring technical inconsistencies (e.g. instantaneous communication at light years away, with crystal clear holograms, or FTL and other advanced technologies but basically 21st century medical level).

There are some interesting ideas, and I wanted to see what happened enough to watch the whole season. It was very much an experience of "genre tolerance" - I really like alien invasion and space travel, but there's not enough (good) options out there so I'm more tolerant of it than, say, a family pathos drama, of which there are tons of options.

Perhaps the biggest annoyance for me was the emotional immaturity and stupidity of people, especially the crew. I mean, this is a crew that it is on the most important mission in human history and they're all basically of the emotional maturity level of the cast of 90210.

That said, I will watch season 2 if it comes out because I want to see how it develops. But given the terrible reviews I doubt it gets renewed.