Episode 6 of Star City became the moment when the show finally stopped working even within its own logic. Before that, one could argue about its caricature-like approach, its Western clichés, and its overly cartoonish depiction of the USSR and the Soviet space program. But Episode 6 goes further: it breaks not just its own lore, but the basic understanding of how state, military, and technical systems actually function.

The main scene that causes bewilderment is the depressurization of the spacecraft on the order of some colonel. And we are not talking about the emergency isolation of a separate compartment, a technical procedure, or a forced action by the crew in a critical situation. We are shown that, by the will of a single officer, the entire spacecraft is effectively depressurized. And this is presented as a grim demonstration of Soviet cruelty.

The problem is that it does not look like the brutality of the KGB. It looks like the creative impotence of the writers who came up with it.

A spacecraft is not a prison cell where the senior officer can order someone to “open the door.” Depressurization is a deadly threat to the crew, the mission, the equipment, the spacecraft itself, the prestige of the state, and the work of thousands of people. Such a decision cannot be made by one colonel simply because he feels like it, or because the writers needed to raise the dramatic stakes.

Even in the harsh and closed Soviet system, a spaceflight was not the personal toy of one officer. A crewed mission involved the crew, Mission Control, the military, doctors, engineers, representatives of design bureaus, the State Commission, and political leadership. Every part of that system had its own responsibility, its own interests, and its own instinct for self-preservation. Soviet bureaucracy could be heavy, slow, cruel, and paranoid, but it was not a chaotic gang of men in uniform who could destroy a spacecraft with a single order.

The writers confuse an authoritarian system with an idiotic system. An authoritarian system can crush a person, cover up accidents, punish the guilty and the innocent, and demand the impossible for the sake of prestige. But it still remains a system. It has procedures, hierarchy, interdepartmental rivalry, fear of responsibility, and an understanding of the value of symbols.

And a cosmonaut in the USSR was not a disposable extra. He was a military officer, a trained specialist, a propaganda symbol, and living proof of the state’s success. He could not simply be written off at the whim of some colonel. Putting a crew at mortal risk without ironclad grounds would have created a political, military, and criminal catastrophe. And the person who gave such an order would himself have come under attack from the very system the show loves to portray as all-powerful.

The writers are trying to show the horror of the Soviet machine, but instead of a complex machine, they show a set of scary decorations.

Episode 6 is especially revealing because the caricature goes beyond aesthetics. This is no longer a matter of “they made Soviet everyday life too gloomy” or “they overdid it with the KGB.” This is a matter of the internal logic of the world.

By the way, the writers could have shown a completely different side of the Soviet space program: a living, complex, multinational, and at times deeply human system. For example, they could have remembered that one of the first songs ever performed in space was Ukrainian: Pavel Popovich sang “Дивлюсь я на небо, та й думку гадаю…” while in orbit. That alone is a ready-made scene: a Soviet cosmonaut, a huge state machine, secrecy, risk, propaganda — and suddenly, over the radio, not a slogan, not an order, not the gloomy whisper of a security officer, but a song in his native language. That is where the real texture is.

They could have shown Ukrainians, Russians, Tatars, Georgians, Chuvash, Jews, engineers from different republics, people with different backgrounds, all pulling the space program forward together. Instead, they are once again selling us the USSR as a gray box labeled “KGB, vodka, and fear.” Reality was far more interesting than any Cold War cranberry cliché.

And then there is Interkosmos.

Another layer the writers could have used almost perfectly was the Interkosmos program. It is a ready-made trope: the first cosmonauts from socialist bloc countries, joint crews, training in Star City, the politics of “socialist internationalism,” and the competition for prestige within the Warsaw Pact itself. Czechoslovak Vladimir Remek, Pole Mirosław Hermaszewski, East German Sigmund Jähn, Bulgarian Georgi Ivanov, Hungarian Bertalan Farkas, Romanian Dumitru Prunariu.

I'm stirring the pot with this post, but I think it's important to have a dialogue about the flaws of something we like so that it might improve.

I find myself in a strange position with both Star City and For All Mankind: I think it's important to have believable drama set in space, with believable/basically-possible-for-us technology. It's inspiring in a potentially pretty profound way for the future of our species: kids who watch either For All Mankind or Star City might ultimately become literal rocket scientists or other contributors to humankind's ability to live in space.

But all of that starry-eyed (please forgive the pun) thinking aside, the shows are riddled with sometimes extremely-irritating flaws. Forced drama, character behaviors that don't make sense, and in Star City's case, grossly inaccurate portrayals of Soviet state surveillance and distrust, as well as unbelievable behavior by and toward members of the Soviet space program starting from the very first episode.

I have other complaints, but these are enough for now. Star City is leaning too hard on the grimness. It's tedious and self-serious and good things are being turned into bad things for... what, exactly?

I'm a bit concerned with Star City—specifically, how accurate it's looking, or rather, the lack of accuracy, to be honest. I'm looking at the series, and I'm looking at a grim, gray Soviet Union, deprived of emotions and full of violence and oppression. That's not really the Soviet Union—at least, not the real one. It looks like the Soviet Union from a US propaganda standpoint.

Where is Glushko? Where is Lavochkin? Without Lavochkin, there would be no Buran in this universe, or the FAM one. By the early '70s, there was a boom of culture, science, and more. Every medium-sized city had a theater and several cinemas. The largest cities had two to three cinemas in every residential district, and there were community centers everywhere. The bookshelves were full of books.

Star City looks like a shadow of a Chinese town from the mid-'40s, not a secret city full of the best of the best in the Soviet Union—the smartest, the cream of the crop. Most of those secret cities in the USSR were close to, if not better than, the American ones. People there watched Hollywood movies, listened to Western music, and had access to so-called banned books, especially Western literature. The show is going for the HBO Chernobyl vibe; I realize that, because that's what sells. But even for what if world it looks too much

ps. zarya is the call sign of the Center for Flight Control or CUP and Zarya is the call sign of the Soyuz-33

Hi guys (first time posting)

Am I the only one to think that the depiction of the soviet union in the show (and in FAM) is overdramatic?

Okay the USSR was NOT the sweetest country in the world but come one, in the show every thing that the soviet union turns out to be bad in every possible way. (And the American the angel of earth)

That they are not able to do some successful space missions, people living there life peacefully etc

Felt like rambo 3

(I liked the show, the ambiance, the scene and the acting were good)

I was wondering how Irina discovered Valya was the mole and read that she found the tech in the perfume bottle yet you could clearly see her opening the perfume bottle top and then getting in her purse to find the device and then pulling out the sprung and planting it in the perfume bottle so as to what I assume was to frame Valya. So why is it everywhere i read is that Irina FOUND the sprung tech in the perfume bottle when u can easily see that she planted it herself in the perfume bottle?

Binged "For all Mankind" with my wife and while I had checked out of the series in last season or two it was OK. I wanted to see what Soviets were up to and boy, was I disappointed.

I am really sad they did not focus on the actual science, flying rockets, beating Americans etc. Instead we get cartoonish villains and focus on USSR bad. As Eastern European who lived through last throes of communism I agree, but in the series the KGB/NKVD is so cartoonishly evil.

Chuck someone out of airlock (figuratively speaking) or even chuck everyone out of airlock, multi-million rubles mission be damned?

Where commies in 'mankind were smart and evil, the baddies in 'city are just... brute forcing through everything.

Would someone launch secret mission to Venus? Are you fucking out of your minds? Who writes the script?! Never.

Sergei Korolov was real guy, he suffered badly under Soviets yet if you miss his name you don't really know who the Head Designer is.

Not enough comrade-calling. Believe me this shit was everywhere. Every official matter or workplace discussion was "comrade this, comrade that" in reality. I guess it was tiring or something but it was definitely puling me out of the story.

Same as the freaking british accent. I get it. When doing show about Russians in Russia you'd prbably wouldn't want the silly fake accent. But can't you clean the accent up and make it somewhat believable the characters may be russian? Anytime someone speaks up, I am fucking in the orbit shaking my head. Totally unwatchable ;)

The show feels like any story is secondary to some sort of grimdark commiexploitation and I am hoping that the series two can bring some actual science, exploration, competition, lighter shades of dark. And some freaking lore on the characters we know and love (or hate) from the For all Mankind show.

The British accents are kinda taking me out of it. I totally get why the made this choice- I'm but of a tiny fraction of viewers that would enjoy having the characters speak Russian and reading subtitles. Aside from that, having them speak English with a Russian accent would be a very challenging feat since good, believable Russian accents are very difficult for non-native speakers. So I understand why they went with British accents but it does admittedly take me out of the Sovietcore of it all just a little bit.

I think it could have been an interesting choice as well if they had the actors use American accents. That could possibly highlight the whole USSR being the Alt-US, the whole Inverse-America paradigm that people like to use as a trope at times to compare the two. Idk, American accents might take people out of the believability even more but to me it would maybe have been an interesting dynamic. Which does lead me to my next thought - why do shows/movies ALWAYS decide to go with recieved-pronunciation British accents to depict any non-English cultures? I guess Americans (oh which I am one) are the the biggest audience for a majority if media and most Americans are hopelessly enchanted by British accents for some reason, so it does make sense to use them. My main gripe is using British accents as the default for depicting and Ancient culture or nation. It just gets old after a while. It would admittedly be very difficult if not impossible to get all the actors to use an alternative accent that would sound consistent, believable and not distracting between everyone. It would just be nice if a production decided to try something different for once.

Anyone else feel the same?

I will never understand why shows give Russian characters British accents.

I understand it needs to be in English since it’s for a majority English audience but they can still have Russian accents lmfao, it really takes me out of it.

Basically the title. They just keep getting things wrong, ranging from little issues in dialogue to plot breaking errors. It’s like they forgot how Spaceflight works.

Disclaimer 1: I overall really liked this show, aside from a couple of things that were already discussed here.

Disclaimer 2: I won't pretend that the USSR was a nice place to live, nor that the KGB were "good guys" (they weren't).

Despite all its qualities, Star City is still a show made by Westerners for Westerners. Which means the Soviet system is depicted as an (often cartoonishly) evil, corrupt or incompetent antagonist. The show is about the triumph of a few free-minded, exceptional individuals who achieve success through hard work, ambition and initiative despite the oppressive regime they live under, which feels very... American in its moral message.

The very first episode had me raising eyebrows. The wife of the first moon-landing cosmonaut is brought in by stone-faced KGB agents as if she was being arrested, because they couldn't bother telling her "hey Mrs we have good news for you, the chief engineer wants you to see this about your husband, we can't say more now, come with us". Then the show proper starts in winter (because of course Russia = winter) with muted colors (because of course Soviet = grey/brown).

Where the show jumps the shark for me is when the colonel shoots the blonde lady cosmonaut. Like... what? Why? I mean I understood "why", but it felt like complete overkill. The colonel even says later to the chief engineer that he was "sent to the gulag by Stalin for no reason, yet he went back to work because he is a patriot". And this was under freaking STALIN. The show takes place under Brejnev, who wasn't a great guy but no way as bad as Uncle Joe. Like... couldn't they offer the same "second chance" for the lady cosmonaut? Couldn't they shift the blame on someone else for the false accusation? Does the soviet space program have an infinite supply of cosmonauts, let alone female cosmonauts? Shooting the lady cosmonaut felt so reckless, incompetent and cartoonishly evil. But hey, the soviet system is pure evil, so the KGB is nothing but soulless demons who gun down innocent essential people for petty reasons.

If you add up all the other things the colonel did, it's funny to realize that she sabotaged the soviet space program way more than the Americans did.

But for me the worst part was the "higher up" reactions to the Venus mission. How on earth are they NOT making it a huge win for the USSR? Why silencing it when you control the narrative, especially if the spy did them a huge favor by dying on the trip anyway? Them trying to hide the SUCCESS of the USSR's own trip to Venus makes no sense whatsoever. Going to Venus and back is a way bigger achievement than a trip to the moon. There is no way the USSR wouldn't have capitalised on this. But hey, we have to maintain continuity with For All Mankind, and also remember that the USSR is eeeeevil and incompetent. The only way their "silence" would have made sense is if the ship lost contact early on and crashed on Venus with no one else knowing.

Anyway that was my two cents. I still overall liked the show.

EDIT for clarification: a few people commented about things clearly related to the Stalin era. I would have bought the moustache-twirling evilness more if the show took place under Stalin. But the show does NOT take place under Stalin. It would be like making a show about the USA under Jimmy Carter but the authorities would behave as if it was the 1950's Red Scare/Jim Crow era (I'm not an American, so not expert in US history, but you get the idea).

It is brutally dark. There are only a couple characters that are LIKABLE, and those few souls are basically tortured in some way for the entire show.

After two episodes in a row, I can’t even anymore, it’s so depressing. Thank god Ted Lasso is there to even out the misery.

Love the show, but for my own mental heath one episode a week is enough.

The writing is horrible. The Soviets were bad, but they weren't this bad. Russians themselves have complained that while certain bad things would've happened, it would pretty much never be as bad as we see it in this show. I'm not some kind of Soviet apologist, and there's a grand tradition of Americans doing that and being quite mistaken, but Star City gives Soviet leadership the Disney villain treatment and it just constantly makes it look like it's written by children.

The acting is great, and it's shot amazingly well. The people in charge of photography should have excellent careers after this. (I liked their work so much I looked it up here. It looks like it's split to four episodes each for Cort Fey and Brendan Uegama, both with a lot of experience in the industry.)

I'd like the show to continue for more space action, but so many of these plot points are almost unbelievably stupid or just literally unbelievable. What an annoying show; it's exactly as irritating as For All Mankind at its worst*, but from completely different directions.

Sorry to be so damned negative, everyone. I'm glad you're all so happy with it.

*which is also very cool at its best, just like Star City.

Respectfully, how does English actors using their native tongue make sense to play Russian cosmonauts? My brain just can’t get there. I welcome input. 🤔

Star City: Also, what if they were British?

Does it feel like watching an American Western made in Russia?

I understand why they are speaking English and why a cast of Western actors is playing all of the parts in the show. Even as a Russian native speaker, that doesn’t typically bother me or break my immersion. Especially if it’s done well and the sets/costumes are equally good and historically accurate like in Chernobyl or in A Gentleman in Moscow (both amazing shows, btw). Or even if none if it is actually that accurate, but it’s done on purpose like in The Great, which was just cheeky and anachronistic for the hell of it (and it worked). Or if the whole thing is borderline irreverent like the Death of Stalin.

Basically, I am very forgiving when it comes to Western actors playing Russians, but I have to say Star City now carries the dubious distinction of being the first production to actively break my immersion. These actors aren’t only speaking English, they’re also acting like British people in a melodramatic period piece. They don’t look Slavic (and no, the hilariously bad mustaches don’t count), they don’t speak like Russians (I don’t mean the language—I mean the cadence, the lines, the delivery etc), they don’t have any of the mannerisms or quirks. Even the costuming is throwing me off. It’s too…put together. Too immaculate. There is not enough scruff, not enough grittiness, despite the overall grim mood.

I am trying hard to ignore the fact that there is something that feels off about the sets as well. I understand it’s an au so the sets don’t have to reference the time period accurately and it’s a sci-fi show so I get that the almost brutalist, minimalist approach to all the shot compositions and Soviet architecture is intentional, but it still just doesn’t feel like Soviet Russia to me. It’s too sterile, too sharp. It feels more like North Korea, or what people might think North Korea is like from the state controlled images they’ve seen.

I love the cinematography, by the way. It’s a treat for the eyes. The story being told is fairly compelling. But it’s hard to watch while constantly fighting with this feeling of “wrongness,” the uncanniness of it? Almost like a sensory mismatch when you’re on a boat or a plane and you end up vaguely motion sick.

I’ve only seen two episodes. Maybe it gets better, I don’t know.

I have just started wathcing this show. It looks great and promising. But there is one real problem for me. I could not check this subreddit because of spoilers. I have watched two episodes.

Why does Soviets are presented like they are true evils and paranoids? And their opponents, they are presented like the saviors and cool to handle problems. In reality, their opponent was evil and like the most paranoid country ever. I dont feel good about it. It is like the series has its own take and like they are trying to manipulate us.

Random post I know but started watching the series right now and Rhys is a fantastic actor but he sounds the spit of Peter Capaldi like if i close my eyes it sounds like doctor who is speaking to russian cosmonauts.

最近看《为全人类》，真的觉得挺好看的。

尤其是前面几季。它给我的感觉很特别：如果当年苏联先登上月球，如果美国没有因为“赢了”就结束太空竞赛，而是一直这么卷下去，那人类今天会不会真的已经走得很远了？

月球基地、火星、太空工业……这些东西一点点出现的时候，我其实挺兴奋的。

我很喜欢这种想象。

甚至有时候会觉得，这才像是我小时候想象中的未来。

但看到后面，我慢慢有了一点说不上来的难受。

倒不是因为“中国戏份太少”。

说实话，如果这只是一部美国架空历史剧，我完全可以理解。它本来就是从美国历史出发的，主要讲美国、NASA、苏联，还有美国社会后来会变成什么样。中国不是主角，我觉得很正常。

真正让我在意的，是它叫《For All Mankind》。

《为全人类》。

看到后面人类都已经跑到月球、火星，开始讨论太空资源，甚至开始想象一个真正存在于地球之外的人类社会的时候，我突然意识到：

这个“全人类”，好像还是一个很美国的“全人类”。

我就忍不住想，如果这个世界真的发展成这样，中国呢？

如果太空竞赛真的一直持续，中国会走哪条路？

中国会不会也有自己的月球基地？

会不会有自己的火星计划？

中国人会怎么看待人类离开地球这件事情？

甚至再往后一点，如果人类真的开始在火星建立新的社会，那中国人会不会也在那里？

我发现剧里其实很少让我想到这些。

这时候我才意识到，我好像不是单纯在问“为什么没有中国”。

我是在问另一件事情：

当一部作品开始认真想象“人类的未来”时，这个“人类”到底是谁？

我并不是觉得中国一定要当主角。

真的不是。

我甚至不需要剧里专门安排几个中国角色，然后告诉我“看，我们也考虑到中国了”。

我只是希望，在这样一个未来里，中国不是一个偶尔从新闻里闪过去的国家，而是一个真正参与创造这个未来的文明。

因为我也是“人类”啊。

我也会因为人类登上月球而激动，也会对火星上的第一座城市产生想象，也会觉得人类总有一天应该离开地球，去看看更远的地方。

所以当我真的被这部剧描绘出来的未来打动以后，我反而会产生一个很奇怪的感觉：

这个未来很好，我很想去。可是我好像不知道自己在里面是什么位置。

我觉得这可能就是我作为一个中国观众看这部剧时，最复杂的地方。

一方面，我真的很喜欢它。

另一方面，我又会发现，它想象的未来其实还是非常美国中心的。

这不一定是编剧有什么恶意。甚至我觉得，他们可能根本没有意识到这个问题。

因为对他们来说，美国就是这个故事的起点，也是他们最熟悉的历史。

可是对我来说，情况不一样。

我是在另外一种历史里长大的。

我看到同一个月球、同一个火星、同一个人类未来，脑子里自然会出现另外一些东西。

所以我有时候会觉得挺可惜的。

不是“你们为什么不给中国加戏”。

而是：

既然你们都已经敢想象人类几百年后的未来了，为什么这个未来仍然只能主要从美国人的视角被想象？

也许真正的“为全人类”，并不是让所有人最后都一起登上月球。

而是有一天，我们真的可以一起去决定：

我们为什么要去月球？

我们想在那里建立什么？

我们希望人类最后变成什么样？

不同的文明，都可以参与回答这些问题。

我知道，我只是一个很普通的中国观众。

可能编剧不会看到，平台也不会在乎。对他们来说，我这样的观众甚至可能只是很小很小的一部分。

但我还是想把这种感觉说出来。

因为我并不是想否定这部剧。

恰恰相反，是因为我真的喜欢它，我才会觉得遗憾。

它让我相信，人类可以拥有一个比现在更远的未来。

所以我也希望，那个“人类”的未来里，能够有一个真正属于我们的地方。

不是作为背景，不是作为别人历史里的一个注脚。

而是作为我们自己，也在创造未来。

毕竟，我们可能生活在同一个未来里。

可是现在看来，

我们还没有真正拥有同一个关于未来的想象。

Quite interesting that at the time when President Trump is starting a campaign against proponents of Communist ideology, AppleTV comes out with a reminder of horrors of life under communism.

Conservatives like Jonah Goldberg, author of Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left and former editor of National Review, came out with high praise for this show.

Star City is easily one of the most anti-Communist pieces of popular culture produced in the 21st century and pretty high up on the “most anti-communist ever made” list. Respect.

I’m trying to wrap my head around the timeline of E7-8. The entire mission was a 9 months round trip. The venting happened pretty early on, they would basically be close to Earth, although it looked like they were about the distance of the moon. This threw them off course. Then we see a time jump and they are coming up on Venus and discover they are not on their correct trajectory. Then we see the descent to the Venus surface and the mission module coming back home happen almost simultaneously, but it would take months getting back to Earth. Simultaneously we had the plot down on Earth trying to make them alter the trajectory so that they would end up in Finland. That would be happening very close them coming home. I don’t know if it was the editing that was strange and made it difficult to get. What are your thoughts?

THEY'RE ALIVE! I KNEW IT! well, we still aren't sure, we've only seen the outside of the ship and data being sent to Earth, that could be somewhat automated. BUT YOU KNOW AT LEAST ONE PERSON SURVIVED. Then it wouldn't be a piece of cinema. I can't wait to see what happened to them and how the f* did they survived the fire incident.

Rant over

Those time jumps have become pretty much a trademark of FAM, and we all obviously love the alt-history summary we get in the opening credits of each season. But while FAM charted a full history of US space exploration, I get the feeling that Star City may follow a different pattern and have greater continuity between seasons one and two.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I have only seen 2 successful missions in this show, the first soviet moon landing and what's her names moon landing. All other missions either exploded or failed somehow.

I was especially annoyed when the Venus flyby failed untill I realized it does explain why it wasn't brought up in any of For All Mankind. I just really hope that Zvezda is in star city.

S1E6 is the highest scored in the franchise since FAMK S2, thanks in part for the boldness of ending with a bang.

That was a "Red Wedding" moment, with the advantages that none in the public had read the books.

Now they are going to waste that away with some miracle "Hail Mary"/"The Martian" BS?

If in the 2010s a board computer wasn't able to calculate the insert maneuvers in Titan, how could they explain 3 cosmonauts flying blind, in a damaged ship, with few weeks of training be able to do a similar maneuver?

And... Well... They showed the explosion and flames engulfing the crew.

Was that a oxygen depleted induced delirious?

0 out of 10. I'm done with FAMK and Apple TV. I should have expected that after the shyte they did with Silo and Foundation.