For All Mankind Review: And Here’s To You (Season 2 Episode 8)
To be fair, For All Mankind Season 2 Episode 8, “And Here’s To You,” telegraphs its absolute worst moment the minute you see the episode title, but that somehow doesn’t manage to lessen the truly disturbing scene in which Karen Baldwin makes a deliberate choice to sleep with Danny, who is not only half her age (which I don’t judge) but was once a child she saw in diapers.
Excuse me while I go vomit forever. Yuck.
Thankfully, the show also has Karen realize what a huge mistake she made fairly immediately — as soon as Danny starts talking about being in love and finding a place together (Y i k e s!!) — but it doesn’t make it all any less horrifying.
I wish that For All Mankind was doing a better job explaining what Karen’s arc is meant to be this season. Is she unhappy? Clearly. Is she tired of being an astronaut’s wife? Probably. Is she trying to find something of her own now that she’s pushed Ed back to active duty space missions? I guess?
Karen has always been a difficult character to really know or like, but this is…whew. It’s not clear what’s going on with her story at the moment, but I feel confident in saying that she deserves better.
Elsewhere, Gordo finally makes it back to space, ten years after his Jamestown mission and the breakdown that grounded him for a decade and derailed Dani’s career. It’s a surprisingly moving moment, and I say that as someone who’s hasn’t really enjoyed Gordo much this season. (He’s basically a poster child for the way that men are consistently allowed to fail upward, IMO.)
Yet, it’s all great, from the (perfect) use of AC/DC’s “Back and Black” as Gordo reenters Jamestown to the way he can’t seem to stop comparing the new, more expansive base to the one he remembered.
Even his reunion with Tracy is surprisingly awesome. Their relationship has generally been the definition of messy over the course of this series, but their conversation over a hidden joint in what is essentially a space station closet is a reminder of the ways they’re good together.
Granted, I don’t know if that’s the same thing as hoping they get back together — but suddenly I’m not as averse to it as I once was. (That’s not the same thing as being a good idea, but it might be a narratively interesting one.)
The end of the hour finally kicks off the international incident that For All Mankind has basically been promising all season, as the Americans gun down two Russian cosmonauts who approach the mining camp.
(The image of those poor men burning alive in their suits is going to stay with me for a while, just saying.)
It’s likely we’ll have a lot of conversation in the season’s final episodes about the shoot first ask questions later the U.S. soldiers adopt here — particularly if it gets out that the Russians were coming in peace, as it certainly appears that they were.
(Suddenly guns on the moon look terrible for everyone, don’t they?)
To be fair, my objection to militarizing the space race isn’t necessarily about firearms (that’s a debate for another day!). It’s more about the fact that going to the moon and beyond, in my opinion, is about discovery, not conquest. Exploration, rather than dominance.
Maybe this a pollyannaish viewpoint, but watching two countries fight over who gets to strip mine resources from the lunar surface isn’t how I like to think of mankind journeying to the stars, even if it’s probably a likely eventuality, if that makes sense?
But, regardless, I’m really looking forward to seeing what the fallout from all this looks like — for the Jamestown astronauts, for Ellen, who pushed so hard for militarization — next week.
Stray Thoughts and Observations
- This is probably For All Mankind’s best-paced hour of the season — almost nothing dragged. (Except for the subplot with Aleida, but I truly don’t understand the purpose of making her part of this season, so that’s not super shocking to me.)
- After a half dozen episodes we finally see the real fallout from Molly’s decision to rescue Wubbo in the season premiere. She’s going blind from a specific breed of glaucoma caused by radiation exposure. What a terrible diagnosis for anyone, but most especially for her, a woman who has dedicated her life to the sort of thrillseeking adventure that definitely requires her to be sighted.
- Ellen is never ever going to give up the job as the head of NASA for Pam, and it kind of breaks my heart that she’s not being honest about it? (Or rather, Ronald Reagan is never going to let her be the head of NASA and also be an out gay woman, and Ellen’s too savvy not to realize that.) I’m honestly kind of nervous about how this inevitable break-up is going to go down.
- Truly, I ship Margo and Sergei so much. They’re adorable. Also, Margo deserves something like happiness so I’m all for this.
What did you think of this episode of For All Mankind? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Lacy Baugher
Lacy is a pop culture enthusiast and television critic who loves period dramas, epic fantasy, space adventures, and the female characters everyone says you're supposed to hate. Ninth Doctor enthusiast, Aziraphale girlie, and cat lady, she's a member of the Television Critics Association and Rotten Tomatoes-approved. Find her at LacyMB on all platforms.
6 comments
I actually don’t mind as much Karen sleeping with Danny. We are all human beings with different needs. As some other article pointed out, when Gordo was sleeping with other woman sympathy for the character didn’t go away that quick. Don’t mind much Karen doing this, as long as they show the dilemmas, constraints such a relationship would entail. Which they seem they are.
There’s a difference with Gordo sleeping with other women and then Karen sleeping with essentially her surrogate son. Remember that Gordo, Tracy, and Ed were all away for extended periods of time leaving Karen as the only one to take care of both her children and the Stevens. To sleep with Danny is extremely perverse and basically ignores that entire period where she saw him as son like figure.
Dr. Freud would have a field day with this. Funny, Ed and Gordo mention that to Danny about how all the shrinks say “you’re in love with your mom or in love with your dad.”
This is a messy situation that adds a lot of unnecessary drama to this show that has done an incredibly bad job of making us care what the heck Karen’s arc is supposed to be. This was not the direction her character seemed to go and now that it is, we’re stuck with the gross situation affecting later episodes. It just sucks, man.
Gordo and Tracy were sharing a cigarette, not a joint.
Men are constantly failing upwards, thats why they are by far more likely to be homeless, die by suicide and are constantly valued only by their success and wealth. Gordo is feeling useless. He didnt fail, he broke under extreme pressure. You know who else did? Karen. She is the perfect example of a woman throwing everything awy and blaming it on her husband not being around after sending him away.
“(He’s basically a poster child for the way that men are consistently allowed to fail upward, IMO.)”
And Karen is the poster child for how a woman can engage in behavior that would get any guy treated like a child predator and it’s OK. She’s just going through some things. Imagine if a guy had had sex with the 20 year old daughter (who he used to care for as a child) of his wife’s best friend. He’d be a complete piece of crap to everyone. But with Karen we’re supposed to be understanding since she’s just trying to find happiness.
I really enjoyed the aliadas story…. It would be kind of dumb to not included in this season as it was somewhat of a mystery ending on the first one….
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