For All Mankind Review: Game Changer (Season 3 Episode 2)

Things get tense in For All Mankind Season 3 Episode 2, “Game Changer,” as NASA makes a decision about who will lead them to Mars and an unexpected third party jumps into the space race.

In an interesting twist, Karen Baldwin is saved from financial ruin in the wake of the Polaris hotel disaster by an unexpected offer from tech mogul Dev Ayesa. Clearly this reality’s version of Elon Musk, he runs an independent aerospace company known as Helios and wants to buy Karen’s ship in the hopes that he can use his fancy new engines to them and beat both NASA and the Soviets to Mars. 

(He even has a snazzy speech about how an independent party colonizing Mars will somehow bring the world together in its wake because space exploration shouldn’t be about international competition. I mean, I guess?)

Meanwhile, back at NASA, Molly decides to do an end-run around Margo’s personal preferences and just announces that Ed’s the pick to lead the Mars mission. She tells him this news in front of the class he’s teaching and announces it throughout the building, a move that’s basically banking on the idea that if enough people think it’s true, Margo won’t be able (or have the will to stop it.)

But for maybe the first time, Molly is very wrong. Margo not only rescinds Ed’s offer of command, but she also fires Molly too, and decides that Danielle Poole will lead the mission instead. Everything is a complete mess, and Ed’s humiliated and furious. (Which, to be fair, he probably has a right to be.)

It’s hard watching all these characters who have known one another for so long be at each other’s throats this way, particularly when everyone kind of has a valid point. In Deke’s NASA, Ed would have been the pick no question, but it’s Margo’s time now and she’s interested in promoting different skillsets (and a different kind of optics, although I think she would probably rather be hit by a bus than admit that.) And Dani is also incredibly qualified and has more than earned this show. 

Tough Dani manages to be the bigger person when she thinks Ed has gotten the nod over her, he is incapable of doing the same, and essentially calls her an affirmative action hire to her face. Granted, he is quite drunk, but given that he knows how good she is, how capable she is, it’s doubly insulting. (And Dani has every right to be pissed.)

I mean, my heart’s not made of stone—I actually feel really bad for Ed here. Yes, he’s handling the loss of his dream terribly, but none of this is his fault, and he had no reason not to believe that his being offered the position wasn’t legitimate. 

After being the guy who’s remembered for not landing on the moon first, losing the shot to be the first man on Mars has to sting. (Also Margo’s people skills have possibly gotten worse in the decade since Season 2.)

Speaking of terrible people skills, “Game Changer” also sees us check in on Ellen for the first time this season, who’s running for president against Bill Clinton and shopping for a potential VP to join her ticket. You know how sometimes you can feel like you’re watching a car accident in slow motion while it’s happening? That’s how everything about this subplot feels, as Ellen finds herself getting talked into picking someone almost solely for their appeal to the GOP’s hardcore evangelical base.

You know, precisely the kind of person that’s going to definitely react very badly if and when they find out that Ellen is gay. And this is so obviously where this story is going that it’s already making me anxious.

I can’t decide if I think For All Mankind would actually let Ellen win. I don’t think so (I mean I just can’t see America electing a woman in the 1990s in any reality) but I’m admittedly intrigued by the idea that they might.

Rarely does an episode of For All Mankind telegraph its plot twists quite as clearly as “Game Changer” does but it’s apparent from the minute Ed gets fired that he’s going to end up working for Helios in the hopes that he can still, somehow, get to Mars.

That said, it’s an obvious twist that I really like, and one that opens up a lot of interesting emotional angles for the rest of the season. Besides throwing Ed and Karen back into each others’ immediate orbits in ways that will feel emotionally familiar to them both, it sets Ed on a competitive collision course with Dani (who is clearly angry that he’s trying to still her thunder/change at history) and puts Margo in an uncomfortable and embarrassing position, professionally speaking.

(I mean, she’s gonna have to get a LOT of intel from the Soviets if she has any hope of moving up NASA’s launch date two whole years, is what I’m saying.)

Stray Thoughts and Observations:

• Really, really not here for this Danny is suddenly a stalker plot!! (Also, I just have so many questions about how he’s apparently genuinely still carrying a torch for Karen a decade later and what happened between them in the meantime. I don’t know if I actually want to know the answers to those questions, but I have them.)
• I cannot believe Margo fired Molly. The times I guess they really are a-changing.
• But, truly, I cackled at the closing image of Molly smoking a join in the bath and cheering on Ed’s decision to go to Mars anyway.

What did you think of this episode of For All Mankind? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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New episodes of For All Mankind stream Fridays on Apple TV+.

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