Season 1, Episode 2
Date of release: December 24, 2021 (Netflix)
Written by: Park Eun-kyo
Directed by: Choi Hang-yong
”I just detected an unknown bio signal.”
When the sci-fi drama turns into a horror show, it's the perfect opportunity to also turn it into a “And Then There Were None” slasher, with each of the astronauts suffering a weird and brutal death. And it all starts with the notion that they are not alone on this research station.
If there is one thing I always hated and still hate about “binge TV,” it's that writers treat their short, eight-episode seasons as feature films, which makes it hard for them to properly begin or end an episode when the narrative of the episode was written to be framed for a multi-hour film. This episode just ends, without any kind of conclusion to the episode's stories. And the stories didn't move forward either, as these 40 minutes were essentially just one big journey through the station, turning the show into a haunted house horror film in which every dark corner or new hallway could either produce another corpse, or maybe the actual ghost haunting this place. The way this episode was directed, I sometimes believed that there would be someone moving silently across the screen in the background for a proper jumpscare, just like a horror flick would do.
And while I loved the horror atmosphere of this hour, it was disappointing to see that no answers were given, as more questions were raised, just like a TV show that was inspired by the mid-2000s mystery box thrillers on American television. However, just like a horror film, this episode did quite well in separating the characters and having each of them be in their own little form of danger. The question is now, who will get to face the threat head-on first? Where and what is the monster, and how will the characters defeat it? And couldn't this story have been told in a two-hour film instead?
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| Planning the mission consists of remembering where things are on the research station. |
