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How Apple became the king of sci-fi

https://news.yahoo.com/apple-became-king-sci-fi-091605795.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9kdWNrZHVja2dvLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAJKkSdfWOCEE38RNGjMSvPe4gFZ1VlVYyHCYB7QjC9U0Sjrt8W9E-OU2W3qdSDoznFMK8KWjT-3UHhwA0LHe5bJoMFK0BDXhSqpZlfcIAw4UB702Hu9gp3LRTGbMBUyLd627UiMQ8nB26PlLz7tD5LWfLOjr3ymJJhNKXkrupXxo

Apple TV+ has eclipsed other streamers' science fiction offerings

Apple TV+ has eclipsed other streamers' science fiction offerings

43 comments

troyunrau

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Admittedly, For All Mankind is pretty much worth it by itself.

djc0

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We’ve watched Severance, Mythic Quest, and a few others. But not that. Good to know, thanks!

Prouvaire

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If you like Ronald D Moore's other work (a lot of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the Battlestar Galactica reboot) there's a good chance you'll like For All Mankind. In my mind it's the Star Trek prequel show we should have had.

fsniper

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In fact I like this idea a lot.

nevernevermore

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Not sci-fi but The After Party season 2 is just airing on atv+ right now and the first season is a tour de force

dumpling

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I love this show so much

VerifiablyMrWonka

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Foundation, Silo and Severance are some of the best things I've watched.

BedSharkPal

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Such a fan of Silo. I don't know why but the world they built is so fascinating to me.

marmarama

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I wanted to like Silo. The production was amazing, the cast was excellent, and the concept is very cool. But the storytelling didn't grab me. The twist in season 1 was telegraphed way too early and a bit clumsily, which left the rest of the season feeling flat for me.

zefiax

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What twist are you referring to? You mean the ending of S1?

marmarama

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Yes. In E2 or E3 (I forget exactly which episode) there's an attempted misdirection, a "leading you up the garden path" moment, that was so obvious that for a moment I couldn't believe the script writers had done it. Then you realise that there's no way they'd ruin the rest of the season by actually revealing everything at that point, so therefore the opposite of what they're implying must be true. Which then kinda ruined the rest of the season for me. From that point on, virtually everything in the rest of the season was predictable, including the ending.

It would have been much better if the "garden path" moment had been left out entirely. It had no bearing on the plot itself and none of the characters paid it any heed; it was purely for the viewer.

AbouBenAdhem

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I’m just hoping they pick up the Expanse baton from SyFy and Amazon and finish the series.

fsniper

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I wish they get the Orville.

Ronno

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The only reason I haven’t watched the Expanse yet, is because I know there is no ending (yet). I’m done with watching shows that just stop due to some management decision. If the confirm the ending is in the works, then I will start watching

VasyaSovari

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@Ronno Watch it.
The show ends in a completely logical place and wraps up that entire timeline near perfectly. It doesn’t feel like anything’s missing.
The next three books are set 30 years later in another system. Same crew, wildly different everything else. That’s why they chose not to film them. It wasn’t just ‘ended early’

@inkican @AbouBenAdhem

McBinary

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Ehhhh, they left several loose threads dangling in the wind...

There is a whole book about the planet with the fauna that brings organic tissue back to life. They just shut the door and called it a day.
Also, they barely touched the storyline of mass being lost with gate use.

VasyaSovari

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@McBinary
the resurrection fauna planet is in the +30 year timeline. The books didn't explore the mass loss much more than the show did (other than explaining how they gathered the data), but it was used as the core mechanic of the grand finale - exactly as it was in Babylon's Ashes.

@inkican @AbouBenAdhem @Ronno

tjhart85

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To be fair the books end leaving you wanting more too! The show has an ending that's good, it's just ... Missing decades of content that's in the books!

The show is definitely worth watching and was incredibly enjoyable, fwiw.

McBinary

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They also killed a main character for real life legal troubles. So that might be difficult to continue the cannon.

some_guy

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TBF that character isn’t used for any key moments in the last books that couldn’t be removed or swapped to another character.

Perry

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Apple TV+ started rather slow, but the quality of the shows is just insane, and not just when it comes to scifi. So far, the only show that I didn't like from TV+ was Hello Tomorrow, which had a lot of style and potential, but just never went anywhere.

LazaroFilm

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@Perry Haha of course the one show I worked on haha.

@inkican

Perry

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Oof, I'm sorry, but perhaps it was a matter of expectations. I feel that the problem that I had with the show was that it started off on the premise of some Fallout-style retro futurism, with what I guess one could call "dangerous techno optimism" of the 50's and 60's.

However, beyond the first episode where the woman gets killed by the automated postal car, this never really gets explored much further than some occasional background elements. The story could just as well have been set in the actual 50's and it wouldn't have changed much.

Now normally, I don't generally have issues with character driven stories where the setting comes secondary (e.g. Ted Lasso is a character driven comedy set on the backdrop of football), but in this case it was the setting that actually interested me to begin with.

It's a shame, because all the individual pieces, from acting, to scenery and atmosphere were great, it's just that the show never clicked with me in the end, because it wasn't what I thought it would be.

inkican

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What was your role? Just curious ... :)

LazaroFilm

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@inkican I day played as Steadicam Operator. The show was shot on ARRI Alexa65 which is one big heavy camera.

@Perry

inkican

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Ooh - my hero! :)

fishos

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If it's any consolation, I've been raving about the show since it came out. Been calling it a "realistic fallout prequel that does its own thing".

LazaroFilm

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@fishos Thanks and I agree. I think the parallel with Fallout was a double edged sword. Creating a was for the style, abs also setting expectations that weren’t quite met in the story.

@inkican @Perry

fishos

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I felt like that expectation was there for me for the first episode or two, but then you could see how it was doing its own thing and building its own world. It felt familiar to step into and then was a comfortable transition to the rest of the world you all created.

Thank you for your work; it's cool to talk to someone who worked on it. Can you say if you know how likely the show is to continue on? I haven't heard anything about a season 2, but I'm hoping.

@LazaroFilm

LazaroFilm

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@fishos Thanks. I don’t know anything about next season. All I know is that given the current ongoing strikes with the Writers and Actors unions, it is very unlikely to be filmed this year, if at all.

@inkican @Perry

fishos

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@LazaroFilm

Yeah, that probably is gonna delay things a bit... Hopefully you get to continue(with fair pay of course :) )

nevernevermore

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I finished hello tomorrow and if you look past the lens of retro futurism it is a quality character piece

McBinary

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My only problem with picking up Apple TV for scifi is that all these shows are in their infancy. Most are only 1 season, and that hardly feels like enough motivation to start the show knowing there could just never be a second season. Netflix burned me with good shows getting cancelled and I can't motivate myself to start something with less than 2 seasons.

Madison_rogue

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I am loving Foundation. I'm really glad Apple TV has taken the chance to do series like these. My wife also really likes Loot, which is supposed to air their second season sometime this summer.

Our next series will be Ted Lasso. I'm looking forward to watching it.

Prouvaire

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IMO Foundation should be more accurately called Foundation and Empire (also the title of Asimov's second book). The Empire storylines have generally been compelling. The Foundation storylines not so much. I hope that they address that imbalance in the second season. (And not by making the Empire stuff worse!)

McBinary

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They would have to pick up the pace a lot.
It might be a few seasons before they get there at this pace. The entire first season happens in the first few chapters of book 1...

Prouvaire

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Yeah, but it's a very loose adaptation of the novels and they're spending a lot of time on Trantor. The stuff they've done with Cleon is the most interesting part of the show.

Personally I'm looking forward to what they do with the Mule and Arkady (who was my favourite character in the trilogy when I was a kid). Assuming that the show makes it that far.

lyptt

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I’m so happy to finally have new sci-fi to watch. I’ve loved all of Apple’s offerings so far

ef9357

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I'd love it if they'd take on the Perry Mason reboot.

Cliff_Walker

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I’d give you gold for this comment…

Fiivemacs

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Pretty sure they just bought their way in and didn't create shit. Doesn't count as being better...

fsniper

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Aren't all of the above mentioned works all Apple Originals? I am not very Apple ecosystem friendly however on this one Apple seems like did good.

keeb420

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Maybe I'm ignorant but it does seem like the people that run apple as a whole would be the ones who actually get good scifi.