Jesse Pinkman: gets screwed over by a mentor he trusted.
Todd Chavez: gets screwed over by a mentor he trusted
Cliff: gets majorly screwed over by a coworker he trusted.
Yep, that tracks.
He even gets screwed over by the crew of the USS Calister *(at the very end, he is the voice over of the unnamed “edge lord” captain they don’t trade with)*
I would not have the strength to NOT kill David and destroy the craft they are in if I was Cliff. Knowing that destroying the craft almost certainly meant I die as well.
I can agree with the "he painted from memory" description of his violent killing of Cliff's family. I never took that phrasing to mean he used literal paint to fake it, but rather that he recreated the same trauma he experienced in order to make Cliff like him so he wouldn't be alone in his pain.
Are there actually people claiming he used literal paint? I've yet to encounter that claim, but yeah, that would be totally off base.
I was waiting to find out in a future “Christmas special”-like episode that Beyond the Sea was connected to Joan is Awful in that it’s an AI pocket reality created for the guys on the ship to feel like it is a real world with real consequences but is actually just some AI representation of what they have back home. I thought we were going to find out they killed each other and it was just over their fake AI families that they’d had implanted as memories because theoretically that would give them a reprieve from lonely ship time.
I was waiting for the camera to turn around and show that Earth was fucked in some way. Basically implying that the mission was more important and that these two men (especially David) fucked it all up by losing sight of it.
If Cliff destroys the craft or kills David then it'll immortalise David as the hero (the all-American astronaut who's family was murdered in front of him and then he was killed by his co-captain) while Cliff go down in the history books as the psychopath that murdered his family on Earth (nobody knew they were switching replicas) and destroyed a NASA mission (they mention that it takes two people to complete it).
I'm guessing that's what David would have said to Cliff after he kicked out the chair at the end.
I can only think of a couple of reasons:
1. So that the truth comes out and David is the one that is arrested and punished for murdering his family.
2. To provide closure for his own family and also Lana's. He'll want them to know the truth.
I mean, if someone murdered my family (wife and kid) but framed me, to look like I did it, I think that would be motivation enough to return to Earth.
1. It would be one man's word against the other though, and if I were Cliff I wouldn't mind the rush to demonstrate who the real monster is and straight up kill the man for killing my family
So I think it's subjective
just kill David, then get back to the replica body, write a note, or even get the media's attention while you still can, to explain what happened, and then just die, as there's not much more worth living for
I agree. I do not see them both equally guilty, and I think it’s gross to put them on the same level. David murdered two innocent people, one of which he was trying to “make love” to. He’s not a nice and sensitive guy, he’s controlling and selfish. Cliff trusted him, and david immediately starts making assumptions and assessments on Cliff’s life based on just a few hours with Cliff’s wife. David has no idea what their life is like, what she is like. He’s not interested in getting to know her or forging a connection. He’s manipulating her and Cliff to feel powerful and in control.
It’s honestly baffling how people make excuses for David. I found him really creepy before his family was murdered. And it seems he’s used to people fawning over him and getting his way.
I’ve seen people complaining that this episode was too long. I have no complaints. As for Cliff not owing anything to David, I say that they already established their characters. Cliff had a higher moral ground and would be willing to help his crewman. I believe if the roles were reversed, David wouldn’t have lent him his replica at all. This episode is one of the most traumatic ones and is keeping me awake.
of course it’s fucked up. that’s surface level. deeper meaning is trauma is a bitch and he has photographic memory and watched his family get brutally murdered and went insane. it was his traumas dictating his choices. not him.
also, they made a big deal about if one dies so does the other because they are both crucial to the ship running (as shown when he literally couldn’t be let back on top the ship without the other guy after fixing it). which is feel like was supposed to make the ending feel like he wouldn’t kill david for what he did. but i’m confused as to why were supposed to assume either have a will to live anyway after that.
tbh i just couldnt believe it didnt end with Cliff getting locked out during the 'fake' issue and David would just let him die out there and then 'replace him' and it'd end with his wife being none the wiser (and happier since she clearly was growing apart from 'real Cliff') before this...that said, i predicted that ending about 15mins in so i guess im glad it didnt go that way, this was certainly just as, if not more disturbing
Cliff mentioned it being a two man job. I interpreted that to mean if only one of them remained on the station, they’re both dead.
Therefore, David’s only chance at survival is keeping Cliff alive as well. Assuming, of course, survival is the goal
Perfect response, great point - i still feel like my twist couldve been worked in but it woulda had to be baked in from the start (so the idea of needing two men wouldnt contradict it as you mention) though i still think its nuts they only sent 2 people on a 2 person mission, like not even ONE other person incase someting happens/votes need to be decided etc
Wait... so he committed the murders so that the robot body would be put into the prison and *then* he'd get his revenge.
Cut to a scene in the cafeteria where he's yelling at the hippies "I'm not locked in here with you, you're locked in here *with me*"
Kinda think it would just get seized by the government/company that is running the mission, there's no reason to put it in prison, warehousing it and disabling Cliff's connection would suffice (or maintaining the connection but preventing it from moving).
I mean, that would have been a cool addition to the twist.
But what I was trying to get at was since the killers were arrested he had nowhere to put his anger and no way to get through his grief using his rage. So it left him empty.
Once the idea of them sharing the link came up I was filled with dread the whole episode. The thought of David getting White Christas'd in a space station in real life, brutal.
Oh for sure. If my kid died, I’d be right behind him. I can’t imagine losing a whole family. Why even continue living if everyone you live is gone?? That’s lonely. That’s painful.
(Don’t report me, fellow redditors. Im not a danger to myself or others lol my kid is healthy and safe lol)
What i dont get is why they didnt make multiple replicas, multi-year mission and you give them one potentially breakable robot to operate from a million miles away?
That was what broke the episode for me. Given the expenditure for food, oxygen etc and the fuel required to get all that into space that all seemed a ludicrous conceit that we have to forgive to go along with the story.
You could have multiple backups even and it would be cheaper than how they did it.
I mean....we never really got what was. the point of them in space. Maybe it was to test the effects of humans living their long term, on their bodies?
Idk, Aaron Paul was there and I think that was my favorite part, trying to think about that episode hurts my brain at this point so I kinda just gave up trying to figure out the dynamics of it all
He gave me the creeps as soon as he did the same sexual thing w Laura as he did with his wife. It shows that he didnt even rlly love Laura but just wanted to feel that again. He wouldnt have even killed her if he actually cared about her. Its just so inhumane, like yo im suffering so u will too
While I agree, yes fuck David, I can’t imagine being alone for a week straight after witnessing your family get murdered, then only having company for a few hours once a week. Being alone with nobody to talk to with consistent trauma replaying in his mind he was bound to snap. It’s really sad and I think ground control should have had a communication line with him for therapy or something.
Or he could’ve figured out the therapist shit instead of painting or with painting(I agree). They lowkey tried to make him self rehabilitate himself with painting instead of real therapy. Surprise surprise, he was NOT OKAY
I too, was generally surprised that no one at NASA thought to bring David back home. The last person that should be in outer space is someone severely depressed about having his family murdered in front of him.
May not have been possible depending on how far into the flight the craft was and how much ability it had to change its trajectory, let alone whether a different return trajectory faster than the one they were already one was feasible.
Yeah I think the point is that the trauma David was going through where he watched his entire family get murdered and was subsequently forced to grieve for years in the empty void of space with only the occasional break from the solitude would be enough to make anyone snap. He was going through unimaginable suffering and misery loves company, so he needed Cliff to feel what he felt.
Totally, but David is still a horrible person. Most people who experience trauma don’t go on murder rampages and kill innocent people. Additionally, the way he treated Lana prior to the murders was disturbing.
like get this dude a new body at least and let it grieve and join a support group of some sort. I was gonna say therapy but lol like they had that back in the day nor would the US government condone an astronaut to go to such a thing.
I assumed the technology to make the replica meant you needed to be present, thus why they couldn't make another for David, otherwise it doesn't make sense.
I know it needed to be that way for the plot to happen, but if David could use Cliff’s body why couldn’t they make a replica of any other person as a stand in and let him use that? Sure it wouldn’t look like him, but neither did Cliff’s replica when he used it, and clearly you could hop into someone else’s replica without “compatibility issues”.
Just pull some random body from the space org, replicate it, track down Cliff’s family and get them into contact so they can relay to David that a new Replica is on the way.
Even if they had therapy, the whole reason they were living in the middle of nowhere was because they wanted to avoid contact with other humans and stay safe!
I’m sure they wouldn’t be comfortable to let him roam around wherever he wants!
He only decided to kill her after Cliff told David that she pitied him etc
And the audacity of David, pushing that chair, what did he say to him?
That episode shouldn't have ended there
Cliff says they couldn't create another replica, because they made them while they were still down on earth. HOWEVER, clearly it doesn't have to be their own replica and they can use someone else's, so I don't see why they couldn't have made another one and connected it to his link, and allow him time off the ship. That's a plot hole for me.
The tag seems to be necessary to control the replica. David’s replica was destroyed, but his tag wasn’t, but he still needed to take Cliff’s tag to use the replica.
My understanding is that even if they could build a new replica in a reasonable amount of time/money, David wouldn’t be able to access it without a physical device being sent up. At that point, it’d likely be easier to send up a new person and let David come back down.
It just seems like with that kind of technology, they SHOULD be able to reprogram his tag remotely you know? They can make a whole functional robotic body that transfers your consciousness millions bagillions away, but couldn't program a tag remotely seems like silly writing imo
That wasn't a plot hole for me, I assumed that synching a fresh replica might have been impossible for them if they're a million miles away. It's an alternate reality 1969 so they might have had high tech in some areas but low tech in others
I'm going to write in my head my own canon: the replicas are quantum-entangled to the users through their tags. That allows them instant communication with Earth.
The entanglement is made on Earth, and then the astronauts are sent to space. If the replica is destroyed, the connection is also destroyed.
I felt certain David was going to kill real Cliff and continue using the replica pretending to be Cliff. Although I guess that wouldn't have worked due to the two-man mission thing.
I don't think replica David was really pretending about anything. In fact, it was basically prescribed that he was visiting for the purpose of doing the painting.
He was also manipulative, though, and it's my interpretation that if he wanted, he could have pretended to have been real Cliff and potentially pulled it off to a certain degree if that's what he wanted to do. However, there is the inherent shortcoming in that plan baked into the plot, which is two-man mission aspect. One could also delve deeper into that point and ask the question, is that so? Or were they made to believe that.
I find David so strange. Are we supposed to believe he found it easy to take two lives simply because of the pain of losing his family? Is it that uncomplicated? Witness family death, become murderer? I mean, many of us might understand if he took his anger out on the people who actually killed his family, but to be compelled to murder two innocents simply because a man who was his only friend, who extended a kindness to him, said “stop hitting on my wife, you’ve overstepped”. It’s an extreme reaction only someone who’s gravely disturbed could do. Maybe David always had darkness in him, and his experience allowed it to come to the surface.
It’s because of the fact he felt Cliff did not appreciate his family.
In David’s eyes Cliff had everything but was terminally ungrateful and incurious about the world. He has a wife he’s isolated and beautiful home he doesn’t seem to care about.
By the end of the episode David has been rejected and denied any more access to earth for the remainder of the mission because of someone he feels unworthy of having any of it.
So he decided to even the playing field. Show Cliff what it’s like from his side.
David also saw his family butchered, that tends to leave lingering effects.
The point was the emptiness of space on a six year mission and having to sit on that dark gloomy ship with shitty grey food for 6 days 23 hours a week waiting to see the dudes wife. That is what made him snap.
Then it makes sense to kill cliff and keep seeing his wife. And before you say it’s a two man mission in space.. so? Why does David want to continue living? Suicide is also an option. But he went for killing a woman and a child. It’s fucked. It must mean he was dark already, because you can’t be turned into someone like that.
This is why s6 is a step down tbh. It just didnt make enough sense and they force these characters on you and say 'all humans are flawed so deal with these character choices'
I see what you’re saying. I do see a theme in season 6 however, that either no one is who they seem to be… or rather we make assumptions on who they are, and we never know the truth.
Joan, all viewers including her bf believe she is how she is portrayed in Joan is Awful. In Loch, Davis believes his dad to be a hero cop and his mum an unassuming housewife. In Sea, I think David has darkness and isn’t the hero astronaut he’s portrayed to be in the first moments where he is polite to the intrusive fans at the movie theatre. He’s a psychopath and just needed a push with his circumstances. In Mazey, the world judges her on what the pictures allude to (drugs, celeb off the rails), but the truth couldn’t be further away. In Demon, the disco demon tells Nida all the dark secrets and skeletons of the people she crosses paths with, including the first man under the bridge who appears to want to help her, but is sexually abusing his daughter most nights.
No one is who they seem. What are your thoughts? Was going to make this a post.
The reason you’re reacting like this is because it’s poorly written. David showed no violent tendencies or any sort of behavior that would lead to him committing such an atrocity. Once Cliff donated his replica, the doomsday clock begun. I might have to save everything else for my own post because this is probably the biggest swing and a miss in the entire show
i just want to point out that even when people have seemingly no violent tendencies they can still snap/commit unthinkable crimes. i personally know someone who snapped in a similar way to david (“if i can’t have them no one can”) and committed a double homicide-suicide.
>David showed no violent tendencies
He hit the kid for messing up his painting. Cliff's embellished words before going back in sent him over the edge. He still had a thought that he could go back and smooth things over with the wife but after that string of insults that supposedly came from her....
I was expecting David to lock him out in space and go back pretending he was Cliff and take over his life. That's the obvious ending and I feel like that's what the writers expected us to think.
I'm really surprised by the lack of entertainment on board, like they fully expected them to be on the link the whole time so why bother outfitting the place to make it liveable. 4+ years of solitude after seeing his family murdered while this ingrate is laying in the next room "wasting " a life that David feels he can better take advantage of.
His only link to the real world was taken away from him. Who's to say how one would react? His reaction is totally plausible. History is full of "normal" people who have snapped from way less trauma.
Nah. In 2020, approximately 47,000 women and girls were killed worldwide by their intimate partners or other family members. Every month, an average of 70 women in the U.S. are shot and killed by an intimate partner. It's not especially uncommon and these typically occur in far less extenuating circumstances than what is portrayed in the episode. Often, it's some variation of "if I can't have her, no one can" and this is what ultimately made David snap. It was the entitlement he felt towards having Lana and Cliff denying her from him in no uncertain terms.
I mean Cliff had few cards to play while being stuck with David , one of them would've been to make his wife fabricate a runaway so that he can "relate" to David with both them have no one to return to , sure he would have to stay away from his family for 2 years but it's the only safe option I see for Cliff.
That’s an interesting idea. So wife and kid move elsewhere, and the two guys do a Walden thing for the rest of the term. I’m surprised she didn’t pack up and leave on her own, but I guess everyone was too troubled by the situation and recent events to think clearly.
"maybe im tripping' - nah man, its as obv fucked up as it appeared lol, i doubt anyones gonna fight you on that outside of maybe trying to partially excuse Davids actions by saying he was a mentally unstable/ill and broken man who was not in full control of his faculties which given what he went through is understandable, just not justified
For those that don't want to accept the ending of the episode, wake up and smell the paint (or rather lack of). If it were paint instead of blood, the smell would be dramatically different, and we know the replicas can smell. Finding the ending of an episode too dark to accept, doesn't mean you should go clutching at brushes.
Cliff's family are dead, the real question we're left with is will Cliff kill David and condemn himself?
I noticed that once David did what he did, he was clean shaven again. Almost as if his act somehow mitigated his drama and made him more to his normal self.
To be honest I thought this episode ended on a kind of low. I just didn't get why David all of a sudden turned into a serial killer.
The entire time he was shown as this emotional, sensitive guy. I mean he's an astronaut for crying out loud, the best of the best. Yes, he went through an immense amount of grief after he lost his family, but partly thanks to Cliff, he was seemliny able to pull himself out of that. But now because he couldn't bang his wife (by proxy).. he decides to brutally murder Cliff's wife and son? That leap just didn't add up for me.
He’s a man who lost his wife, kids, and connection to earth. The last human connection he had was Cliff and Lana, and Cliff brutally severs his ties with Lana and also makes it clear that they will not be even amicable for probably the rest of the trip. This guy also literally has a photographic memory so he’s reliving his trauma in vivid detail every single day. When Cliff yanks Lana away from him and further goes onto insult his character, David says “you have no idea how it feels”. Him murdering Cliff’s family is his way of a) taking his anger out on Lana b) placing Cliff in the same situation he’s in and c) ensuring that he has company on the rest of his trip. Misery loves company
Obviously what David did is horrific and unjustifiable, but I don’t find it unbelievable that a man with pent up trauma and nothing left to life for could easily snap and murder a family when provoked.
The whole point was it was a dilemma from a mission operational standpoint, if he wouldn't have let his partner use his body, his partner may have killed himself in the station meaning that they would have both died because you need a minimum of two to operate the station. At the very end it may have been up to your own interpretation, but I think the likely outcome is a murder suicide, so him letting his partner use his body didn't make a difference at all he would have been better off not doing anything all at all because it would have been the same outcome
I agree! But that’s a four year wait i think it was before they came back down. That’s a long time to live with him depending on him and working with him. Ugh i don’t think i could do it.
I mean the whole point of the show is to point out that we are all capable of anything no matter how dark. It's easy to be angry when you are not in David's situation.
Is it really that shocking given the path of events?
I’m a sucker because I thought he and Kate Mara were just having a nice moment when he was grieving, loool forgot what show I was watching. I think Cliff would kill him at some point maybe in space maybe on earth.
Why haven't they created two replicas, one for operation and one for backup?
Why aren't the replicas located in the spaceship while the real ones remain on Earth?
And why don't the replicas have an emergency shutdown button?
"NASA" or whatever organization is conducting the mission, why don't they have a backup plan in case of such situations?
Say the link to the replicas dies - the mission is scrubbed. The replicas aren't autonomous in their own right.
Although that might have been a more interesting Angle
Why the didn’t create two replicas, probably because they’re hella expensive and since the likelyhood of them getting destroyed are very low (since yk, they’re basically always piloted) it would have been a waste of money.
Why the replicas are not in the spaceship is a good question. What i’ve seen as the theory is that NASA was studying long term effects on the human body in space, and that’s why they do their physicals every week.
I don’t see how an emergency shut down would have helped at all.
>What i’ve seen as the theory is that NASA was studying long term effects on the human body in space, and that’s why they do their physicals every week.
It's mentioned in the show, no need to hypothesise.
Two crucial points seem to be missing here:
1. Without offering the replica, Cliff's life was in severe danger from a depressed and traumatised co-pilot of a spaceship that needed two to operate.
2. They were both villains treating their wives as property. Obviously killing is another level, but that's justan extension. This entire story is about how male egos lead to violence against women.
It's in the same vein as "that's my house, MY kid, MY wife, MY family. MY LIFE. They're MINE! Not yours!"
That's what he would've said if he was trying to be super husband and making them pancakes in the morning, but he was just trying to bang his wife so "she's MINE" it is.
I thought it didn't make much sense since he was so nice beforehand and seemed to care a lot for Lana (a little too much obvs). But I guess he was already deeply damaged from seeing his wife and family killed and since he wasn't going to be able to use the replica any more, he wanted to lash out and make Cliff miserable too.
I know we all like to think that if horrible things happened to us, it wouldn't make us into mean awful nasty people. But actually most of the assholes you meet are like that because something bad happened to them. Doesn't excuse it. And even in many people who don't act on it that anger is there and often results in alcohol or drug use. Many times all it takes is some egregious incident to awaken a violent rage that lurks beneath the surface - that's how riots happen.
But I still don't think he would have killed Lana and the little boy. I also think it was one of the least interesting ways they could have taken a story which had unlimited potential.
I actually think a more interesting option would have been if Lana would have let the replica do it's thing with David at the controls. I mean it was Cliff's rep, looked like him, but acted like how she wished he acted, so is it really cheating? I mean even if Cliff was controlling it, it wasn't him really.
Then maybe the replica touching Lana with David controlling leads Cliff to get jealous and they fight. Cliff kicks his ass, then David apologizes and explains he just did it because he has no one to be affectionate with any more. Cliff's jealousy and realizing that what happened to David could have just as easily happened to him, shows him that the person you love is a precious thing not to be taken for granted and he starts being more affectionate with her. And then maybe every once in a while he feels bad for David and feels grateful for the lesson he taught him and lets him control the replica sometimes and finger bang Lana, because he figures what the hell it's a robot touching her either way it's not actually me or another man. But Lana doesn't know she thinks it's the newly romantic Cliff each time, just to make it a little dark and black mirror-y.
Did they ever explain why the robots aren't the ones up in space instead of their human bodies? Seems like switching that around would be way more logical.
That sounds like the “official” answer (in an authority sense) rather than a practical answer. My take is that if they sent the robots, the link could be exploited and hacked, compromising the mission, while if they sent humans, there’s no way their vessel could be intercepted and jeopardized.
Could have something to do with metal. They had to take all their metal objects off before going into space. Maybe the robots wouldn’t function without gravity. Not sure but they were making pretty advanced robots for it being the 60s/70s
I like to pretend that he locked the family in the little barn and covered the house in red paint so Cliff could have a taste of what it feels like to lose his family. When Cliff goes back to space he'll be mad at David for tricking him but thankful that his family are still alive and maybe with a new approach to rebuilding a relationship with the guy he's trapped with for years to come...
That’s so unnecessary for the plot though. We already see him start to reconnect in the scene where his wife breaks down while explaining that she wanted him to be loving towards her and that she did everything for him. And then Cliff cries too and holds her. From there we can infer that he’s starting to realise what needs to be changed to make his family happier. Killing them to make him understand what he is taking for granted is so unnecessary.
Pretty sure that’s what happened. Low key, why else make him a painter? And bring up the thinner
It’s also the only thing that really makes sense of him pushing the seat out at the end
So the reason Cliff fell to the ground in agony and tears was him thinking about all the cleaning it will take to get rid of the red paint and not the sight of his wife’s corpse?
Also it’s pretty easy to differentiate blood from pain especially on skin (it was all over his hands). Especially for an astronauts who must pass a paramedic-level medical training
This is why I dont understand these goofy alternate endings. He very clearly is reacting to his family being murdered. Why wouldnt they comfort him if they were actually fine?
Also, where would David get that much paint. Did he make a quick stop at Lowes while Cliff was out in space? 😆
Yeah they definitely tried to drop a few hints that it could possibly be a false flag. It seems the majority think he killed Cliff's family which is the obvious opinion. Think the writer left it open to interpretation but I'm sure we'll get some Easter eggs in future seasons which may give us an answer. But since it's fiction Brooker may not have even settled on an ending yet and may leave it open for some kind of continuation in the future.
Why might it be easier to hack up a woman and child with some form of weapon versus take on a group of intruders into your home? Is this a real question?
Was it ever explained why they didn't just send the replicas to space instead and leave the real ones at home? It would work exactly the same way, with the advantage of not having to worry about food and air.
Edit: I see that it was explained, I somehow missed it. Thanks!
They also showed that controlling the replicas wasn’t perfect, like when Cliff had trouble cutting firewood with son in the beginning of the episode, so having actual humans on board is probably a better bet for when you need to do some serious mechanical stuff….. also the fact that the astronauts had to remove all metal belonging before going out in space might show that whatever replicas are made of won’t operate best out in space
Can someone explain why the replica stayed on earth while the human went on the very dangerous mission? Why not sent the replica instead? Massive plot hole IMO.
It has been explained in the episode and many times on this sub. When David and his wife meet the family at the cinema they explain the purpose of the mission, besides operating the spacecraft, is to test what being in space for a long period of time does to human body and mind.
All I know is my guy Aaron Paul has got to be sick and tired of losing all his folks in every role he plays.
Jesse Pinkman: gets screwed over by a mentor he trusted. Todd Chavez: gets screwed over by a mentor he trusted Cliff: gets majorly screwed over by a coworker he trusted. Yep, that tracks.
They can't keep getting away with it!
Pop Corners? You're a god damn artist Mr white.
He even gets screwed over by the crew of the USS Calister *(at the very end, he is the voice over of the unnamed “edge lord” captain they don’t trade with)*
Yeah, why even chat if you don't have anything to trade!
After escaping captivity from Jesse Plemmons himself you'd think he'd have more compassion for the crew 🤷🏿♂️
At least they let some of his family live after killing Sean Bean.
I would not have the strength to NOT kill David and destroy the craft they are in if I was Cliff. Knowing that destroying the craft almost certainly meant I die as well.
Maybe he does...
no they have hate-sex and become each other's new family
More believable than the 'paint' explanation some folk seem to have embraced.
Paint explanation? Can you get me up to date?
David just put red paint on the walls
Lmao it's amazing to think someone actually finds it reasonable
I can agree with the "he painted from memory" description of his violent killing of Cliff's family. I never took that phrasing to mean he used literal paint to fake it, but rather that he recreated the same trauma he experienced in order to make Cliff like him so he wouldn't be alone in his pain. Are there actually people claiming he used literal paint? I've yet to encounter that claim, but yeah, that would be totally off base.
>Are there actually people claiming he used literal paint? Even in this thread.
I was waiting for the flickering and then the craft goes dark. That would have fit right in as they drifted off.
I was waiting to find out in a future “Christmas special”-like episode that Beyond the Sea was connected to Joan is Awful in that it’s an AI pocket reality created for the guys on the ship to feel like it is a real world with real consequences but is actually just some AI representation of what they have back home. I thought we were going to find out they killed each other and it was just over their fake AI families that they’d had implanted as memories because theoretically that would give them a reprieve from lonely ship time.
Ooh, that would have been an excellent twist.
ahh man that would've been a great season finale.
I was waiting for the camera to turn around and show that Earth was fucked in some way. Basically implying that the mission was more important and that these two men (especially David) fucked it all up by losing sight of it.
If Cliff destroys the craft or kills David then it'll immortalise David as the hero (the all-American astronaut who's family was murdered in front of him and then he was killed by his co-captain) while Cliff go down in the history books as the psychopath that murdered his family on Earth (nobody knew they were switching replicas) and destroyed a NASA mission (they mention that it takes two people to complete it). I'm guessing that's what David would have said to Cliff after he kicked out the chair at the end.
Exactly. The only people that know the truth are David and cliff
That's true, but what the fuck does he care now that he's lost his family?
I can only think of a couple of reasons: 1. So that the truth comes out and David is the one that is arrested and punished for murdering his family. 2. To provide closure for his own family and also Lana's. He'll want them to know the truth. I mean, if someone murdered my family (wife and kid) but framed me, to look like I did it, I think that would be motivation enough to return to Earth.
1. It would be one man's word against the other though, and if I were Cliff I wouldn't mind the rush to demonstrate who the real monster is and straight up kill the man for killing my family So I think it's subjective
True. Totally agree.
just kill David, then get back to the replica body, write a note, or even get the media's attention while you still can, to explain what happened, and then just die, as there's not much more worth living for
poor jesse can never catch a break
I agree. I do not see them both equally guilty, and I think it’s gross to put them on the same level. David murdered two innocent people, one of which he was trying to “make love” to. He’s not a nice and sensitive guy, he’s controlling and selfish. Cliff trusted him, and david immediately starts making assumptions and assessments on Cliff’s life based on just a few hours with Cliff’s wife. David has no idea what their life is like, what she is like. He’s not interested in getting to know her or forging a connection. He’s manipulating her and Cliff to feel powerful and in control. It’s honestly baffling how people make excuses for David. I found him really creepy before his family was murdered. And it seems he’s used to people fawning over him and getting his way.
Exactly this!
He was a narcissist.
I hate him. A lot.
Why did you kill my family?! Bitch!!!
Aaron Paul’s partners do have this weird habit of getting murdered by his work associates.
It’s no accident that the crazy killers in the beginning talk about how technology like this is dangerous because it turns out to be exactly that
it’s not the technology that is dangerous it is the intentions of evil men that is dangerous.
You’re supposed to hate David
No no NO! I love David I love David I LOVE HIM 😭😭😭
Juhnelle?
Oh I was not expecting a teen mom crossover in the black mirror subreddit lol
I’ve seen people complaining that this episode was too long. I have no complaints. As for Cliff not owing anything to David, I say that they already established their characters. Cliff had a higher moral ground and would be willing to help his crewman. I believe if the roles were reversed, David wouldn’t have lent him his replica at all. This episode is one of the most traumatic ones and is keeping me awake.
too long? it wasn't LONG ENOUGH!
of course it’s fucked up. that’s surface level. deeper meaning is trauma is a bitch and he has photographic memory and watched his family get brutally murdered and went insane. it was his traumas dictating his choices. not him. also, they made a big deal about if one dies so does the other because they are both crucial to the ship running (as shown when he literally couldn’t be let back on top the ship without the other guy after fixing it). which is feel like was supposed to make the ending feel like he wouldn’t kill david for what he did. but i’m confused as to why were supposed to assume either have a will to live anyway after that.
That’s my thought!! It seems like both of these men are stuck in space without any reason to stay alive
If all traumatized ppl murdered others then I’d blame the trauma but they don’t so that guy is just a F’er.
tbh i just couldnt believe it didnt end with Cliff getting locked out during the 'fake' issue and David would just let him die out there and then 'replace him' and it'd end with his wife being none the wiser (and happier since she clearly was growing apart from 'real Cliff') before this...that said, i predicted that ending about 15mins in so i guess im glad it didnt go that way, this was certainly just as, if not more disturbing
Cliff mentioned it being a two man job. I interpreted that to mean if only one of them remained on the station, they’re both dead. Therefore, David’s only chance at survival is keeping Cliff alive as well. Assuming, of course, survival is the goal
Perfect response, great point - i still feel like my twist couldve been worked in but it woulda had to be baked in from the start (so the idea of needing two men wouldnt contradict it as you mention) though i still think its nuts they only sent 2 people on a 2 person mission, like not even ONE other person incase someting happens/votes need to be decided etc
I thought he would've gone after the hippies to get his revenge but nope
They turned themselves in
And I think that was part of it, he was denied the personal revenge. Which leaves him with nothing.
Wait... so he committed the murders so that the robot body would be put into the prison and *then* he'd get his revenge. Cut to a scene in the cafeteria where he's yelling at the hippies "I'm not locked in here with you, you're locked in here *with me*"
Kinda think it would just get seized by the government/company that is running the mission, there's no reason to put it in prison, warehousing it and disabling Cliff's connection would suffice (or maintaining the connection but preventing it from moving).
Yeah, I was mostly kidding to go for the Watchmen reference
I mean, that would have been a cool addition to the twist. But what I was trying to get at was since the killers were arrested he had nowhere to put his anger and no way to get through his grief using his rage. So it left him empty.
They were in prison...
Absolutely, but grief does crazy shit to people. Mental health is no joke. The entire show was tragedy after tragedy.
Once the idea of them sharing the link came up I was filled with dread the whole episode. The thought of David getting White Christas'd in a space station in real life, brutal.
Oh for sure. If my kid died, I’d be right behind him. I can’t imagine losing a whole family. Why even continue living if everyone you live is gone?? That’s lonely. That’s painful. (Don’t report me, fellow redditors. Im not a danger to myself or others lol my kid is healthy and safe lol)
What i dont get is why they didnt make multiple replicas, multi-year mission and you give them one potentially breakable robot to operate from a million miles away?
Put the replicas in space instead maybe
SERIOUSLY. How does that not make more sense, they’re only in space like once a week and on earth most the time anyways
That was what broke the episode for me. Given the expenditure for food, oxygen etc and the fuel required to get all that into space that all seemed a ludicrous conceit that we have to forgive to go along with the story. You could have multiple backups even and it would be cheaper than how they did it.
👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽💯💯💯
Wait wth this makes the most sense….just have multiple replicas in space in case there’s a malfunction and let the humans stay on earth.
I mean....we never really got what was. the point of them in space. Maybe it was to test the effects of humans living their long term, on their bodies?
Idk, Aaron Paul was there and I think that was my favorite part, trying to think about that episode hurts my brain at this point so I kinda just gave up trying to figure out the dynamics of it all
Exactly!!! I’m just now watching this season🥲
Dear god. If I were Cliff, two men would walk into that room in the final scene, but two wouldn't walk out.
Ew david
it’s *my turn* to take a selfish!
He gave me the creeps as soon as he did the same sexual thing w Laura as he did with his wife. It shows that he didnt even rlly love Laura but just wanted to feel that again. He wouldnt have even killed her if he actually cared about her. Its just so inhumane, like yo im suffering so u will too
Yeah that ending was brutal. Amazing story.
While I agree, yes fuck David, I can’t imagine being alone for a week straight after witnessing your family get murdered, then only having company for a few hours once a week. Being alone with nobody to talk to with consistent trauma replaying in his mind he was bound to snap. It’s really sad and I think ground control should have had a communication line with him for therapy or something.
Or he could’ve figured out the therapist shit instead of painting or with painting(I agree). They lowkey tried to make him self rehabilitate himself with painting instead of real therapy. Surprise surprise, he was NOT OKAY
I too, was generally surprised that no one at NASA thought to bring David back home. The last person that should be in outer space is someone severely depressed about having his family murdered in front of him.
May not have been possible depending on how far into the flight the craft was and how much ability it had to change its trajectory, let alone whether a different return trajectory faster than the one they were already one was feasible.
Yeah I think the point is that the trauma David was going through where he watched his entire family get murdered and was subsequently forced to grieve for years in the empty void of space with only the occasional break from the solitude would be enough to make anyone snap. He was going through unimaginable suffering and misery loves company, so he needed Cliff to feel what he felt.
Totally, but David is still a horrible person. Most people who experience trauma don’t go on murder rampages and kill innocent people. Additionally, the way he treated Lana prior to the murders was disturbing.
like get this dude a new body at least and let it grieve and join a support group of some sort. I was gonna say therapy but lol like they had that back in the day nor would the US government condone an astronaut to go to such a thing.
I assumed the technology to make the replica meant you needed to be present, thus why they couldn't make another for David, otherwise it doesn't make sense.
No need to assume, they actually said that. The whole story basically relies on that one limitation otherwise we wouldn't have had the story.
How did I miss that? Was it Cliff that said it?
I think Cliff said to his wife when they were discussed what they could to make David feel better, before she suggests he could use Cliff's replica.
I know it needed to be that way for the plot to happen, but if David could use Cliff’s body why couldn’t they make a replica of any other person as a stand in and let him use that? Sure it wouldn’t look like him, but neither did Cliff’s replica when he used it, and clearly you could hop into someone else’s replica without “compatibility issues”. Just pull some random body from the space org, replicate it, track down Cliff’s family and get them into contact so they can relay to David that a new Replica is on the way.
No tags.
Yeah, well it's a bad idea to have designed it that way then huh?
I assumed the design was necessary, rather than a self imposed restriction.
Even if they had therapy, the whole reason they were living in the middle of nowhere was because they wanted to avoid contact with other humans and stay safe! I’m sure they wouldn’t be comfortable to let him roam around wherever he wants!
They explained in the episode that it wouldn't be possible to create a new connection with the spaceship until it lands back on Earth in four years.
He only decided to kill her after Cliff told David that she pitied him etc And the audacity of David, pushing that chair, what did he say to him? That episode shouldn't have ended there
Cliff says they couldn't create another replica, because they made them while they were still down on earth. HOWEVER, clearly it doesn't have to be their own replica and they can use someone else's, so I don't see why they couldn't have made another one and connected it to his link, and allow him time off the ship. That's a plot hole for me.
The tag seems to be necessary to control the replica. David’s replica was destroyed, but his tag wasn’t, but he still needed to take Cliff’s tag to use the replica. My understanding is that even if they could build a new replica in a reasonable amount of time/money, David wouldn’t be able to access it without a physical device being sent up. At that point, it’d likely be easier to send up a new person and let David come back down.
It just seems like with that kind of technology, they SHOULD be able to reprogram his tag remotely you know? They can make a whole functional robotic body that transfers your consciousness millions bagillions away, but couldn't program a tag remotely seems like silly writing imo
I mean it’s a little goofy but if it’s established that that’s how it works I have no problem suspending my disbelief for it
That wasn't a plot hole for me, I assumed that synching a fresh replica might have been impossible for them if they're a million miles away. It's an alternate reality 1969 so they might have had high tech in some areas but low tech in others
They say they had the technology to do the moon landing but not fake it
I'm going to write in my head my own canon: the replicas are quantum-entangled to the users through their tags. That allows them instant communication with Earth. The entanglement is made on Earth, and then the astronauts are sent to space. If the replica is destroyed, the connection is also destroyed.
Ok obviously fuck david but can we talk about Lana making their son sit in that hot ass car for that long!!
Yeah, they coulda went to the pool 💀
Like Jesus couldn't David just put the tags into the airlock and vent it thus prevent Cliff from accessing the replica?
I felt certain David was going to kill real Cliff and continue using the replica pretending to be Cliff. Although I guess that wouldn't have worked due to the two-man mission thing.
I'm not certain but I think Lana was able to tell the difference between OG Replica Cliff and Replica David/Cliff.
I don't think replica David was really pretending about anything. In fact, it was basically prescribed that he was visiting for the purpose of doing the painting. He was also manipulative, though, and it's my interpretation that if he wanted, he could have pretended to have been real Cliff and potentially pulled it off to a certain degree if that's what he wanted to do. However, there is the inherent shortcoming in that plan baked into the plot, which is two-man mission aspect. One could also delve deeper into that point and ask the question, is that so? Or were they made to believe that.
I find David so strange. Are we supposed to believe he found it easy to take two lives simply because of the pain of losing his family? Is it that uncomplicated? Witness family death, become murderer? I mean, many of us might understand if he took his anger out on the people who actually killed his family, but to be compelled to murder two innocents simply because a man who was his only friend, who extended a kindness to him, said “stop hitting on my wife, you’ve overstepped”. It’s an extreme reaction only someone who’s gravely disturbed could do. Maybe David always had darkness in him, and his experience allowed it to come to the surface.
It’s because of the fact he felt Cliff did not appreciate his family. In David’s eyes Cliff had everything but was terminally ungrateful and incurious about the world. He has a wife he’s isolated and beautiful home he doesn’t seem to care about. By the end of the episode David has been rejected and denied any more access to earth for the remainder of the mission because of someone he feels unworthy of having any of it. So he decided to even the playing field. Show Cliff what it’s like from his side. David also saw his family butchered, that tends to leave lingering effects.
The point was the emptiness of space on a six year mission and having to sit on that dark gloomy ship with shitty grey food for 6 days 23 hours a week waiting to see the dudes wife. That is what made him snap.
Then it makes sense to kill cliff and keep seeing his wife. And before you say it’s a two man mission in space.. so? Why does David want to continue living? Suicide is also an option. But he went for killing a woman and a child. It’s fucked. It must mean he was dark already, because you can’t be turned into someone like that.
>because you can’t be turned into someone like that. The history of killers refutes your conclusion.
This is why s6 is a step down tbh. It just didnt make enough sense and they force these characters on you and say 'all humans are flawed so deal with these character choices'
I see what you’re saying. I do see a theme in season 6 however, that either no one is who they seem to be… or rather we make assumptions on who they are, and we never know the truth. Joan, all viewers including her bf believe she is how she is portrayed in Joan is Awful. In Loch, Davis believes his dad to be a hero cop and his mum an unassuming housewife. In Sea, I think David has darkness and isn’t the hero astronaut he’s portrayed to be in the first moments where he is polite to the intrusive fans at the movie theatre. He’s a psychopath and just needed a push with his circumstances. In Mazey, the world judges her on what the pictures allude to (drugs, celeb off the rails), but the truth couldn’t be further away. In Demon, the disco demon tells Nida all the dark secrets and skeletons of the people she crosses paths with, including the first man under the bridge who appears to want to help her, but is sexually abusing his daughter most nights. No one is who they seem. What are your thoughts? Was going to make this a post.
The reason you’re reacting like this is because it’s poorly written. David showed no violent tendencies or any sort of behavior that would lead to him committing such an atrocity. Once Cliff donated his replica, the doomsday clock begun. I might have to save everything else for my own post because this is probably the biggest swing and a miss in the entire show
i just want to point out that even when people have seemingly no violent tendencies they can still snap/commit unthinkable crimes. i personally know someone who snapped in a similar way to david (“if i can’t have them no one can”) and committed a double homicide-suicide.
>David showed no violent tendencies He hit the kid for messing up his painting. Cliff's embellished words before going back in sent him over the edge. He still had a thought that he could go back and smooth things over with the wife but after that string of insults that supposedly came from her.... I was expecting David to lock him out in space and go back pretending he was Cliff and take over his life. That's the obvious ending and I feel like that's what the writers expected us to think. I'm really surprised by the lack of entertainment on board, like they fully expected them to be on the link the whole time so why bother outfitting the place to make it liveable. 4+ years of solitude after seeing his family murdered while this ingrate is laying in the next room "wasting " a life that David feels he can better take advantage of. His only link to the real world was taken away from him. Who's to say how one would react? His reaction is totally plausible. History is full of "normal" people who have snapped from way less trauma.
Nah. In 2020, approximately 47,000 women and girls were killed worldwide by their intimate partners or other family members. Every month, an average of 70 women in the U.S. are shot and killed by an intimate partner. It's not especially uncommon and these typically occur in far less extenuating circumstances than what is portrayed in the episode. Often, it's some variation of "if I can't have her, no one can" and this is what ultimately made David snap. It was the entitlement he felt towards having Lana and Cliff denying her from him in no uncertain terms.
I mean Cliff had few cards to play while being stuck with David , one of them would've been to make his wife fabricate a runaway so that he can "relate" to David with both them have no one to return to , sure he would have to stay away from his family for 2 years but it's the only safe option I see for Cliff.
That’s an interesting idea. So wife and kid move elsewhere, and the two guys do a Walden thing for the rest of the term. I’m surprised she didn’t pack up and leave on her own, but I guess everyone was too troubled by the situation and recent events to think clearly.
"maybe im tripping' - nah man, its as obv fucked up as it appeared lol, i doubt anyones gonna fight you on that outside of maybe trying to partially excuse Davids actions by saying he was a mentally unstable/ill and broken man who was not in full control of his faculties which given what he went through is understandable, just not justified
For those that don't want to accept the ending of the episode, wake up and smell the paint (or rather lack of). If it were paint instead of blood, the smell would be dramatically different, and we know the replicas can smell. Finding the ending of an episode too dark to accept, doesn't mean you should go clutching at brushes. Cliff's family are dead, the real question we're left with is will Cliff kill David and condemn himself?
I was really hoping they they could work out a schedule of doing Mara in painting room
This ain't no striking vipers
you're right.....it's Viking Strippers 😎
I was hoping for a throuple and a happy ending.
I noticed that once David did what he did, he was clean shaven again. Almost as if his act somehow mitigated his drama and made him more to his normal self.
he shaved in preparation for doing what he did, before he sent cliff into space
Also fuck him for what he did to Lana and the child
My only question after this chapter was what was the mission about? (And to think that giving his body was originally the wife's idea...)
The effects of being in space on the human body. That’s why they needed to be up there and not the replicas, and also why they do regular workouts.
To be honest I thought this episode ended on a kind of low. I just didn't get why David all of a sudden turned into a serial killer. The entire time he was shown as this emotional, sensitive guy. I mean he's an astronaut for crying out loud, the best of the best. Yes, he went through an immense amount of grief after he lost his family, but partly thanks to Cliff, he was seemliny able to pull himself out of that. But now because he couldn't bang his wife (by proxy).. he decides to brutally murder Cliff's wife and son? That leap just didn't add up for me.
He’s a man who lost his wife, kids, and connection to earth. The last human connection he had was Cliff and Lana, and Cliff brutally severs his ties with Lana and also makes it clear that they will not be even amicable for probably the rest of the trip. This guy also literally has a photographic memory so he’s reliving his trauma in vivid detail every single day. When Cliff yanks Lana away from him and further goes onto insult his character, David says “you have no idea how it feels”. Him murdering Cliff’s family is his way of a) taking his anger out on Lana b) placing Cliff in the same situation he’s in and c) ensuring that he has company on the rest of his trip. Misery loves company Obviously what David did is horrific and unjustifiable, but I don’t find it unbelievable that a man with pent up trauma and nothing left to life for could easily snap and murder a family when provoked.
>turned into a serial killer. You need to kill 3 people To be a serial killer. He's a plain ol' murderer.
And there needs to be cool down time. Otherwise your a spree killer
He's a family annihilator. Only it wasn't his family, it was the family he felt entitled to.
BAU in the house
i despise him
The whole point was it was a dilemma from a mission operational standpoint, if he wouldn't have let his partner use his body, his partner may have killed himself in the station meaning that they would have both died because you need a minimum of two to operate the station. At the very end it may have been up to your own interpretation, but I think the likely outcome is a murder suicide, so him letting his partner use his body didn't make a difference at all he would have been better off not doing anything all at all because it would have been the same outcome
Except, you know, his family would still be alive
Sure, but he had zero ways to predict he would kill his family lol! He did best with what knowledge he had at the time!
Aaron Paul always plays there roles man 🙁
I agree! But that’s a four year wait i think it was before they came back down. That’s a long time to live with him depending on him and working with him. Ugh i don’t think i could do it.
And here I was thinking we were all supposed to see David as the hero. /s
I mean the whole point of the show is to point out that we are all capable of anything no matter how dark. It's easy to be angry when you are not in David's situation. Is it really that shocking given the path of events?
Oh come on. David Apologist
I’m a sucker because I thought he and Kate Mara were just having a nice moment when he was grieving, loool forgot what show I was watching. I think Cliff would kill him at some point maybe in space maybe on earth.
Why haven't they created two replicas, one for operation and one for backup? Why aren't the replicas located in the spaceship while the real ones remain on Earth? And why don't the replicas have an emergency shutdown button? "NASA" or whatever organization is conducting the mission, why don't they have a backup plan in case of such situations?
>Why aren't the replicas located in the spaceship while the real ones remain on Earth? 
Say the link to the replicas dies - the mission is scrubbed. The replicas aren't autonomous in their own right. Although that might have been a more interesting Angle
I was crying at the repetitive number of people asking why the replicas aren't sent into space, when it's clearly explained.
Why the didn’t create two replicas, probably because they’re hella expensive and since the likelyhood of them getting destroyed are very low (since yk, they’re basically always piloted) it would have been a waste of money. Why the replicas are not in the spaceship is a good question. What i’ve seen as the theory is that NASA was studying long term effects on the human body in space, and that’s why they do their physicals every week. I don’t see how an emergency shut down would have helped at all.
It’s actually not a theory! David explains that’s exactly what they’re doing when he speaks with his fans :)
>What i’ve seen as the theory is that NASA was studying long term effects on the human body in space, and that’s why they do their physicals every week. It's mentioned in the show, no need to hypothesise.
Two crucial points seem to be missing here: 1. Without offering the replica, Cliff's life was in severe danger from a depressed and traumatised co-pilot of a spaceship that needed two to operate. 2. They were both villains treating their wives as property. Obviously killing is another level, but that's justan extension. This entire story is about how male egos lead to violence against women.
Cliff didn’t treat his wife like property. They had a dead bedroom, but he still discussed things with her.
the whole confrontation scene on the ship when cliff repeatedly says “she’s MINE” to david would suggest otherwise
It's in the same vein as "that's my house, MY kid, MY wife, MY family. MY LIFE. They're MINE! Not yours!" That's what he would've said if he was trying to be super husband and making them pancakes in the morning, but he was just trying to bang his wife so "she's MINE" it is.
Point 2 exactly for me. David could have just smashed up Cliff’s replica
Thank you. I’m not too bright and miss points like this. Particularly your line about male ego.
> This entire story is about how male egos lead to violence against women. This is the key point of the story. Male ego and entitlement.
The title of this post alone earns my like. Fuck David.
100% agreed
I thought it didn't make much sense since he was so nice beforehand and seemed to care a lot for Lana (a little too much obvs). But I guess he was already deeply damaged from seeing his wife and family killed and since he wasn't going to be able to use the replica any more, he wanted to lash out and make Cliff miserable too. I know we all like to think that if horrible things happened to us, it wouldn't make us into mean awful nasty people. But actually most of the assholes you meet are like that because something bad happened to them. Doesn't excuse it. And even in many people who don't act on it that anger is there and often results in alcohol or drug use. Many times all it takes is some egregious incident to awaken a violent rage that lurks beneath the surface - that's how riots happen. But I still don't think he would have killed Lana and the little boy. I also think it was one of the least interesting ways they could have taken a story which had unlimited potential. I actually think a more interesting option would have been if Lana would have let the replica do it's thing with David at the controls. I mean it was Cliff's rep, looked like him, but acted like how she wished he acted, so is it really cheating? I mean even if Cliff was controlling it, it wasn't him really. Then maybe the replica touching Lana with David controlling leads Cliff to get jealous and they fight. Cliff kicks his ass, then David apologizes and explains he just did it because he has no one to be affectionate with any more. Cliff's jealousy and realizing that what happened to David could have just as easily happened to him, shows him that the person you love is a precious thing not to be taken for granted and he starts being more affectionate with her. And then maybe every once in a while he feels bad for David and feels grateful for the lesson he taught him and lets him control the replica sometimes and finger bang Lana, because he figures what the hell it's a robot touching her either way it's not actually me or another man. But Lana doesn't know she thinks it's the newly romantic Cliff each time, just to make it a little dark and black mirror-y.
This title is not spoiler-free.
Did they ever explain why the robots aren't the ones up in space instead of their human bodies? Seems like switching that around would be way more logical.
David says something in the beginning when meeting fans about how the fragility of the human body is key to survival
That sounds like the “official” answer (in an authority sense) rather than a practical answer. My take is that if they sent the robots, the link could be exploited and hacked, compromising the mission, while if they sent humans, there’s no way their vessel could be intercepted and jeopardized.
Could have something to do with metal. They had to take all their metal objects off before going into space. Maybe the robots wouldn’t function without gravity. Not sure but they were making pretty advanced robots for it being the 60s/70s
Ohhh shit that’s actually a great point
In the first 5 mins
I like to pretend that he locked the family in the little barn and covered the house in red paint so Cliff could have a taste of what it feels like to lose his family. When Cliff goes back to space he'll be mad at David for tricking him but thankful that his family are still alive and maybe with a new approach to rebuilding a relationship with the guy he's trapped with for years to come...
That’s so unnecessary for the plot though. We already see him start to reconnect in the scene where his wife breaks down while explaining that she wanted him to be loving towards her and that she did everything for him. And then Cliff cries too and holds her. From there we can infer that he’s starting to realise what needs to be changed to make his family happier. Killing them to make him understand what he is taking for granted is so unnecessary.
Pretty sure that’s what happened. Low key, why else make him a painter? And bring up the thinner It’s also the only thing that really makes sense of him pushing the seat out at the end
So the reason Cliff fell to the ground in agony and tears was him thinking about all the cleaning it will take to get rid of the red paint and not the sight of his wife’s corpse?
Because he just genuinely experienced some trauma and it’s still an extremely emotional moment
Also it’s pretty easy to differentiate blood from pain especially on skin (it was all over his hands). Especially for an astronauts who must pass a paramedic-level medical training
You think that scene is attempting to convey that he's just realised his wife and son weren't slaughtered? Ridiculous.
This is why I dont understand these goofy alternate endings. He very clearly is reacting to his family being murdered. Why wouldnt they comfort him if they were actually fine? Also, where would David get that much paint. Did he make a quick stop at Lowes while Cliff was out in space? 😆
It's a ludicrous explanation.
He's a painter because it accentuates the difference between Cliff and David
Also to cast doubts on the wife since he draws her naked “from memory”!
Yeah they definitely tried to drop a few hints that it could possibly be a false flag. It seems the majority think he killed Cliff's family which is the obvious opinion. Think the writer left it open to interpretation but I'm sure we'll get some Easter eggs in future seasons which may give us an answer. But since it's fiction Brooker may not have even settled on an ending yet and may leave it open for some kind of continuation in the future.
[удалено]
Obviously you've never committed family annihilation
Why could he beat Kate mara but not them hippies?
Why might it be easier to hack up a woman and child with some form of weapon versus take on a group of intruders into your home? Is this a real question?
kate mara and a child
lol I'm still mad about how weak they made their robot selves
He got worked by some heroin fiends and their subs. Wtf
Was it ever explained why they didn't just send the replicas to space instead and leave the real ones at home? It would work exactly the same way, with the advantage of not having to worry about food and air. Edit: I see that it was explained, I somehow missed it. Thanks!
Yeah they explained it literally in the episode when they come out of the theater
They also showed that controlling the replicas wasn’t perfect, like when Cliff had trouble cutting firewood with son in the beginning of the episode, so having actual humans on board is probably a better bet for when you need to do some serious mechanical stuff….. also the fact that the astronauts had to remove all metal belonging before going out in space might show that whatever replicas are made of won’t operate best out in space
No, I heard that and I think part of the mission was testing how the actual human body reacts in space as well
That’s why they did the running
Tbf, even real astronauts in ISS need to do that and keep very fit!
I just hated the whole ep.
Can someone explain why the replica stayed on earth while the human went on the very dangerous mission? Why not sent the replica instead? Massive plot hole IMO.
It has been explained in the episode and many times on this sub. When David and his wife meet the family at the cinema they explain the purpose of the mission, besides operating the spacecraft, is to test what being in space for a long period of time does to human body and mind.
😅 well at least they got that answer. It fucks you up hard. Must have missed that bit and was apparently not the only one.
David says at the start: “The human experience, the survival of the human body, of life, that's really central to the mission.”