The landing of the first humans on Mars is one of the most important events in NASA's history. In the season three finale of "For All Mankind," it was revealed that the answer could be moreterrestrial.
Major plot points from the third season of "For All Mankind" can be found in the following paragraphs.
The alternate space history series " For All Mankind" on Apple TV Plus has come a long way since its first season debut, when the show's timelines split off from reality. The space race ended in the early 1970s because of the rivalry between the US and Russia.
The second season ended with a post-credits scene that took place on the surface of Mars.
When they did the boots at the end of the second season, they didn't know who they were, according to Ben Nedivi, who was the show's co-showrunner. In this season, we left it open to be explored.
A few minutes into the third season finale, the same scene plays out again, only this time, the camera pans out to reveal that the boots belonged to the sole survivor of a North Korean mission. The first person to step foot on the Red Planet was Lieutenant Colonel Lee Jung-Gil.
In this era, they invested a lot into their program. In our alternate history, where the real race is what you're able to do in space, it was only natural that a country like ours. It felt like an extension of what happened in real history.
"We're not saying that North Korea has the same space program as the US or the Soviet Union." Getting people back from Mars is one of the hardest parts of the project. They would roll the dice in a big way in order to get that recognition. They pulled it off despite being one in a million shots.
For a show that focuses on space exploration, the reveal of a North Korean Mars landing might be enough to call it a season.
We came into season three with the idea of trying to reference the Oklahoma City bombing, which was a major event in the 90s and played on this kind of simmering political resentment in society at the time that
Just as a key maneuver is underway at Mars, a bomb is planted at NASA Mission Control. At least two key individuals who have been part of "For All Mankind" since the show's start have lost their lives as a result of the explosion.
In our alternate timelines, NASA is driving innovation and positive developments in technology, but then there is also an unforeseen consequence to those, like the idea of Helium 3 changing the energy sector and suddenly there's no more global warming, but a ton of people. There was a feeling that certain people were getting left behind as the economy boomed in the 90s. To have the blame for that instead of the U.S. government being more focused on NASA was the right touch point for us.
There is a lot of unknown about where "For All Mankind" is headed, even more so than between the previous seasons and their decade long jumps in time. The locations that were common to all three seasons were destroyed in the blast.
Nedivi said that part of the show's spot-on recreation of NASA's historic Mission Control was a moment where they all looked at each other and wondered if they were really destroying this perfect set. We felt like we had to destroy these sets to capture the idea of this bombing.
"For us, walking into that set after the fact and seeing not only Mission Control, but the center director's office, was very emotional, honestly, because we'd grown so attached to these places the same way I'm sure any worker who's worked in them would I believe that was the key to our success. We didn't want to cut to credits when we bombed. We wanted you to really feel the impact of that bombing in a way, where even this building, this room, which is sort of integral not only to the real space program but to our show, I think really brings home that idea of the tragedy.
The post-credit scene for the previous two years has offered a glimpse of where the show is going next, but there is no indication as to the state of space exploration in 2000.
Everyone wants to know what planet we're going to next. We knew we weren't doing that because we are not done with Mars. Nedivi thinks there's still a lot of story to tell. I think that end is a new world for us. As writers of the show, we feel like we're not showing enough of the Russian perspective because the show is built on the idea that the Soviet Union is still flourishing. We haven't been able to open the show to more of that perspective before, so it's possible that with Margo there we'll be able to do that.
It is almost like a new world. We have a version of a new planet.
You can watch all three seasons on Apple TV Plus.
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