Monday 6 May 2013

Space Brothers - Episode 56

The trials and tribulations of their survival training might be open, but it still informs Mutta and company's next task as they set about building a rover as part of the so-called "Comeback Challenge".

Having finished last from their time in the desert, the group are faced with not only no choice of engineer to assist then, leaving them with the unmotivated drunkard that is Pico, but also a smaller budget than other teams.  Even with Mutta's engineering know-how, can they really hope to succeed at this task?  Pico certainly seems prepared to write them off immediately, but just what is his deal anyhow?


Needless to say, this episode takes us through Pico's story, explaining that he isn't a direct NASA employee but rather a sub-contractor who is in fact the project manager of the parachute system tasked with ensuring that the Orion capsule lands back on Earth safely.  Pico was also heavily involved with creating a parachute system for the mission which ended in Brian Jay's fatal accident, but as the story unfolds it becomes clear that, no matter his own feelings, it wasn't actually Pico who was at fault.  Regardless of this, there's still a rover to be built, so can anything motivate Pico to actually help his charges?  Mutta might just be the man with the ability to do just that...

Perhaps unsurprisingly, another week brings another terrific episode of Space Brothers - the unraveling of Pico's story was superbly engineered, bringing a sting in its tale that was emotionally affecting and cast an entirely different shadow over Pico's character, while there's plenty to be interested about in terms of the current challenge facing Mutta and his comrades to boot.  In other words, Space Brothers is back to its best yet again; but did we ever doubt that it would be?

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