“Space might be the final frontier but it’s made in a Hollywood basement” This is a phrase from the Red Hot Chilie Pepper’s famous song Californication that I remembered while watching Netflix’s series Away (2020). The ten episodes talks about Emma Green (Hilary Swank) an American astronaut on a mission to Mars along with her international colleagues: Kwesi a British botanist, Lou a Chinese chemist, Ram an Indian surgeon, and Misha a Russian engineer.
The mission would take three years and the five of them had been trained strenuously by NASA to accomplish it. What I liked most about the series is that it wasn’t technical and boring as most sci-fi shows are. This one was more of a drama where emotions and philosophical views are openly displayed. Also, the day-to-day lives of astronauts are shared with much insight of: what they do to kill time? How communication with base and families is? And how families and astronauts cope especially when problems arise whether they’re domestic on earth or technical in the sky.
The pressure is tremendous and both sides must find ways to cope with the new reality: anything could go wrong and lives of loved ones are at stake when they’re light years away from each other. Hilary Swank perfects her role as the astronaut torn between her duties as a wife and a mother and a leader of her group. Her skills are constantly questioned by everyone surrounding her- especially Lou and Misha who gang up on her- and this causes her a tremendous amount of pressure that sometimes affect her judgement.
Obviously, not everyone is cut for this complicated job and she’s reminded of that constantly by her two rivaling colleagues. The choice of actors was good too and the chemistry and dynamics between them all made the show entertaining. One thing that I found curious was the year of streaming the series as it was the year of the Covid-19 pandemic, which coincided with an aspect that we all shared with the astronauts in the series: how does it feel to be locked up in a limited space with others that you think you know too well? In the series-as in real life- conflicts were inevitable due to different cultures and belief systems yet most importantly: how does Emma and her group solve them? There were moments of cliché when American values are preached to the communist and the former-communist alike-who kept mentioning ‘motherland’-especially when it came to gender roles and preferences.
The British botanist seems to be relying heavily on his faith that at times you wonder if he went through the two years technical training like everyone else — not to mention being forever confused about the ship’s operations- and the Indian surgeon is too smitten by his American leader that he’s willing to sacrifice himself many times for her sake.
Moreover, while the whole crew’s background stories are narrated in different episodes as flashbacks, Ram’s story is merely mentioned as he kept emphasising that there was no one waiting for him back home — with the unconvincing excuse of being a womanizer — which contradicts with his Asian culture where extended families exist and matter. An interesting technical glitch that was pointed out on IMDB was the crews’ tears that streamed down their cheeks instead of floating; a hazard to the ship’s instruments. The series end with the crew landing on Mars but unfortunately the viewers won’t find out what happens next as the show was canceled after the first season. However, Away bears a message of hope where humanity prevails when realising how different yet similar we are.
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