This week is a side story from the events of last week where we were left with a cliff hanger where Halan and Iris were tied up in what appeared to be an airlock. We are shown more background into Aster Calyx and see that she is as crafty and duplicitous as originally shown. She boards onto Beacon 90 seemingly as a trainee to learn more about how to operate a Beacon. She learns as much as possible and finds out there is a prisoner in one of the airlocks who was meant to be a human experiment that is to be terminated. She pulls a gun on the Beacon Keeper, forces a food shipment to go through the lane ahead of the military and imprisons the Beacon Keeper (Jocko) while she investigates the human experiment. She gets herself in a predicament and the show ends on a cliffhanger as the military arrive to the Beacon and order her to release her prisoners.
In this episode, we are shown that Aleph is as ruthless and cruel as seen in previous episodes. As this episode is based on events in the past, it's not clear on its bearing on current or future events however it could hint at a return for Aster in the show, perhaps facilitated by the anomaly since it has her body.
Trivia
- Jacko states that we've become emotionally reliant on AI and it's almost like the AI wants that and is unhealthy.
- If, as happened on Beacon 2, the AI mistakes the beacon keeper as an intruder and tries to kill him, pull the Roland chip from he mainframe. The Roland chip was named after Beacon 2's Beacon Keeper.
- Operation Burza, the largest airlift since Edymion.
- UGMC Douglasson is the ship en route to Beacon 90 and is a Class 2 Gunship
Characters of interest this episode
Unaswered questions
- The same symbol on Aster's pendant is in the rocks as seen under microscope. How are they connected?
- How and in what way does Aster's pendant affect Aleph (and only Aleph)?
- Why and how is imprinting on multiple (or infinite) humans a big deal? It seems to be related to an inherent programmed need within the AI. From an audience/outsider perspective, it does not seem to be important at all.
- How many column members are left? How many star systems are involved? How many total beacons are there?
- Are the rocks coming back?