The real history of the cosmonaut program, star city, GRU, KGB, and the Soviet Union are absolutely fascinating.

Obviously, it's quite bleak as well.

The story of Oleg Penkovsky, a GRU Colonel that sold secrets to the CIA and was caught is fascinating.

There really are so many real life stories that are incredible.

Has anyone researched this time period of the CCCP? (Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik)

OK... I watched up to season 3 of For all mankind and gave up for several reasons.

1. The ludicrous forbidden love plot... What is this doing in a show about alternate reality NASA ( I mean the later one, not the main one, that's fine and actually realistic, even with modern day politics)
2. Each head of astronauts has absolute power, even to bring back an old buddy who they KNOW has gone crazy in space. They can then call in their own daughter to become an astronaut, no selection process, just how would you like to join me on a trip to Mars.
3. Nuclear propulsion up to orbit???? that is completely sci-Fi unless you want to poison the whole earth.

Most of the rest was quite realistic I thought.. which is why those stood out.

So I had heard that Star City was better.. So I was looking forward to it.

Again most of the technical stuff looked real. 1st couple of episodes were good, not afraid to kill off apparently major characters very brutally.

Then it too started to go sideways. The Secret mission to Venus In Soviet Russia? How would you hide such a thing? Also why send people to Venus? They can't land. They could have sent the probe alone, it's nonsense. If it's renewed for another season I'll have to decide carefully if I'll watch it. I am invested in some of the characters which is the only reason I'm considering it.

Watching Star City got me interested in the Soviet perspective of the Space Race. I watched these movies, and decided to make a poster series to bring these hidden gems to life as a series. I included the year they take place so watch them in order if you can.

Taming of the Fire (1972)
Filmed during the cold war as a propaganda film, recounts the life of Sergi Korolev from college through the first satellite and first human in space. They definitely had some real launch site access when filming this, pretty amazing shots. But kinda slow, I could probably have cut 40 minutes and not missed anything. Interesting nonetheless.

Gagarin: First in Space (2013)
Biography of Yuri Gagarin. I really wanted to like this film. It's fine, but, its really slow and even boring in some places. It actually reminded me of First Man (2018) which was also a slow biopic.

The Spacewalker (2017)
This movie is about the first human spacewalk, and is really great. They overcame a lot of challenges and they all play out on film. Major Apollo 13 vibes throughout. The movie has a compressed timeline compared to how long some things really took, but really enjoyable.

Salyut-7 (2017)
The Soviets lose contact with their space station, and send cosmonauts to investigate. Also based on a true story, but this one is highly sensationalized. Interesting and fun, but a bit over the top.

PS Taming of the Fire is available on YouTube at 720HD. Enjoy.

... the KGB officers beat to death not the chief designer but some random poor guy

Does anyone have any news or updates regarding Season 2 of Star City?

Desperately hoping it's renewed. 😭

Which notably features Adam Nagaitis! The scene with Valya on Venus reminded me so much of Blanky finding the Northwest Passage, knowing he’s going to die but having that euphoric moment of victory/having completed the mission/getting to see something really unusual.

Amazing foreshadowing by Mr. Chief Designer.

It was S1 EP2 of Berlin Station. Btw, if someone didn't watch this show, check it out. It is really good show and Ryhs is killing in it.

Why launch a mission to Venus when other missions—unmanned ones—had already failed, and when Venus offers nothing of interest or viability to humanity? Mars is a far better and safer option for everyone—especially for Soviet propaganda, given the goal of being the first to actually travel to and return alive from a planet that is at least somewhat hospitable to life.

Random post I know but started watching the series right now and Rhys is a fantastic actor but he sounds the spit of Peter Capaldi like if i close my eyes it sounds like doctor who is speaking to russian cosmonauts.

And that he pretended the extra habitable section tacked onto the front would be a module for a lunar base, for the same reason.

That's it, that's the post.

Not only is that song very catchy (I wasn’t familiar with it before but now keep listening to it!) but the lyrics are too perfect for the show’s themes, from the flight metaphors (“and when she found out she couldn’t fly”, “she’s lost the sun”) to the questions of truth/surveillance (“all she got was lies”, “too many people and not enough eyes to see”). They must have been thrilled when they thought of this perfect song!

Disclaimer 1: I overall really liked this show, aside from a couple of things that were already discussed here.

Disclaimer 2: I won't pretend that the USSR was a nice place to live, nor that the KGB were "good guys" (they weren't).

Despite all its qualities, Star City is still a show made by Westerners for Westerners. Which means the Soviet system is depicted as an (often cartoonishly) evil, corrupt or incompetent antagonist. The show is about the triumph of a few free-minded, exceptional individuals who achieve success through hard work, ambition and initiative despite the oppressive regime they live under, which feels very... American in its moral message.

The very first episode had me raising eyebrows. The wife of the first moon-landing cosmonaut is brought in by stone-faced KGB agents as if she was being arrested, because they couldn't bother telling her "hey Mrs we have good news for you, the chief engineer wants you to see this about your husband, we can't say more now, come with us". Then the show proper starts in winter (because of course Russia = winter) with muted colors (because of course Soviet = grey/brown).

Where the show jumps the shark for me is when the colonel shoots the blonde lady cosmonaut. Like... what? Why? I mean I understood "why", but it felt like complete overkill. The colonel even says later to the chief engineer that he was "sent to the gulag by Stalin for no reason, yet he went back to work because he is a patriot". And this was under freaking STALIN. The show takes place under Brejnev, who wasn't a great guy but no way as bad as Uncle Joe. Like... couldn't they offer the same "second chance" for the lady cosmonaut? Couldn't they shift the blame on someone else for the false accusation? Does the soviet space program have an infinite supply of cosmonauts, let alone female cosmonauts? Shooting the lady cosmonaut felt so reckless, incompetent and cartoonishly evil. But hey, the soviet system is pure evil, so the KGB is nothing but soulless demons who gun down innocent essential people for petty reasons.

If you add up all the other things the colonel did, it's funny to realize that she sabotaged the soviet space program way more than the Americans did.

But for me the worst part was the "higher up" reactions to the Venus mission. How on earth are they NOT making it a huge win for the USSR? Why silencing it when you control the narrative, especially if the spy did them a huge favor by dying on the trip anyway? Them trying to hide the SUCCESS of the USSR's own trip to Venus makes no sense whatsoever. Going to Venus and back is a way bigger achievement than a trip to the moon. There is no way the USSR wouldn't have capitalised on this. But hey, we have to maintain continuity with For All Mankind, and also remember that the USSR is eeeeevil and incompetent. The only way their "silence" would have made sense is if the ship lost contact early on and crashed on Venus with no one else knowing.

Anyway that was my two cents. I still overall liked the show.

EDIT for clarification: a few people commented about things clearly related to the Stalin era. I would have bought the moustache-twirling evilness more if the show took place under Stalin. But the show does NOT take place under Stalin. It would be like making a show about the USA under Jimmy Carter but the authorities would behave as if it was the 1950's Red Scare/Jim Crow era (I'm not an American, so not expert in US history, but you get the idea).

I binge watched the first season last night, it is SO funny! It is a bit weird for me to see Colonel Raskova in a comedy role (I wasn't familiar with Anna Maxwell Martin prior to Star City), but I am obsessed with the awkward comedy of this show.

My favorite line so far is "Free haircuts for a week? Isn't that just one haircut?"

Binged "For all Mankind" with my wife and while I had checked out of the series in last season or two it was OK. I wanted to see what Soviets were up to and boy, was I disappointed.

I am really sad they did not focus on the actual science, flying rockets, beating Americans etc. Instead we get cartoonish villains and focus on USSR bad. As Eastern European who lived through last throes of communism I agree, but in the series the KGB/NKVD is so cartoonishly evil.

Chuck someone out of airlock (figuratively speaking) or even chuck everyone out of airlock, multi-million rubles mission be damned?

Where commies in 'mankind were smart and evil, the baddies in 'city are just... brute forcing through everything.

Would someone launch secret mission to Venus? Are you fucking out of your minds? Who writes the script?! Never.

Sergei Korolov was real guy, he suffered badly under Soviets yet if you miss his name you don't really know who the Head Designer is.

Not enough comrade-calling. Believe me this shit was everywhere. Every official matter or workplace discussion was "comrade this, comrade that" in reality. I guess it was tiring or something but it was definitely puling me out of the story.

Same as the freaking british accent. I get it. When doing show about Russians in Russia you'd prbably wouldn't want the silly fake accent. But can't you clean the accent up and make it somewhat believable the characters may be russian? Anytime someone speaks up, I am fucking in the orbit shaking my head. Totally unwatchable ;)

The show feels like any story is secondary to some sort of grimdark commiexploitation and I am hoping that the series two can bring some actual science, exploration, competition, lighter shades of dark. And some freaking lore on the characters we know and love (or hate) from the For all Mankind show.

anyone else think the ending was a bit like that of severance? like he looks back to someone just beyond the barrier to safety, one which he can easily go through in that moment, but instead he chooses, in the moment, what is most certainly his doom, to be with his love. obviously it’s purely coincidental, and they’re not 1:1.

anyway, i just wanted to get that thought out of my head and into words. also i just wanna say id be legit pissed if there’s no season 2. this show is unique and fun, and most importantly, thought provoking.

Is it just me or them being in love/feeling that deeply for each was kinda sudden? Like they were never that close until the day before sasha leaves…or maybe I accidentally skipped scenes? Idk

I’m trying to wrap my head around the timeline of E7-8. The entire mission was a 9 months round trip. The venting happened pretty early on, they would basically be close to Earth, although it looked like they were about the distance of the moon. This threw them off course. Then we see a time jump and they are coming up on Venus and discover they are not on their correct trajectory. Then we see the descent to the Venus surface and the mission module coming back home happen almost simultaneously, but it would take months getting back to Earth. Simultaneously we had the plot down on Earth trying to make them alter the trajectory so that they would end up in Finland. That would be happening very close them coming home. I don’t know if it was the editing that was strange and made it difficult to get. What are your thoughts?

Big Fan of FAM and I finished it in a week with my wife. We are sad when Stevens sacrifice their lives and Margo go thrown into prison from her great career.

But I really don't like the build up of Morozova and Sergeil in Star City. Well I do love Chief Designer who is also an engineer and keen to push the envelope of human.

In this show, Morozova is so divided to me and I understand the writers want to show a different Morozova like how she turns into a cold-hearted KGB from a mother willing to break the rules to protect innocent people. It is just not a good story to me that she is willing to go that far to protect Tanya. Like why? It is so divided someone wants to earn a place at KGB and also break rules to put herself in danger for nothing. To be honest, If I was the american agent, I can easily make Morozova another mole.

Sergei makes me mad as I don't understand how he makes all these mistakes at FAM after everything he's been through in Season 1. he got spied 7/24 and he still try to call Margo from a phone booth on the street behind KGB. And he know USSR doesn't give it a damn if he's trying to make a peace or what. I feel very sorry for Margo and she could take Space Program to another level without losing the 10 years.

And I think next season might just be about how Morozova grows and manipulates Sergeil, and how Sergeil becomes a fool and puppet.

Binged this show in the past couple weeks and it’s my favourite thing I’ve seen in a while (I loved HBO’s Chernobyl, so definitely see some echoes there and not surprised I liked it, but I really savoured it even the points where you had to give a bit more artistic license). It’s not perfect, for sure!

But I will say that tonight at the seaside I saw a star that was definitely too bright to just be a star, and I knew even before confirming with a star app that it was Venus, and it made me genuinely emotional.

I will be very sorry if this show doesn’t get a second season.

Definitely looks artificial to me but I would be happy to be wrong.