Re: The Eternaut

On 2025-05-03 1:58 AM, shawn wrote:

On Sat, 3 May 2025 05:31:42 -0000 (UTC), BTR1701 <atropos@mac.com>
wrote:
 

On May 2, 2025 at 7:31:47 PM PDT, "Rhino" <no_offline_contact@example.com>
wrote:
>

What is an Eternaut you ask? If seems to be the translation of the
Spanish original title El Eternauta. When I looked it up, I got "The
Eternalist", which suggests Eternity. It's a science fiction series from
Argentina and it just dropped on Netflix this week.
>
I'm two episodes into it; there are four more to go in the first season.
>
IMDB rates it 7.7. The reviews there say it is based on an Argentinian
equivalent to a graphic novel from the 1950s that is apparently much
beloved among the Argentinians. There are many reviews that give it 9 or 10.
>
It is a hot summer day in Argentina when the story begins. A strange
light in the sky startles three young women in a boat just offshore.
Then, back on land, it begins to snow despite being hot out. The snow is
toxic: anyone who has snow land on them is dead in just a minute or so.
The main characters are playing cards at one of their houses when the
snow falls. All the power goes out as does cell service and all
electronics and even the gas for the stoves. One friend ventures outside
and drops dead before they understand how dangerous the snow is. All
over the city, anyone who was outside when it started snowing is dead.
The friends debate what to do and one of them finally improvises a
hazmat suit with a mask and goes outside to check on his daughter, who
is supposed to be a couple of miles away. He sees several people (and
pets) dead in the snow as he walks along.

>
Okay, if this snow is killing all fauna, you can expect the entire biosphere
to collapse in mere weeks. No food. Everyone dies. The end.

, That depends on how widespread the snow fall is. If it's only in the
surrounding area they will be fine. If it is worldwide then they are
all screwed. Given that power went out they may have no clue as to how
widespread the deadfall (my name for deadly snow) is.
 

I watched episode 3 after my post on this show and it becomes clear there that the problem is widespread; the host of the card game gets a shortwave radio working and manages to reach people in Uruguay and Brazil indicating that they are having the same problem. Whether it is worldwide though is unclear so it's conceivable that there will be aid from other countries in time. The guy who got the radio working also says the earth's magnetic field is "broken" and demonstrates with compasses that just spin and never settle on North.
Our next door neighbour, Mars, has virtually no magnetic field and this eventually allowed the vast majority of its atmosphere to bleed off into space. Mind you, that is reckoned to have taken millions of years so the human race isn't about to suffocate unless the aliens have figured out how to accelerate the bleeding off of the atmosphere....

According to IMDB, the story leads eventually to aliens but I haven't
seen any yet. I don't expect you'll recognize any of the actors unless
you're deeply familiar with Argentinian TV or cinema but you might like
the story anyway. I'm curious to know more about these aliens and what
they're trying to do.

 If you watch the trailer I posted you will see the aliens at the end.
Though I suppose that may not be the only aliens as those looked more
like living tanks than the sort of aliens that you would expect to
carry out such an attack.
>

At the end of episode 3, you hear some noises that might be aliens and see some reactions from an Argentinian but you don't actually *see* an alien.

One of the comments at IMDB says that the dubbed version of this show is
NOT very good so that you are better off with the subtitled version.
That's what I'm watching and it seems pretty satisfactory.

 Like I posted in the other post the English dub wasn't that good in
the trailer. Though I will say the voice actors towards the end of the
trailer did seem to do a better job. The first voice actors just
didn't do a good job of selling me on them being in this situation.
More like a cold reading from someone with little experience.

--
Rhino