apple tv | At Home with Tech

March 31, 2024

What the Heck is Happening in the Sci-Fi Series Constellation?

If you want to understand what’s going on in this Apple TV+ show, you’d better pay attention to all the details. And that may not be enough. Here’s my review.

Confusion abounds. Reality warps. It’s hard to keep track of all the fleeting clues. Watching science fiction was so much easier when Spock had a beard.

Spoiler Alert: Yes, the Apple TV+ series “Constellation” suggests a multiverse. There, I’ve said it. But this is no Marvel movie. Yes, it’s starts in space on the International Space Station. No, there are no aliens. Yes, things get weird.

Actually, the writers of this eight-episode show would probably be angry with me for wrongly connecting this tale to the multiverse. It’s about quantum entanglement. There, now I’ve said that.

Every Detail Matters
Either way, before you know it, you don’t know what’s going on. Nothing makes sense.

Across this first season’s arc, the writers slowly fill in key details that help you figure out what’s really happening. Barely.

“Constellation” plays more like a mystery than sci-fi. But you’d better know your science fiction. And while you’re at it, bring along your understanding of science facts too (especially your knowledge of the end of the Apollo space program).

And you’ve got to pay attention. Really pay attention. The truth is out there, but it’s hard to keep everything straight in this wonky, reality-bending family-focused story.

Family Crisis
The family in question is our astronaut hero Jo played by Noomi Rapace, her often-frustrated husband played by James D’Arcy and their precocious and ‘Force’-sensitive ten-year-old daughter played by twins Davina Coleman and Rosie Coleman. (The casting itself is a plot giveaway.)

Sure, the pressures of modern life can wear on a family unit, and many movies explore this space. But the story brings new meaning to the phrase, “I don’t know you anymore.”

There’s also a former astronaut played by Jonathan Banks running a secret experiment on the ISS. He seems to have all the answers, like the Cigarette Smoking Man from “The X-Files.”

Reality is Not a Constant
The series begins with an accident on the ISS and Jo’s harrowing escape. But when she gets back home, it’s not exactly the same. Certain details have changed.

By the end of the disturbing first season which mostly takes place on terra firma, after hours of a drip-drip, wash and repeat story-telling structure, it does finally come into a partially satisfying focus. Barely.

“Constellation” takes it time and throws a lot of genres at you. Science fiction, mystery, suspense and even a dash or horror.

It’s different. I’ll give it that.

Did I like it? I’m not sure. Maybe. Perhaps some version of me did. (Ha ha.)

Yes, it’s well done, and the actors are great. But the filmmakers really needed to leave a few more crumbs along the way for less detail-oriented viewers to follow (guilty).

Will There be a Season 2?
And I’ve got to say that the traditional season-ending cliffhanger is particularly frustrating here when there’s no guarantee there will be a second season. (As of this post, a second season of “Constellation” has not been announced.)

Maybe it would be better if it all ends right here. Episodic mysteries that involve science fiction often have a difficult time getting to their own finish lines in a completely satisfying way. It’s all about the mystery… not the pay off. And that’s often a problem.

“Lost” got lost. “The X-Files” never really wanted to find the truth.

Houston, We have Another Problem
“Constellation” could be different. Who knows. But the producers need a green-lit second season, if we’re ever going to find out.

Of all the many remaining loose ends, the most disturbing one for me is the Apollo program inconsistency the show doesn’t even acknowledge is a reality-bending problem.

Do you want a real spoiler?

Two words. Apollo 18.

Enough said.

July 2, 2023

I Time Traveled to 1979 and into the Film Set of The Crowded Room at Rockefeller Center

I accidentally ended up walking through a scene from “The Crowded Room” on Apple TV+ right before filming began. Here’s what happened.

I walked quickly to work in New York City last summer. The day was July 5th, and I experienced something of a spatial anomaly. Before I knew it, I was suddenly transported in time back to 1979.

I knew the year was really 2022, but reality started to warp around me pretty quickly as I crossed through Rockefeller Center.

I Entered a Time Bubble
To the right, I noticed a film crew and a group of actors hanging out between takes next to the famous ice-skating rink landmark. The extras were all dressed in hideous outfits from the 1970s. I didn’t immediately think much about it. (I grew up in New York.)

I turned my gaze forward and approached a woman in black wearing a headset and clutching a clipboard. She seemed very 2022.

As I passed her and took an immediate left to walk west on 50th street towards Radio City Music Hall, I sensed a small commotion behind me and vaguely heard something about the street now being closed to pedestrians. I kept walking.

I looked ahead and was stunned by what I saw. The entire street had been reversed four decades. It was as if I had walked through a time bubble and popped out in the 1970s.

The cars…the signs…the people. All transformed.
Even Radio City Music Hall had signage promoting an upcoming Frank Sinatra performance.

Had my mind been somehow captured, and I was relocated into another season of “WandaVision?”

I Crashed a Scene from “The Crowded Room”
Not exactly. In fact, I was walking through a scene of “The Crowded Room,” starring Tom Holland on Apple TV+.
I had inadvertently slipped through right before a street scene was to be filmed. All of the extras were in place, and it was as if I were an extra too.

For the next two minutes, I walked through 1979, appreciating all of the design work that had been done to bring this famous street back to another era. And then there were the dozens of extras, all seemingly transported here from the ‘70s. That actually felt really weird and slightly destabilizing.

It’s interesting how easily it is to disrupt your sense of normal, even if you know what’s going on.

Return to Reality
As I approached Sixth Avenue, I saw another crew person in black holding back other versions of me wanting to take the same trip back in time. They were too late.

I popped out of the time bubble and reentered 2022. I heard people yelling behind me to ‘stand by’ and ‘take your places.’

I didn’t look back. I had my moment back in 1979, and I was satisfied.

And no, I didn’t brush past Tom Holland or any other movie stars. (That might have actually ruined my immersion into the past.)

It was just another New York moment:
July 5, 2022 at 8:40am.

You never know what you’ll see on the streets of New York City.

March 6, 2022

How to Pack your Streaming Apps for your Next Vacation Movie Night

After a fun vacation day on the slopes, my family settled in for a movie on our hotel room TV. Here’s how we did that using my existing Apple ecosystem.

I recently returned from a little skiing vacation with my family at Mount Bousquet in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. We hadn’t been on the slopes for a couple years due to the pandemic, so it felt great to practice some downhill again. (That’s our son having fun on a snowboard in my above photo.)

Pack your Apple TV for your Next Vacation
During our time in the hotel room, I tried using a particularly useful vacation tech trick I’d learned a while back. I had brought our Apple TV puck with us with the intent to jack it into the hotel’s WiFi network. This would allow me to access our entire arsenal of streaming apps and create movie nights using the room’s big TV screen. (Doing this effectively sidesteps having to purchase anything additional from a hotel as long as the base-level WiFi can handle streaming.)

Sadly, the streaming apps on my Apple TV didn’t work this time, because the hotel’s WiFi required a multiple-step login process, which the Apple TV couldn’t access beyond the password step.

Fortunately, I had also packed a lightning to HDMI adapter for my iPhone. (It’s always good to have a backup plan, when vacation movie night hangs in the balance.)

Apple Lightning Digital AV Adapter

Using this dongle, I was able to substitute in my iPhone as the streaming source and connect it directly to our hotel room’s HDTV via its HDMI cable. Then, my iPhone effortlessly served up the Disney movies we wanted via its Disney+ app.

Tech Ethics
You could say my streaming strategy unfairly took advantage of the hotel’s WiFi network, possibly slowing down WiFi speeds for others. But my iPhone ended up tethering to its cellular connection using its AT&T wireless data plan. So I don’t have to debate tech ethics here (not this time).

I pay for unlimited data on my AT&T account. So, in a sense, I’m already paying full price for my movie tickets while streaming. That said, I’m very happy not to be concerned about blowing through any data limits while on vacation!

Ensuring that Screen Time = Family Time
And why all my effort to project a movie onto a hotel room’s TV? Can’t an iPad or iPhone screen suffice during vacation? Not for me and my family. If you’re also a parent with kids, I imagine you might agree that screen time is a complicated topic.

The last thing I want to do is generate more opportunity for little eyeballs to stare at little screens, separate from the larger family focus.

If there is to be movie screen time on vacation, it’s great when it’s part of a larger family activity…experienced together.

Vacation Tech Joy
When bringing extra tech with you to create your family movie nights on vacation, please don’t forget to pack up all of the pieces before you leave. (Adapters have a way of disappearing if you’re not careful.)

And do put the hotel TV cabling back together. The next family may just want to turn on the TV without ‘Frankensteining’ together their own mini movie theater.

Nevertheless, I do enjoy screaming “It’s alive!” whenever I get my vacation TVs to work. A little tech joy always adds to my overall vacation experience.

In fact, I highly recommend it.

Tag: apple tv

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