‘For All Mankind’s Big Fight Has Been 30 Years in the Making

Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for For All Mankind Season 4 Episode 5.

Season 4 of the hit AppleTV+ science fiction series For All Mankind has our main characters making a go of it on Mars. The United States, Russia, North Korea, and the privately funded Helios Corporation are trying to work together gathering data on the Red Planet. Two of the show’s main characters going back to the first season in the late 1960s, Ed Baldwin (Joel Kinnaman) and Danielle Poole (Krys Marshall), lead Helios and the NASA team from America, respectively. In Episode 5, “Goldilocks” a large asteroid rife with precious Iridium, is discovered, and the leadership has to decide on the best and most equitable way to go about mining the rock. Things finally come to a head between Commander Poole and her XO (Executive Officer) Baldwin when they disagree on the necessary course of action. It is a heated exchange that has been simmering for over 30 years, dating back to when Baldwin was heading up NASA’s astronaut program and Poole was in training to vie to be the first woman in space.

For All Mankind

Exploring the possibilities that might exist if the global space race had continued and where humanity would be now.

Release Date

November 1, 2019

Main Genre

Sci-Fi

Seasons

4

Danielle and Ed’s Fight Has Been Simmering Since Early in the Show

In the first 10 minutes of the episode, Baldwin is insubordinate in front of the crew when she lays out a plan to capture Goldilocks. The two astronauts step out into the hallway and establish that Baldwin has been an asshole ever since Svetlana Zakharova (Masha Mashkova) was forced to return to Earth after she accidentally killed a colleague. Baldwin had grown close to Svetlana and looked as if he had more than just business in mind with her when Poole relieved her of her duties. Poole calls him out and extends an olive branch, maintaining that the two top officers need to work hand in hand for them to do their job and acquire what could be the largest resource ever found in outer space. There is an estimated 70,000 megatons of Iridium within Goldilocks with a value of close to 20 trillion dollars. Yes, that’s “Trillions” with a “T”!

So the stakes are high and Baldwin is not making things easy for Poole with his subversive and petty attitude. The two appear to handshake on an agreement to work in lockstep moving forward, but it doesn’t take long for Baldwin to break the agreement and get on Poole’s final nerve with his puerile behavior. The two had been at odds all season, starting with when Poole became aware of the terrible working conditions that Miles (Toby Kebbell) and the other equipment technicians were enduring. While she and Ed were living in comfort, the living conditions for the workforce stationed down below was terrible. Unsurprisingly, Ed doesn’t have a problem with it, while Danielle insists that the quality of their circumstance be improved.

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Within minutes of agreeing to work with Poole, Baldwin is acting like a complete ass again. He is running operations outside his purview that he should be taking to Poole. And he is also whining that she is micromanaging him. In reality, he is still bitter that he has to answer to a woman whom he used to have under his command way back in the ’70s and ’80s when he and dinosaurs like Deke Slayton (Chris Bauer) were running the show at the Lyndon Johnson Space Center. And let’s not act like her being a woman of color isn’t a factor in Baldwin’s irascible and surly attitude. Later, it is relayed to Poole that Baldwin is hiding a medical condition from Poole, so he is overcompensating for that as well. Baldwin is out of line and unfit for such an important job. Both emotionally and physically. The second argument is where the two drop all pretenses and finally get real about their personal biases (almost all Baldwin’s) and have them out. It is something that has been simmering near the surface of their relationship since before their days together at the Jamestown capsule in the ’70s in Season 1.

The tension between Poole and Baldwin is off the charts throughout the episode, and it finally explodes in the final scene. Whenever the two OGs of For All Mankind are in the same room, you can feel it. The tipping point is when Poole makes the right call and makes Baldwin step down from control duty because of his tremoring in hand. Naturally, Baldwin takes exception and denies there’s anything wrong with him, and he just doesn’t seem to know when to stop chirping. Eventually, Poole breaks and shouts at the top of her lungs, “Fuck you!…Fuck you! I have been putting up with your shit for the last 30 years. Watching you make wrong decision after wrong decision! Only thinking about yourself. Like you’re God’s gift to the cosmos! I have news for you, Ed Baldwin…you’re just a pathetic old man who doesn’t know when to call it a day!” Baldwin tries to counterpunch, but it is drowned out by the pent-up frustration and fury of Commander Danielle Poole. She continues to lay into him, saying, “You are relieved of your duties as XO.” Baldwin is helpless, “C’mon Danielle, don’t do anything you’re gonna regret.” But it falls on her deaf ears as well as the audience when she caps off the one-sided argument with quiet confidence, “I’ve got a lot of regrets, Ed Baldwin. But this ain’t one of them!”

Danielle’s Anger Is Justified and Comes From Many Places

Danielle Poole and Ed Baldwin have had a friendly rivalry ever since she became the first Black astronaut for NASA back in the first season of the show. Since that point, she has climbed hurdle after hurdle as a woman of color to get to where Baldwin is. If you’ve ever heard the expression, “Being born on third base.” It definitely applies to the difference between these two and it’s so cathartic to have Poole actually verbalize it. Baldwin is an old, white man whose path has been so much less turbulent and met with less resistance than Danielle’s. She has had to overcome the patriarchal structure and environment that was so firmly entrenched at NASA for decades on top of being a female woman of color. She has always been smarter, more prepared, and braver than Baldwin, and now she slaps him in the face with this reality. We’ve seen Baldwin fumble his way through so many things now, that this dressing down he gets feels like a release for an audience that has followed the lives of these characters for close to 40 years. What a great way to close out Episode 5 with an argument that has been a long time coming and one that needed to be had. We’re not going to lie, it feels good to see Ed get his comeuppance and for Danielle to be the one who delivers the message.

New episodes of For All Mankind stream every Friday on Apple TV+ in the U.S.

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