"Crossing The Line" is the seventh episode of the fourth season of For All Mankind. It was released on Apple TV+ on December 22, 2023.
Synopsis
A group on Mars takes drastic measures. Margo grapples with a new assignment.
Plot[]
On Happy Valley, the Helios workers are on day 7 of a strike aimed at ensuring that the asteroid Goldilocks is mined in Martian orbit, instead of Earth's. During a meeting between the striking workers and the M-7 members, Samantha argues with Dani, while Ed intermittently interjects. Dani argues that the cryo plant necessary for fuel refining needs to be made operational again, as they are over 100 tons of liquid methane short of what Ranger will need to capture Goldilocks.
On Earth, Eli Hobson and Irina Morozova speak over video, trying to find a solution to the strike, Irina puts forward a proposal to have the M-7 members on Mars restart the generators and begin refining fuel themselves. Eli counters that they are not trained, but Irina responds by saying that they are engineers and they will find a way. The striking Helios workers who have begun to fight amongst themselves, discover the plan, and block it by placing the base's supply of spacesuits onto the Martian surface, leaving no way to retrieve them or make it to the cryo plant 800m away. During a M-7 meeting, Palmer James puts forward an idea to use the grey water pipes connecting the plant and the rest of the base to get inside the cryo plant.
At Star City, Irina holds a meeting of Roscosmos, where a member of the meeting tries to link Helios and NASA, as they are both located in Houston. Margo laughs and says that she has met Dev Ayesa and he cares more about his own interests than America's. Irina says that their intelligence concurs with Margo. Margo then tables new calculations of the optimal intercept for Ranger, crediting Tatyana Volkova. After dismissing the meeting, Irina holds Margo back and tells her that a representative of Roscosmos is needed to travel to Houston to discuss the asteroid capture. Margo agrees and says that she will help the representative with the plans. Irina then informs her that President Korzhenko has asked for Margo to go personally. Margo tries to argue that the deal was that she will never need to go back and that Korzhenko only wants her, so as to "stick a finger in Gore's eye". Irina agrees, but tells her that the agreement has changed and it would be wise to accept the request.
Aleida goes on Eagle News to discuss the asteroid, but interviewer Zoey Chase instead asks about her relationship with Margo. Aleida is watching the interview back at home with her family, when she turns it off once the interview reaches a section where she is swearing and insulting Chase. Aleida's husband Victor Diaz then tells her that his brother texted that he enjoyed the part where she flipped Chase off as she was leaving. Aleida responds with surprise having forgotten she had done that. She then admits that she is just upset over Margo returning, that she was so happy she was alive when she first saw her again, but now wishes she was still dead. Victor then tells her to push back when she has to meet her.
Dev, Kelly and her son Alex land on Mars, with Dev helping ease Alex's nerves and pointing out the canyon that Happy Valley is located in, calling it their new home. Dani welcomes them to Happy Valley, while Ed meets his grandson for the first time, who who wants nothing to do with him and instead holds onto his mother. Palmer meets Dev and offers to show him around the base, before Dani takes over and says that she needs to speak to Dev on new developments. In Dev's new quarters, Dani asks his plans for the strike, as they are his workers, Dev says that he is still considering his options and blows off Dani's requests for information. Dani reminds him that it is her base and what she says goes, before leaving.
Dr Dimitri Mayakovski gives Alex a check up, before telling him about his father, and how they were friends and they would often play chess with each other with what ever was on hand. Alex says that he also plays chess and Dimitri says they should play one day. He then informs Kelly that Alex is healthier on Mars than he was on Earth.
The M-7 members of Happy Valley begin to traverse the grey water pipes, complaining about the journey, before arriving in the cryo plant, where they begin to bring it back online.
Ed, Kelly and Alex have dinner together, having spaghetti Kelly says that it's missing something, to which Ed agrees, before Kelly brings out a tube of Kraft parmesan cheese, an old favourite in the Baldwin household. Ed takes it and asks Alex if he wants some, Alex says no, but Ed still puts it on, Alex gets up and walks away, with Kelly reprimanding Ed for doing so and that he needs to get to know him first, instead of being a union organiser. Ed says that he is trying, but Kelly says there's more than one way to do things. Ed argues that if Goldilocks isn't taken to Mars orbit, then his idea of a Mar's colony will fail, and it will just be a backwater research station like McMurdo. Kelly who had worked at McMurdo asks what's wrong with that, before a knock at the door stops the conversation, as a helios worker calls for Ed to come as there's a problem.
In the Helios common room, the workers argue that their leverage is gone as M-7 is now in the cryo plant, but Maya Estime shows that she has taken the primary gas flow regulator, and that they will be unable to restart the generators without it. Back in the cryo plant, M-7 try to get it started, with Nick Jennings sent to check the condenser, although he finds it missing, he starts to bypass it which Mike Bishop argues against on safety grounds. Jennings tells him to relax as he has done jobs like this before. The plant is then restarted, although the pipes start to creak, and back in the command centre the readings begin to read red. Dani tells them to shut it off, but it is too late and there is an explosion in the cryo plant.
Aleida barges into Eli's office, arguing that Margo should not have diplomatic immunity and that she should not be allowed in the country, and specifically the building. Eli argues that his hands are tied and she has to come. Aleida says that she cannot work with her, but is cut off by news of the accident at Happy Valley.
There are chaotic scenes in the medical bay of Happy Valley as Dimitri is working on the victims of the explosion who have varying degrees of burns, but is overloaded with patients, Jennings passes away on the table as Bishop and striking Helio's workers look on.
Eli meets with Will Tyler and a CIA representative. Where it is revealed that there are 4 members injured, with one fatality. The representative says that they know that there is at least one KGB member on Happy Valley, while the CIA has their own member on the base. They go on to say that they have a weapon that will fire non lethal rounds, but will not pierce the walls of the Hab. Eli tells him that he will not institute martial law on Mars, Will then says that they can send up a security detail like the Moon Marines, Eli says that there would not be enough time to send them or train them, and even if they could, they almost caused World War 3 in the lead up to the Jamestown crisis. Will then says that there are already members with military experience on the base and they can deputise them and have them be the security force, to which Eli agrees.
Dani prepares the security force made up of M-7 members, they are then sent to try and find the reason for the explosion, they begin to search through the Helio's quarters, angering the workers and causing scuffles to break out. An impromptu meeting of the workers is held, where Ed says to keep the pressure up, to which Samantha says it has gone too far. Dev walks in creating a line with sugar on the ground, he says that he respects their negotiations and actions, but that the cryo plant is needed, and that the nations of Earth will never allow the asteroid to be brought to Mars, because it's not in their financial interest. He then promises to give them their demands for safety and pay, offering a deal that will give the first 100 members to cross the line he has created over $1 million each. Samantha tries to argue that he is just trying to buy them out, but Dev counters by asking if an abstract idea of togetherness is more important than their families back on Earth. One by one workers begin to cross the line, Ed insults them as they do and Samantha tries to stop them, but to no avail, By the end only Ed, Samantha and three other workers have not crossed. Ed congratulates Dev on killing Mars.
Margo arrives at the Cobb Space Center being welcomed by Eli, as protests are held over her arrival. She takes time to look at Molly Cobb's name on the centre, having last been there when it was the Johnson Space Center.
Dev enters Ed's quarters without knocking, Ed responds with anger, saying that Dev has some nerve to come see him after what just happened. Dev says he needs Ed's help to create a living, breathing Martian colony. Ed tells him that he just killed that, but Dev tells him that the strike showed how the workers were controlled by greed, and that Ed not crossing the line showed his resolve to Dev. Dev then asks if Ed wants to help him steal an asteroid.
Cast[]
Main Cast
- Joel Kinnaman as Edward Baldwin
- Toby Kebbell as Miles Dale
- Krys Marshall as Danielle Poole
- Edi Gathegi as Dev Ayesa
- Cynthy Wu as Kelly Baldwin
- Coral Peña as Aleida Rosales
- Tyner Rushing as Samantha Massey
- Svetlana Efremova as Irina Morozova
- Wrenn Schmidt as Margo Madison
- Daniel Stern as Eli Hobson
Guest Starring
- Robert Bailey Jr. as Will Tyler
- Dimiter D. Marinov as Ilya Breshov
- Myk Watford as Palmer James
- Goran Ivanovski as Dimitri Mayakovsky
- Jorge Diaz as Victor Diaz
- Santiago Veizaga as Javier Diaz
- Billy Lush as Mike Bishop
- Tess Lina as Veronica "Ronnie" Hunt
- Vinny Chhibber as Ravi Vaswani
- Thea Andrews as Zoey Chase
- David Bowe
as CIA Dep. Director Robert Burks
as CIA Dep. Director Co-Starring
- Ania Bukstein as Tatyana Volkova
- Salvador Chacon as Gerardo Ortiz-Niño
- Moses Jones as Rich Waters
- Jo Kelly as Maya Estime
- Emil Markov as Leonid
- Ezrah Lin as Alex Poletov
- Sebastiano Pigazzi as Luka Gurino
- Gene Silvers as Henry Keck
- Cindy Jackson as Holly "Sparks" Edmondson
- Magdalene Keh-Vick as Julie Musgrave
- Steph Evison Williamson as Geraldine Middaugh
- Sacha Seberg as Dimitri Egotov
- Will Vought as Jeremy Rust
- Michael Lee Joplin as Charlie Parfitt
- Chris Jaymes as Nick Jennings
- Sean Patrick Murphy as Nate Lowry
- Yavor Gadzhev as Pasha
- Paris Rose as Graciana Diaz
- Alex Cioffi as Tim
- Amy Schloerb as Tech Director
- Katarina Morhacova as Nina Rozhenkova
- Amdrew Hansen as Ops Controller - Howard
- Vivan Dugre as Ops Controller - Quintero
- Chris Alvarez as Astronaut
- Mike Gaines as Helios Shift Worker
Other
- John T. Hillman as Helios Worker (uncredited)
Appearances[]
Events & missions
Vehicles & vessels
Locations & stations
Notes[]
- For this episode, actor Myk Watford was erroneously credited as "Palmer Jones" instead of "Palmer James".
- Also, Katarina Morhacova was credited as "Nina Roxhenkova" instead of "Nina Rozhenkova".
Trivia[]
With a runtime of only 42 minutes, this marks as the shortest episode of the whole series.
External links
Soundtrack
- Soundtrack of episode 4x07, "Crossing The Line" on Tunefind
Transcript
- Transcript of episode 4x07, "Crossing The Line" on TV Show Transcripts
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