 What if NASA had needed women astronauts as part of the Apollo program, diversifying its astronaut corps in the 1960s instead of the 1980s? Well, that's the what-if that Apple TV Plus' new show for all mankind looks at. And, since it's something I've spent the better part of three years thinking about, I thought it was worth sitting down for some discussion. So let's dive in. A quick recap for those who haven't seen the show or for whom it's been a while, and if you haven't seen the show yet and want to wait, there will be spoilers, so I'll give you a second right now to bookmark this video and then come back after you've seen it. Okay, let's keep going. Episode 2 ends introducing a new element to the show. We see Cosmonaut Anastasia Belikova on the moon, which spurs President Nixon on to wanting NASA to recruit women astronauts. Now, Nixon isn't doing this to sort of, you know, stand for women's rights, he's doing this to level the playing field. Episodes 3 and 4 thus dive into the selection and subsequent training of female astronauts, and episode 4 ends with the first mixed-gender crew launching to the moon on Apollo 15. Now, this is the storyline I've been waiting for since seeing the first trailers months ago, because I was super curious to see how they were going to treat the idea of female astronauts in the Apollo era. Now, I love the impetus for the women's storyline a lot. I love that it's a politically motivated goal because a female cosmonaut was on the moon. This brings really true to reality, so I like that. Valentina Tereshkova was the first woman in space in June of 1963, and even though we might like to say she became this warrior for women's rights, she has, but her flight was not. Her flight was politically motivated to show that in the Soviet communist system, women and men have the same opportunities, whereas the democratic system in America did not afford the same opportunities. Now, if you disagree with me that Valentina Tereshkova's flight was politically motivated, consider it was another 19 years before another woman flew in space. She was a Soviet Svetlana Savitskaya, who launched because NASA announced that Sally Ride would be the first American woman on a shuttle flight. So politics is a really clear reason to sort of naturally bring women into the Apollo era in this alternate history, but there's another really interesting one as well, and that's science. NASA's fourth group of astronauts was selected in June of 1965, and it was the first class to break with the then traditional mold of all astronauts being test pilots. For this group, NASA was looking at scientists, medical doctors, or other science experts who might have something specific to lend to a mission. Basically, the agency was starting to realize that to get real science returns from these expensive missions, you had to have some science happening. NASA sent a short list of potential astronauts for this group for selection to the National Academy of Sciences for further review, and on that list were four women. Now as we know, none of them were ultimately selected. The group was another all male group, and because there was no media coverage over the potential for these four women to become the first American women in space, there was no media uproar when they weren't selected. It kind of quietly became a footnote in history. Nevertheless, it is a thing that is out there, and I would have loved to see this be the jumping off point for including women in the Apollo program in this show. At this point in the show, the goal is to build a moon base, to keep the competition between the Americans and the Soviets going. So why not bring in women with technical expertise? A geologist? A medical doctor to help keep the crew healthy? Some kind of technical expert. There were PhD women scientists in the country in the 1960s. That would have been a really nice way to seamlessly bring women in and make it not about women, but about scientists who happen to be women. Instead, the show falls into this kind of 1960s sexism and has a NASA group of men selecting women effectively to fill roles. And what this does is kind of have all these women checking off various boxes, and it felt really weird to me. There's Tracy Stevens, the pretty blonde astronaut's wife, who can't get kicked out because she's good for the program. There's a single woman of color, Danielle Poole, who's a former computer, who feels like an attempt to bring in a hidden figure's narrative rather than give her her own backstory. Then there are two women who fill in that sort of traditional hot shop pilot role. There's Molly Cobb, who's like some Top Gun Maverick wannabe, and Patty Doyle, who seems to exist solely as a sparring partner for Molly Cobb. These two women in the for all mankind universe were selected because they were graduates of the Mercury 13 program that had never joined NASA because the program was canceled early. It was at this point that I just straight up yelled at the TV and got like super mad. The Mercury 13 program was not a real program. It had nothing to do with NASA. I would posit that it's not even 13 women. The name Mercury 13 was invented by a Hollywood producer in 1995 for a dateline segment as a play on the Mercury 7. Fun fact, the women who were involved in this program, not that it is even properly called a program, never met. They never all got together as a group. This is as far from a program as you can possibly imagine. Okay, admittedly, this was more annoying for me than it probably is for most people because I've spent the better part of the last three years writing a book on exactly this topic. It was predictable and it was frustrating, and honestly the whole thing just got worse for me again personally because I've been living with this story by the character of Molly Cobb. Molly Cobb is clearly an homage to a real pilot, Jerry Cobb, who is often associated with the Mercury 13 story. Now I've spent the better part of three years unpacking Jerry to understand her role in this story. So when I see Molly, I see two women that are clearly supposed to be similar but are so wildly different. But in a way, I think Molly is kind of the woman that Jerry wishes she could be. Jerry to me would love to be that brash that outspoken and embody that level of confidence that borders on a pretty substantial ego. Though I would say Jerry's ego was pretty healthy in itself. These two women though, however different they are, have one element in common. Neither would have been selected for the astronaut corps. So let's talk about astronaut qualifications for a second because that's ultimately what this boils down to. In the Apollo era, astronauts were chosen from the ranks of test pilots because every mission was effectively a test flight. Each spacecraft differed from the one that flew before it and different mission goals meant that things were constantly in flux. Astronauts had to have the experience and the discipline to react instinctively when something happened really fast in a cockpit, while also still serving as the engineer's eyes and ears in the cockpit. And when you consider that every facet of space flight was pretty much unknown in the 1960s, especially the human side of things, NASA management had to figure out what existing job most closely resembled what might be asked of an astronaut in space, and the answer was a test pilot. But that was only part of it. There was a bigger component than just technical background or flying skill or experience, and that's the personality. From the moment someone was earmarked as a potential astronaut, every conversation was part of the selection process. Were they a team player? Could they argue with the crewmate without causing friction? Would they follow orders? Were they brave without being foolhardy? Could they reign in bravado for the sake of a mission? In short, did they have the right temperament to fly in space? The character of Molly Cobb might have been medically fit and had the right flying background to qualify as an astronaut, but with that attitude, I cannot imagine she would have made it into space. Once Molly is on the crew of Apollo 15, there's in-fighting and one-upsmanship and ego play. The whole thing is just this massive clashing of bad attitudes that I can't imagine they wouldn't all be pulled from the flight, but she's kind of the worst, like, antagonist starting issues for no reason other than to prove herself because she has this massive chip on her shoulder. She's not the team player. She's not the cool level-headed person that you want making decisions when your life hangs in the balance because, you know, everything in space is trying to kill you. And, okay. And granted, I understand that, like, really good by-the-book-com-engineers-turned-astronauts or compilates-turned-astronauts does not make for good TV. I get that. But ultimately, I just thought her character was so unlikable that when we get that final hero shot, the Saturn V launching off to the moon with the first American woman on board, it's just like, I kind of hate that it's you. And I kind of hate that that's how we're putting forward women astronauts in this show. I just-I really just could not get behind her as a character. Now, once Apollo 15 does get into space, I actually liked her a lot more. I thought they played around with the psychological victory of an American woman in space really, really well. There are scenes with the other female astronauts reading letters that young girls have sent them. And when Molly's in space, mission control reads up letters to her that girls have sent saying how she's so inspiring. This totally echoes a lot of the stuff that I found in researching for my book. A lot of the pilots who were trying to force NASA to change its stance and accept women into the astronaut corps wrote letters either to them directly or to NASA or even the White House. And they were all just these little girls and as young as eight or nine saying how excited they were to grow up in a world where they could also be astronauts. So I love that they brought that element in because that was a very big part of this first kind of wave push to get women into space. And it was a really adorable touch. Not to mention once she's actually on the moon and doing the mission, I really liked that they stopped treating her like the woman and just treated her like the astronaut doing her job because whether you're a man or a woman, the end of the day, if you're walking on the moon doing your science, you're just an astronaut doing your job and you should be treated as such. So I like that they kind of dropped the female element a little bit for the sake of just having her be completely equal with everyone else on her crew. Like I say, guys, this is a really tough storyline for me personally only because I've spent the better part of three years writing this. I have a physical copy and you can get yours today. All the pre-order links are in the description. And Jerry Cobb is on the cover. Like I said, I spent a lot of time trying to unpack her backstory to understand really why she behaved the way she did and acted the way she did in this push to get NASA to accept women in the 1960s and what her motivations really were. And it was very eye-opening. I won't say more about it now, but it was really interesting what I found versus what typical retelling say. So pre-order today available February 18th. So let me know what you guys think about how the show brings women into the astronaut corps. Did you like it? Did you think it felt realistic or not realistic? What were your thoughts on the characters of the different women? Let me know all of your thoughts and anything you would like to see discussed in future episodes in the comment section below. Also, be sure to follow me across social media for updates on when anything new is happening, any new videos coming out, new topics that we're discussing. And of course, if you never want to miss an episode of The Vintage Space, be sure to subscribe. Thank you guys so much and see you next time.