primeideal

"Slicker and snot" -- one of John's Earth-isms. Is that a southern US thing? I've never heard of it.
Drivers' ed is a struggle, I can relate. Although seeing where things go from here, my drivers' ed was never this rough.
According to the others they need to give John drivers' ed so he can actually be useful. Implication is that even Rygel is more useful than him. Does not compute.
Our guest star is a punk Australian, nice
Fake Cyrillic on the rap sheet.
The aliens want to know if he has a penis.
"Let's go home" - John talking to Aeryn about Moya. Do they both see the ship as home now?
"I did fix it. That's why it works if I whack it a few times."
Aeryn is very pragmatic when it comes to the whole kill shot dilemma. Her disdain for John as a "lesser species" doesn't even factor in here, she just thinks "he's the technical one and I'm not."
"You guys must be good at kill shots" - John on the Peacekeepers
We get an exact conversion from alien technobabble here, one microt equals two Earth seconds.
And of course Chekhov's Kiss of Life comes back. Though given Aeryn's normal condescension towards John it's hard to believe she's super worried about saving him now?
"You threw the game?" "Yes, and it was hard, he's terrible!" Rygel with the twist. I do love some board game nerds.
John asks Aeryn the obvious question and she's like "to do what, wait here alone?" Again, the point is that if you finish fixing the oxygen you aren't waiting to die.
"I didn't see an afterlife. But maybe I wasn't meant to die just yet."
And now it's the "we're about to die so let's kiss" trope! And...they survive, how awkward. This plotline also starts much earlier than I'd osmosed. But maybe it'll be like Lan/Nynaeve in the Wheel of Time adaptation? (In the TV series, Lan and Nynaeve sleep together in the penultimate episode, in a "we're probably all going on a suicide mission tomorrow so let's at least check this off," then when they wind up not dying, it's awkward, with the potential for lots more slow-ish buildup later. This isn't a thing in the books in the same way.)
Staanz hits on D'Argo, hahaha, wow. No, wait, she's female! Okay, I did not see that one coming, well played.
John and Aeryn directly confront the tension and say "yep, that was definitely a 'just because we thought we were going to die' thing, it won't happen again." *beat* "But you are female?" Aeryn: "...yes." *tiny smile*

Cold open is a flashback to John's love life on Earth, wow.
John and his ex had to deal with the two-body problem. #scientistlife. I wonder how different this would be in the age of Skype? Maybe still an issue, but not necessarily to the same extent.
We get more echoes of "deception is sinful," at least in Zhaan's theology.
"I'm insane." "Yeah, that was my next guess."
Now we learn what Zhaan got imprisoned for, to the tune of some creepy Gregorian chanting.
Was the schism attempt more of a failed coup d'etat or reformation?
The title is fitting--next to the Delvians' color, everything else is washed-out, and the planet is in greyscale.
"Roots don't grow on trees."
So this potentially lets us see Zhaan's dark side, but it feels less like "oh, she's a complex character with strengths and flaws" and more of a personality overwrite. Like, this doesn't count.
Rygel has a Napoleon complex about his height.
Now that Tahleen has said that thing about the trees we'd better see them bloom later this episode!
Is the "father-daughter" dynamic with Tahleen and the old priest literal or just a religious label? Either would make sense, I'm just curious.
Deception again. "How are you a priest?"
John: "Bawk bawk bawk. Does that translate?"
"Look at yourself as I see you." This is hokey but wild.
Delvians have literal color-coded eyes to make Zhaan's return to herself obvious.
And then she literally "levels up."
The love triangle is like, this woman left her boyfriend to be with Tahleen, but then it turns out that Tahleen was just using her, so she gives up on playing "Alexandra" and winds up with the boyfriend after all. The gender dynamics aren't really the focus here! Curious how this would have been made in 2022, I can imagine some people being like "depicting the f/f ship as unhealthy compared to the m/f one is bad representation" but other people being like "as long as there's plenty of potential f/f dynamics with Tahleen and Zhaan, who cares, not every relationship is going to be healthy."
"If you do that, she wins." What do Zhaan (or John) want religion to be?
"They were the best cycles of my life." ...that she spent alone in jail. :( Poor Zhaan.

With that title, I was expecting a flashback or flash-sideways to John's dad, the famous astronaut/scientist dude. But that's definitely not what this episode is about, haha. Is there an allusion here I'm missing?
"Guess what, you resigned." Continuity!
I thought John's United States rocket was out of fuel, now he's taking off again?
Cut to John on a tropical island. No backstory whatsoever. I assume this is deliberate, just like all the other random episode beginnings, but my preference would be for even one or two sentences more of "today on Moya..."
"Offering someone food is a courtship gesture." Echoes of Paul/Chani from Dune with Paul being oblivious. But John just takes the news in stride. "Boiled or barbecued?"
If a cycle is an Earth year (and they confirm it later in the episode), there's been a three-month timeskip with John enjoying Survivor: Uncharted Territories and Moya's crew searching for him. That feels pretty significant. But how long has it been since the season began? And what does this mean in terms of Moya's pregnancy?
Interesting dynamics on the new planet, there's a father-daughter and mother-son power struggle.
"This map will show us the location of highly developed organisms." "So not our three dudes."
I feel like Rokon should know that seizing Lishala and carrying her off is not going to help him win her heart?
Rygel gets the Ewok treatment. I'm not the kind of person who calls everything ~problematic or ~aged bad but I feel like there are more interesting things you can do with the "technologically isolated tribe" than the Ewok deity trope.
"How did you know about the sacred text?" "Every religion has one!" And now we get Jessica's gambit from Dune, heh.
Ooh, this isn't just C-3PO worship, we have something more Christian going on here with the sacrificial god-king. That's more like it!
And it turns out they were actually colonists sent by Rygel X. Again, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, this is what I mean when I say "even the one-off settings have actual twists/development in their backstories that makes them more interesting than the potential cliches they could have been!"
And maybe Rokon and Lishala will make a good couple after all.

This and the last two episodes have added to the "starburst is painful and sometimes unpredictable and weird" tally, Moya's having side effects because of the pregnancy.
"this person is a criminal" "okay we'll put her in the cells then" How many times have you put people in the cells by now? Especially with Rygel you should know they're not that secure!
Chiana looks like a greyscale version of Pris from Blade Runner, wearing a collar from Battle Royale.
And John once again can't resist a pretty face, sigh.
The food bars look like chocolate but taste bad.
"Rygel bombed the ship, let's kick him off." They're not going to actually go there but based on the way they treat Rygel, again, they probably should!
"Don't fall off the ship again" - John to D'Argo. #continuity
"Turn the starburst on or I'll kill Aeryn and Rygel." - Durka. Again, I feel like most of the crew's response would be "that's fine as long as you start with Rygel first."
"Would your shipmates care if I killed you?" "Well, I don't care, come at me." Rygel gets to be defiant at least.
John (after Chiana tries to attack him and he knocks her over): "You okay?"
And Rygel's bomb gets the winning blow, even if he doesn't get to launch it himself. With the implication that Durka might get picked up by the Nebari again. Maybe we have a new recurring enemy?