Beacon 23 – Season 1 Episode 8 “Adamantine” Recap, Review & Ending Explained

Adamantine

The finale of Beacon 23 answers many burning questions viewers have posed throughout Season 1. It also skips answering some of them, but with the renewal news about the show, we can expect those answers in the next season. Episode 8 begins with Aster casually looking at the Artifact from the cupola as if it is nothing. She has a quaint smile on her face, almost as if she can see inside it. Aster looks like a woman who knows all the secrets about the priceless phenomenon. 

Who saves the beacon from the QTA?

We also see a vision where young Aster is going through the door to the other side on an abandoned spaceship. Harmony tries to warn Finch and Saldana about controlling the beacon. She offers help to perform Bart’s functions, which can be overwhelming for humans. However, the duo rejects her offer. In the most unexpected of outcomes, Halan goes after the cutters and successfully destroys them. But in the process, he also renders the Amboyna useless. Halan docks back on the beacon where the duo try to blackmail him. But he is up to the task and is determined to take Aster off the beacon with him.

Why does Keir not want Aster to help Aleph?

Keir opposes this move and believes that the Artefact has a message for her. Aster must be allowed to complete her journey – to learn what that message is. Keir believes it can elevate the human experience. Harmony beseeches Halan to convince Aster to “surrender.” She works for the QTA and the organization wants Aster to harness her relationship with the Artefact for them. 

Finch and Saldana want to abandon the beacon but Keir isn’t ready to. They get the idea to use Aster. Having her could give them leverage with the QTA. However, Harmony warns them against doing so, promising “severe punishment” if they try anything. All of a sudden, the beacon experiences technical malfunctions. The computational error is due to Aleph’s QTA mothership, which hovers near the beacon in its orbit. Harmony rejects Halan’s cry for help. She refuses to go against his “maker,” whose original consciousness is embedded in his generational AI, as we saw in Episode 4. 

Harm also warns Aster against doing anything to upset Aleph. Keir once again tries to tell Aster not to reveal the secrets of the Artefact to Aleph. He knows all about her history and connection to the phenomenon. Keir believes that Aleph will use the secrets to create more evil, as opposed to Aleph’s proclaimed ambitions of advancing human civilization. But Aster once again remains firm and says she will make up her own mind.

What does Aster decide to do?

What Aster really wants is to help Halan, whom she has feelings for. We see another vision – possibly of Aster’s – where we see her younger version standing near a version of Aster wearing a beautiful dress, and a version of Halan, whispering something in young Aster’s ear. Does it have any relation to Aleph’s quote “I saw my past, present, and the future in the Artefact?” This seems one likely explanation. Meanwhile, the ISA sends instructions to Finch and Saldana to blow up Aleph’s mothership.

Aleph finally arrives on the beacon and approaches Aster. As expected, he wants her to go in it and tell all its secrets to him. Since Aleph is now an AI, it cannot see the Artefact himself. In exchange for giving him the information he wants, Aster asks Aleph to get a pardon for Halan. Aleph thinks it is feasible for him to do so…but he questions if it is Aster who controls the Artefact or the other way around. Aster insists that it is not the case. She also says that she needs Halan to accompany her on the mission to go inside the Artefact. 

Ending Explained: Is Aster alive?

As Finch and Saldana are about to undock and blow up the mothership, Harmony traps them in the airlocks. She cuts off the oxygen, on Aleph’s commands, to suffocate the duo. Aleph commends her loyalty and instructs her to do the same with Keir. But as they’re about to die, Harmony brings back the oxygen, saying they have been granted a pardon. Halan finally agrees to go with Aster on the mission. The duo also inform Aleph that they will take Harmony with them to record whatever they see and relay info back to the mothership.

However, Keir appears suddenly and shoots Aster when she says they’re going inside the Artefact. Aster hits her head on the railing and blood pours from her head. Halan tends to her and it is unclear if she is alive or dead. We see the Artefact’s image glowing in her eyes and we go to the vision where the younger Aster asks the older Aster, “What Is the Message?”

Is Aster dead? We don’t think so as she is expected to play a central role in Season 2. Her connection to the Artefact is too special and precious for the writers to lose at this point. But as has been the case throughout Beacon 23, we are left with a lot of uncertainties. This also includes many unexplained plot points for which we do not have answers for our readers

The Episode Review

When all is said and done, this wasn’t the kind of finale we were expecting. It felt way too anticlimactic. Aleph’s cameo raised hopes of an epic finish. But we were left far too distanced from learning the show’s core mystery. I am befuddled as to why it has been such a tightly kept secret. What is exactly the Artefact and how was it resurrected after Grisham destroyed it? While Aster’s connection isn’t necessary to reveal, the other aspects of the single most important thing in the show’s universe are. 

I did not enjoy the setup of having people from The Column – a name we only heard two episodes ago – at the beacon. The trio of Keir, Finch, and Saldana felt misplaced since they didn’t have any background on the show. Their realm seemed different from say Halan, Aster, and Harmony’s, who have been very well developed in the season’s course. 

Keir seemed like such a pivotal philosophical antithesis to Aleph. But he is introduced too late in the story. Beacon 23 had an opportunity to finish on a high but lost sight of what really should have mattered in the end.