My my, wasn't that a lot of palace intrigue in this week's episode of The Expanse? With season two rapidly drawing to a close—just one episode left—Errinwright has finally made his play, as has Jules-Pierre Mao. I'll admit that I didn't think Errinwright had it in him. We got to see a much more human side to his character this week, followed by a lovely bait-and-switch by the writers. "Earth first" indeed.

With Bobbie Draper and Cotyar in tow, Avasarala went to meet Mao on his orbital gin palace—spaceships look pretty good if you're a gazillionaire. Again, the show has done an effective job of visualizing the kinds of small details that the books can only tell you about, part of the world-building that keeps me so engaged. Will Mao's ultimatum work? After Errinwright's actions this week, I wouldn't bet on it. But who couldn't love the needling between Draper and Coytar?

The tone was quite different for the scenes with Naomi on the Weeping Somnambulist. With only enough air for 52 people and more than 100 refugees trying to get off Ganymede, it turned into quite a tear-jerker, particularly Champa's exhortation to his fellow belters to remember who they are and how they live (and die).

And finally, we get to see Holden go full Ahab. His obsession with destroying the protomolecule is clouding his judgement, but eventually he listens to Alex and does the right thing.

As we head into the final episode next week, I have to say that I'm much less confident that I know where the plot is going. Perhaps I need to re-read Caliban's War, because it feels like the TV show plot is starting to diverge from that of the novels. Not that that's a bad thing; the storytelling is still compelling.

In this week's episode of the podcast I'm joined by Jennifer Hahn, Ars' video editor. We recap this week's episode and then reminisce about other good sci-fi TV from the past.

I'll be analyzing, debating, and dissecting The Expanse every week with a different guest, and we'll post the podcast on Fridays throughout the season. New episodes air on Wednesdays in the US, so you have time to watch before we get into major spoilers. The Expanse season 2 will air in the UK on Netflix, although possibly not for another month or two.

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Decrypted is Ars Technica's weekly podcast about the TV that obsesses us. Currently we're dissecting The Expanse. Listen or subscribe however you please above and let us know what you think—ideas, questions, and so on—through the comments section, on iTunes, or via e-mail.