Aliens huh? Nothing better to do it seems than spent eons crossing countless galaxy so they can invade Earth, enslave us and do with us as they will.
It’s happened time and time again, fictionally at least, and you couldn’t be blamed for wondering if there is anything really new left to say on this hypothetically nightmarish scenario.
It turns out that if you’re Carlton Cuse (LOST, The Strain) and co-creator Ryan Condal that there is plenty left to say and it’s good, very, very good.
Colony starts spinning its original dramatic tale quite a number of months after aliens, who are almost never glimpsed, have arrived on Earth, destroyed all of our military defenses in just eight hours – which includes killing all our soldiers and cops in a bloodbath of worldwide proportions – and set up proxy governments in colonies around the world, which means of course that there are enough people willing to roll over and play collaborator.
The series centres on the LA colony-based Bowman family, headed by ex-soldier and cop (something he keeps hidden for obvious reasons) Will (Josh Holloway), who ends up working for the aliens against his will to save his son Charlie whose lost over in the Santa Monica colony, and Katie (Sarah Wayne Callies) who’s working for the resistance – hello internal family conflict of interest! – and trying to protect their remaining kids Bram (Alex Neustaedter) and Gracie (Isabella Crovetti-Clamp).
Along with Katie’s sister Maddie (Amanda Righetti) and her son, they’re doing their best to navigate a wholly different world to the one that existed less than a year before, one marked by genocide, authoritarianism, brutal political machinations and a tense struggle between those who want to fight their occupation with everything at their disposal and those happy to cave in and salute the new order.
Being in this kind of poisonous environment where the line between surviving and not surviving is wafer thin takes its toll and by the end of season 1 (SPOILERS!!!), which I rated very highly, Will knew what Katie was doing and was headed surreptitiously into Santa Monica colony to find Charlie, Katie was left all alone, resistance-inclined Bram has been captured by the occupiers and Maddie, her son and Gracie were in the Green Zone where the collaborators live in cosseted luxury.
Naturally being a finely-told, nuanced drama with great insight and intelligence things are only going to get worse for the Bowman family and Earth as a whole in season 2, which promises to reveal far more of what’s happening around the world, according to a Hollywood Reporter interview with Cuse.
While no air date has been officially released for season 2, things are only going to get darker in this wholly original take on alien invasion.