Since we are well and truly in the lead up to Christmas, I thought it quite apropos to title this post TV yet to come …
Granted this is just a drop in the bucket of the seeming millions of new TV shows coming our way in 2018 – I can’t keep up now so no idea how I’ll handle even more options – but these two caught my eye and look intriguing enough to commit some time to.
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The show stars Bill Hader as a hitman who, after following his intended target to an acting class, finds himself intrigued and decides to become an actor and change his life. Hader created the series with Silicon Valley executive producer Alec Berg and makes his directorial debut helming episodes of the series. (synopsis (c) Collider)
I love quirky TV shows with some serious drama thrown in which makes Barry the perfect candidate for my limited viewing time.
It helps that the show appears to treat the serious stuff seriously and leave the quirk to bounce around in its own separate little stream – though doubtless the two will have to crossover and merge at some point – and that it stars the incomparable Bill Hader, a gifted comedic actor if ever there was one.
Granted this teaser trailer doesn’t much more than tease (so to be fair is doing what it’s meant to do) but even in its short but glorious running time, you get a sense of what a gem this show could be.
Barry premieres on HBO in the US Spring.
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Based on the classic cyberpunk noir novel by Richard K. Morgan, ‘Altered Carbon’ is an intriguing story of murder, love, sex, and betrayal, set more than 300 years in the future. Society has been transformed by new technology: consciousness can be digitized; human bodies are interchangeable; death is no longer permanent. Takeshi Kovacs is the lone surviving soldier in a group of elite interstellar warriors who were defeated in an uprising against the new world order. His mind was imprisoned, ‘on ice,’ for centuries until Laurens Bancroft, an impossibly wealthy, long-lived man, offers Kovacs the chance to live again. In exchange, Kovacs has to solve a murder … that of Bancroft himself. (synopsis via IndieWire)
Humanity has a rather tangled, messy and altogether not terribly beneficial relationship with hubris.
We got a bit too big for our boots, we stuff up mightily, face immense disaster and come away somewhat chastened … only to begin the whole process all over again.
Rinse. Cycle. Repeat.
The only problem of late is that we don’t seem to be learning history’s lesson with everything from climate change to potential ecological catastrophe to imminent war just three of the many ills afflicting us.
And yet certain groups in society keep marching on, convinced that hubris cannot touch them.
That seems to be the case 300 years from now where we appeared to have conquered death. Of course, as is the way with these things, complications will inevitably ensue and we may have cause to wonder if the solution is far worse than the disease.
In any case, Altered Carbon seems to suggest we still haven’t learnt our lesson which is a good thing in this case since it means some damn fine viewing awaits.
Altered Carbon premieres on Netflix on 2 February 2018.
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Set two generations before the destruction of the legendary Man of Steel’s home planet, Krypton follows Superman’s grandfather (Cameron Cuffe, The Halcyon) — whose House of El was ostracized and shamed — as he fights to redeem his family’s honor and save his beloved world from chaos.
I may be shot at dawn by Superman-adoring fanboys and girls but the truth is, I have never been a massive fan of the Man of Steel. Sure he’s “Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!” – all very impressive qualities I’m sure you’ll agree – and has saved humanity countless times but I’ve never found him terribly compelling. Nice and worthy yes, and quite dashing in a nerdy superhero kind of a way but not desperately compelling. However, this all-too-brief teaser trailer from SYFY – code for we haven’t shot that much of the show yet – for Krypton takes us way, way back to when the House of El when there was still some chance Superman’s home planet could be saved. We know that wasn’t the case, but that knowledge could well make this show eminently watchable since it will invest it with a poignant sense that all is lost even as hope, somewhat tragically, springs eternal.
Krypton premieres in 2018 on SyFy.