Altered images, or carbon copies
Altered Carbon
10 episodes, available now It seems that Netflix has a new direction for its big-budget, highly publicised prestige dramas — and it’s no longer the stately elegance of The Crown. Instead it’s dystopian, bloodsoaked mayhem. Altered Carbon, based on the 2002 novel by Richard K Morgan, revolves around the question of what happens when we reach levels of technology that can grant immortality.
The series begins 500 years in the future. Every human has a chip embedded at the base of their brain, referred to as their “stack”, which records their experiences over the course of a life. When a body dies, this slack can be “re-sleeved” into a new one. If one has the money to re-sleeve endlessly, they live forever. “Real death” occurs only if the stack is “corrupted” or destroyed. Instead of jail time, convicts’ stacks are put “on ice,” only to have the Government put them into “first available” sleeves when their sentences are up. If the parents of a young murder victim get their daughter back in the body of a middleaged man, that’s their tough luck. This is not a show for the faint of heart, or the weak of stomach, but if dystopian horror is your thing you are in for a treat.
Seeing Allred
Available Friday Depending on who you talk to, Gloria Allred is either one of the most important feminist voices in America or an opportunist who is highly adept at picking fights she is sure to win. She has been the lawyer for some of the most famous victims of the American legal system, including the families of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman (whom OJ Simpson was accused of killing) and the accusers of Bill Cosby.
This somewhat hagiographical documentary delves deeper into the woman behind the controversies and it is moving to hear Allred talk about how she was raped as a young woman in Mexico and then almost died after an illegal abortion to terminate the resulting pregnancy. However, there is also a sense that certain areas are skipped over, including the current state of her relationship with her famous daughter, Lisa Bloom, the lawyer who represented Harvey Weinstein, even after some of the allegations were made against him. Mother and daughter clashed over the case and Bloom eventually resigned as Weinstein’s advisor — it would have been interesting to hear more about how this played out.
My Next Guest Needs No Introduction, With David Letterman: George Clooney
Available Friday It was sometimes difficult to understand the appeal of Letterman. He was seldom funny and the relentless jolliness of latenight American chat shows anyway mitigates against getting interesting interviews out of big stars — by the end he hardly seemed to be trying. Now, having migrated to the streaming service, he is freed from the constraints of the band and the audience and the result is slightly more sober and thought-provoking interviews with some big-name subjects — Barack Obama is here in the line up too. This week we have George Clooney and Dave keeps it light without getting too cosy.
When We First Met (2018)
Available Friday It’s amazing how much the #MeToo movement has changed the way we view pop culture. When the makers of this film dreamed it up it probably seemed like a fairly irresistible romcom set-up — boy meets girl, gets shunted into the friend zone when he realises she isn’t interested in a relationship, but via a magical photo booth is able to travel back in time to retrace his steps and make a better go of it romantically.
So far, so harmless, escapist froth you might think, but to the pitchfork mob of Twitter that idea now seems suggestive of a lack of respect of a woman’s autonomy and boundaries and not romantic at all. If this film does commit a sin, it’s that it is a little messily cut together, with some non sequitur scenes that don’t really add to the momentum of the story. Beyond that it’s really just a sugary confection of a film with charming performances from Adam DeVine and Alexandra Daddario as the two leads. Let’s not overthink it.