Show + Tell with Paul Flynn
IT’S NOT ONLY Harvey Weinstein making film look like an outmoded, regressive and basically quite hideous 20th-century medium. It’s film itself. Whether we love or hate the somnolent
Blade Runner reboot is of no real concern, beyond the 20 seconds we each spared on social media, divvying ourselves up into the fors and againsts. It represents a dearth of original ideas.
Denis Villeneuve, Harrison Ford and Ryan Gosling aren’t the only culprits.
Star Wars episodes 1 to 1 million, each Marvel comics franchise, every tedious old superhero. They are the final triumph of extreme capitalism, the crucifixion of art at the altar of cash. In their depressing wake – because we are human and curious, because we are alive even when the marketing men pretend that we’re dead – we look for the new. Which brings us circuitously to Stranger Things, an original idea from Netflix. OK, so it’s hewn from retro sci-fi influences, but it feels so fresh.
Stranger Things is a screen event of the year. In the 12 months that have passed since season one, it has accrued everything
Star Wars and Blade Runner did for their moments when they were not a muscleflexing enterprise in spreadsheet nostalgia. It made you forget about the world by inventing a new one. Winona’s fairy lights, the funny-looking kid, the paradigm of Barb’s style vs the Gucci catwalk, the neon signature graphic, the hot-mess cop, the note perfect ’80s soundtrack, the peculiarity of childhood, the panoply of flawless references so deftly interwoven into one story, the stark exposition of the vulnerability of innocence. They all seeped into the culture purposefully because of Stranger Things. Because creators the Duffer brothers didn’t choose to dip into somebody else’s universe, instead creating their own. And it was AMAZING.
We all know the reason why every model of significance this year has shaved her head. We know that those absorbing totems of modern beauty – Cara, Kristen, Adwoa and Slick – resonate with special magic because of a mute girl named after a number on a TV show. Equally, we know that no one is going to wear anything because of Blade Runner. Stranger Things is not just a TV show. It is a tough lesson to everyone else to be less lazy and boring at their jobs. Netflix, from Friday