Creator Burns takes on climate change, future in ‘Extrapolations’
What might our lives look like decades from now, when the effects of climate change have progressed even further? That’s the premise of “Extrapolations,” Apple TV+’s star-studded series from Scott Z. Burns.
Burns might be best known as the screenwriter of 2011’s “Contagion,” which anticipated many of the fears and outcomes of the pandemic. He’s doing something similar as it pertains to climate. The series jumps forward over the course of eight episodes, beginning in
2037 and ending in 2070.
It’s also a meditation on the evolution of technology, along with stubbornly entrenched corporate greed that is making the planet increasingly inhospitable to life.
There’s a lot to admire about the show’s ambitions, even if they’re not fully realized. The production design envisions a future that is at once recognizable but distinct from our own present moment.
I like that “Extrapolations” is asking serious questions. It’s not a hectoring approach but one designed to be entertaining, its themes delivered in a gleaming package filled with boldface names: Meryl Streep, Kit Harington, Diane
Lane, Gemma Chan, David Schwimmer, Keri Russell and more.
The series is conspicuously focused on either the comfortably middle class or the ultrarich, the latter of whom are forever manipulating the levers of power and global resource management. The people who experience the worst effects of these decisions, losing access to water or livable environments, are
mostly an abstraction. It makes you wonder who the target audience for this series actually is — and whether it will have its intended effect. These are all individualized stories, and I found it curious that “Extrapolations” never contemplates the possibility of collective action and what that might look like against seemingly unstoppable corporate and political interests.
Another running thought: Why do environmentalists not exist in this vision of the future? And by that I mean: regular people who are environmental activists in their own daily lives.
Sometimes you need to see something in a fictional context to be able to imagine what that might look like in real life. With climate change, inaction is a problem — but so is constant action that results in more destruction. “Extrapolations” is an invitation to speculate about all of that in meaningful ways.
As the series heads further into the future, tech innovations play a bigger role. One episode centers on a man (Tahar Rahim) who earns his living as a simulation.
The finale is a dystopian courtroom drama, putting
a billionaire on trial for his crimes of ecocide, but the story lacks the narrative snap and structure of a good legal drama.
Only two episodes really stand out for me. In one, Daveed Diggs plays a rabbi in Miami trying to keep his temple from flooding. The episode is contemplative and also angry in all the right ways — instead of just adjusting to a new normal, younger generations will be asking the harsh questions: Why is this happening? What is this all for?
As things worsen, what does that mean for your average person whose mere existence becomes increasingly fraught? An episode that takes place in India gives us a glimpse. The year is 2059, and a young man is hired to drive a truck carrying unknown cargo to a particular location. The odd-couple performances from Indian actor Adarsh Gourav and British Paralympian Gaz Choudhry are terrific, a blend of bickering and confusion and resignation. You don’t get to know either one of them all that well, but it’s enough to make you invested in this smuggling escapade and whatever purpose it may serve.
How to watch: