ROSWELL, NEW MEXICO
Season 1 | US The CW, 15 Jan | UK TBC
The latest early ’00s sci-fi series getting revamped is Roswell, New Mexico. However, this version is only loosely based on the Roswell High books and Jason Katims’ TV adaptation.
Showrunner Carina Adly MacKenzie admits to SFX that she came at the show with a strong aversion to just repeating what came before. “I was wrapping up my run on The Originals and they asked if I was interested in revamping
Roswell. I said no because I didn’t want to do a teen supernatural romance. But [executive producer] Julie Plec said I should pitch the show I wanted to do so I made the [characters] all grown up. And the influences I was feeling at the time were politics, Twitter and a lot of murder podcasts and documentaries. So, I wanted to tell a small-town murder mystery, with aliens. [The CW] liked it so with this version, there are classic sci-fi ideas and we’re flipping them, so we’re looking at Body
Snatchers, Stepford Wives and alien autopsies.”
TB/AM