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March 28, 2024, 11:34:29 AM

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Years and Years (Russell T Davies)

Started by VelourSpirit, April 21, 2019, 11:46:14 PM

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VelourSpirit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSOo4_7Pccg
Trailer's out, no date yet but it's coming soon and it's had some great reception from the premiere

I've been really looking forward to this. Absolutely love RTD, I think he writes the best characters on TV and I've had a whole new appreciation for him after reading The Writer's Tale.

BlodwynPig


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Quote from: TwinPeaks on April 21, 2019, 11:46:14 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSOo4_7Pccg
Trailer's out, no date yet but it's coming soon and it's had some great reception from the premiere

I've been really looking forward to this. Absolutely love RTD, I think he writes the best characters on TV and I've had a whole new appreciation for him after reading The Writer's Tale.

Yeah, this looks very promising. RTD has a real flair for writing properly bleak apocalyptic fiction, which is what this appears to be, and I already get the impression that it'll annoy all the right people (I mean The Daily Mail et al, not Blodders).

chveik


VelourSpirit

Quote from: Ballad of Ballard Berkley on April 22, 2019, 02:43:48 AM
Yeah, this looks very promising. RTD has a real flair for writing properly bleak apocalyptic fiction

Always thought Turn Left would have made a great series. Then again Children of Earth similarly had a 'what if the Doctor wasn't here' conceit. I mainly think of his writing as cheeky, silly and horny but it's rarely actually as lighthearted as it seems.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

This does look like it'll feed off some of the pessimistic ideas and themes he explored in Turn Left and Children of Earth. For all of the tenth Doctor's "human beings are brilliant!" shtick, I think, underneath it all, RTD has a pretty bleak view of human nature.

If Years and Years is six nightmarish hours of society collapsing in on itself, then I for one eagerly welcome the latest epistle from our bumptious Welsh overlord.

 

VelourSpirit

There's a great bit in The Writer's Tale where he talks about how he started writing Gridlock hoping it'd be an uplifting story about the hope and unity that faith can provide, but faith actually ended up making the characters passive and misguided so they stayed in that big traffic jam.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

And then there's Midnight, the message of which is basically, "People are shit".

He's quite reminiscent of the great man depicted in my avatar. Serling was a decent, liberal sort who wanted to think the best of people, but more often than not his work depicts human beings as prejudiced, selfish and cowardly. So many of his Twilight Zone episodes express the view that we're all fucked.

All Surrogate


Mister Six


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Just watched a preview screener of episode one. Bloody hellfire, it's good. As expected, it's an unremittingly grave and pessimistic piece of speculative fiction in the Turn Left and Children of Earth vein. The world is screwed! No future! Hooray!

olliebean


Alberon

Quote from: Ballad of Ballard Berkley on May 05, 2019, 03:18:38 PM
Just watched a preview screener of episode one. Bloody hellfire, it's good. As expected, it's an unremittingly grave and pessimistic piece of speculative fiction in the Turn Left and Children of Earth vein. The world is screwed! No future! Hooray!

Excellent!

Really looking forward to this.

VelourSpirit

That's brilliant to hear. So soon too! Has there been any word on who the composer is? Doesn't seem like it's been revealed anywhere. I'm assuming it's Murray Gold.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Yep, it's Gold (always believe in your soul).


VelourSpirit

Ahh great, think he's extremely underrated. Couldn't imagine RTD without him.

neveragain


gilbertharding

Saw the trailer for this. Was it pitched as 'Our Friends in the North' but written before events rather than after?

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Quote from: gilbertharding on May 07, 2019, 02:26:52 PM
Saw the trailer for this. Was it pitched as 'Our Friends in the North' but written before events rather than after?

What do you mean?

gilbertharding

Epic sweep of history, bleak depiction of an ultimately corrupt establishment, cast of thousands, cream of British acting talent... but written as a forecast nstead of a history. Kind of thing.

neveragain

I get ya. Like a speculative 'Our Friends', but without Gina McKee.

gilbertharding

I mean, it was a passing thought... doesn't bear up to enormous scrutiny.

I'll watch this, probably.

Norton Canes


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Quote from: gilbertharding on May 08, 2019, 01:11:13 PM
I mean, it was a passing thought... doesn't bear up to enormous scrutiny.

I'll watch this, probably.

No, it's a sound observation, I understand now.

Quote from: Norton Canes on May 08, 2019, 01:51:58 PM
Our Friends In The Future

Pretty much, yep. Gilbert is right.

mothman

Quote from: neveragain on May 07, 2019, 10:33:40 PM
I get ya. Like a speculative 'Our Friends', but without Gina McKee.

I'm out.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

A reminder that this starts tonight on BBC One at 9pm.

Tikwid


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

I love the fact that Russell T. Davies has the clout to put something like that out on BBC One at 9pm. A mainstream TV drama in which... well, we should probably hold off on spoilers for now?

olliebean

Subtlety not exactly Rusty's strong point, is it?

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Quote from: olliebean on May 14, 2019, 10:39:53 PM
Subtlety not exactly Rusty's strong point, is it?

Nope. He's a gleefully broad polemicist. I don't have a problem with that, I'd rather have more of his big, fuck off, apocalyptic musings on primetime British television than the conventional fare you usually find in that slot.