Gillian Flynn’s muted Utopia adaptation fails to say anything unique about our current moment
TV Reviews Pre-Air
Gillian Flynn’s long run of successful thrillers comes to an end with the irritatingly drawn-out, disappointingly oblique Utopia. An adaptation of the British series that aired from 2013 to 2014, Utopia has long bounced around Hollywood: First attached to HBO, with Gone Girl and Sharp Objects author and Widows screenwriter Flynn writing and David Fincher directing, before eventually ending up at Amazon Studios without the latter. Perhaps Fincher’s flair for steadily escalating tension would have helped Utopia, which, despite being about the end of the world, feels curiously stagnant in the seven of eight episodes provided for review. The series incorporates a slew of thematic elements that are eerily timely—an increasingly devastating pandemic, for one—but an overreliance on brutal violence masks the fact that Utopia doesn’t have much to say about the corporate overreach or government listlessness that inspired the show’s concept.
Set in present-day Chicago, Utopia follows a group of unlikely friends whose only unifying trait is their obsession with a comic book called Dystopia. A cult favorite graphic novel, Dystopia is about Jessica Hyde (Sasha Lane), a girl whose genius scientist father is taken hostage by the evil Mr. Rabbit. In exchange for keeping Jessica safe from Mr. Rabbit’s bloodthirsty lackeys, the Harvest, her father creates a series of deadly viruses and bioweapons for Mr. Rabbit to use against the rest of the world. While her father is held against his will, Jessica is trained by the warrior woman Artemis, who helps keeps Jessica one step ahead of Mr. Rabbit and the Harvest.
Dystopia is popular for its dark narrative and its gritty protagonist, but in the years since its publication in 2014, its author never released another work—until an unpublished manuscript for a sequel, Utopia, is found while a young woman cleans out her deceased grandfather’s house. Upon realizing that the comic has a devoted following, the woman decides to sell Utopia to the highest bidder at the Fringe-Con conference, where many Dystopia fans converge each year. So four fans who have bonded on Dystopia message boards decide to meet for the first time at the conference, pool their money, and buy Utopia together: Sam (Jessica Rothe), whose father calls her his “save-the-world girl” for comments like “Rallies don’t work; they make us feel better about doing nothing”; Becky (Ashleigh LaThrop), who suffers seizures caused by the mysterious Deel’s syndrome; Ian (Dan Byrd), an insurance salesman who has a crush on Becky; and Wilson (Desmin Borges), a doomsday prepper who still lives at home with his family.
Sam, Becky, and Wilson aren’t just regular fans. They believe that Dystopia predicted a number of the worst events in recent years, with messages hidden in the panels and artwork. They’re convinced of virus images concealed as eyeballs, and ascertain country borders recreated in the shape of leaves. They think Dystopia foretold Ebola, MERS, Zika, and various other viruses, and they see in climate change and environmental destruction what Dystopia depicted. Their desire to get their hands on Utopia is because, as Sam puts it to a group of mansplaining fans who laugh off her theories, “This shit is about life. This shit is about doing something, not talking about cartoons doing something.” Maybe Utopia will clue them into what horrible things are coming next—or more importantly, how to stop them.
As interested buyers offer increasingly outrageous amounts for Utopia, the world outside of Fringe-Con mimics the comic book: A flu that specifically targets children is spreading throughout the Midwest, causing school lockdowns and quarantine zones, horrifying parents, and dominating the news. As people search for answers, Dr. Kevin Christie (John Cusack) comes under scrutiny for a new lab-grown protein product that was provided to some children who became ill, and a virologist, Dr. Michael Stearns (Rainn Wilson), takes notice that the young patients exhibit the same symptoms as another flu strain Dr. Stearns studied in Peru years before. Would it be too paranoid to think that these occurrences were connected to Utopia? Or are Sam, Becky, and Wilson onto something?
Mostly abandoning the British version’s black-comedy vibe, Utopia crisscrosses these subplots with each other with a peculiar lack of urgency, obfuscating for its characters what are obviously predictable twists for the audience. There is a disconnect between how slowly the show’s protagonists piece together various elements of this potential conspiracy versus how quickly viewers will, which results in reveals that land anticlimactically and episodes that often seem like they’re moving in slow motion. Characters’ reactions are muted and their intelligence varies as needed by the situation: Villains who have been scheming for years make silly, noticeable mistakes in their plans; characters surrounded by murder move on quite quickly. The show explains this by saying that people are unpredictable, but that feels like an excuse for inconsistent writing. Some members of the ensemble stand out: LaThrop as the beleaguered Becky, desperate to learn whether Utopia holds a cure for her illness; Javon “Wanna” Walton as the Internet-savvy Grant, who is fiercely loyal to his friends; and Sonja Sohn, whose no-nonsense attitude contrasts well with the show’s more unbelievable elements. But others are done wrong by underdeveloped characters, in particular Sasha Lane, whose one-note portrayal of badass Hyde is more a problem of the material than her performance.
Utopia relies on at least one scene of staggering violence per episode to move the plot forward, but all that does is underscore how the show fails at building the apocalyptic stakes. The Dystopia and Utopia comic book pages show an array of horrors—humanoid bunnies feasting on people, children gnawing on bones, burning fields, gigantic insects—and in the show narrative, dozens of people are assassinated. There are extended torture scenes, including eyes gouged out and fingernails pulled off; we also watch a mass shooting. But the show does a poor job communicating the impact of these horrors on its protagonists, and the action scenes are shot so similarly (with askew angles and an electronic score) that they increasingly lack impact. By the final minutes of the seventh episode, with only one episode remaining to wrap things up, Utopia is still talking around the baddies’ motivations instead of making them plain. That amount of obfuscation doesn’t make Utopia intriguing, but frustratingly impenetrable.
“What did you do today to earn your place in this crowded world?” asks one of Utopia’s characters, but you could expand that query to the show itself. Flynn’s series is awash with details that sync up to our current moment: characters worry about disease-carrying bats spreading a pandemic, and complain about the Centers For Disease Control and the Food And Drug Administration working too slowly on a vaccine. They turn to corporations who unironically boast of “disruption” to save them instead of “big government”; they are horrified by perceived harm, including sexual violence, against children. But Utopia doesn’t offer any theories about how our culture changes because of this kind of panic, or comment on the fervent nature of fandom, or examine the anxiety of confronting the potential end of the world. Flynn’s thrillers often resonate because of the power of their observations, but Utopia fails because of the lack of them.
52 Comments
So this remake cuts out the humor and the striking visuals, stretches out the fast pace, and simplifies the heroic but also monstrous and scary Jessica Hyde to a one-note badass.Was there any point to this at all?
Original series was a truly spectacular use of six one-hour episodes to tell a dark and convincing story, one that resonates particularly deeply in 2020. Not a SECOND of screen time was wasted.Amazon version sounds like more washed-out American fluff, all style and no substance.
Hell, it even seems to lack the style of the original two seasons of Utopia! Can’t imagine it being the same without Critobal Tapia de Veer’s soundtrack, simultaneously quirky, funky, and deeply horrific. Or the striking visuals! They’ve gone no substance but also forgot the style.
Yeah, the narrative and character changes here already sound iffy, but if you strip away the amazing color palette and soundtrack why even bother?
I’ve been searching around for the original version. Thought I had found it but nada. Any ideas?
I don’t know which executive it is who has this idea, “let’s buy the rights to every popular British TV show, then spend a lot of money making a terrible remake that is close enough to the real thing to not have any originality or suprise, and yet that doesn’t even slightly understand or try to imitate what was successful about the original, so that we can see our money go down the drain when it’s cancelled after a single season because there’s literally no reason to watch it”, but I wish they’d stop.I mean, does it ever work? Apparently the American copy of The Office became enjoyable once it stopped being like The Office? And a long, long, long time ago Americans would regularly copy our sitcoms, and a couple of them worked (I think there were long-running US copies of Till Death Do Us Part and Steptoe and Son?). But the batting average in the last thirty years is really, really poor.And thirty years ago, maybe it made sense to try. After all, nobody in America other than an executive somewhere was actually watching British TV, and vice versa. But now, in an age of an international internet, and an age in which a lot of show-watching is done via streaming libraries, I don’t see the point. Wouldn’t it have been cheaper for Amazon to just buy and heavily promote the original? I know the remake option gives them the chance to make more seasons… but it’s not like a US remake of a British show was ever going to make it to a third season anyway!
The hit rate is low with scripted shows, but its an easier sell to their bosses than a new IP. Even if it only gets one series, thats more than most spec scripts get.And occasionally they hit big. Shameless USA is on season what, 11? And House of Cards was massive for Netflix. Getting On did well enough for HBO to ask for fourth season, which the creators declined.
The reality is that even with easy streaming access, very few scripted British TV shows catch on in any major way in America.
Yep, the only ones I can think of is obviously Downton Abbey and to a lesser extent Broadchurch. Downtown succeeded in part because the accents were so much more easier for Americans to understand and follow. Broadchurch had well known recognizable actors and very good buzz.
“I mean, does it ever work?”All in the FamilyThree’s CompanySanford and Son
House of CardsQueer as FolkI suppose it’s debatable whether Veep is an Americanization of The Thick of It.
Was there any point to this at all? It’s a compulsion that some US production companies get, to recreate British TV shows, even though almost every single time this happens, the results are terrible.In fact the Office is the only exception I can think of, and it only got “good” after they stopped doing the UK episodes, and went their own way, right?The one that I found most perturbing (even before Recent Events) was Cosby, which saw Bill Cosby return to our TVs in 1996, in a remake of UK’s One Foot in the Grave. Which if you don’t know it, basically means that Cosby was so desperate to get back on TV, he chose as his source material a thing about a miserable old conservative white dude from actual England, who mopes around his house and gets into amusing situations because of his moping.And I can remember being so irritated by the way they called it “Cosby” as if we couldn’t imagine them telling him “But there’s already a Cosby Show Mr Cosby, and you were great in it, so we need to call this the Cosby… Cosby… uh…..” and so it took me two or three episodes before I worked out the OFITG thing, which only made it all worse.Only recently have I come to appreciate HOW bizarre it was, because Madeline Kahn was in it until she died, Cosby’s character was named Hilton Lewis, they called the show Cosby for fuck’s sake… and it ran for four seasons and 96 episodes.I don’t even dare look up what the US Absolutely Fabulous was like. Terrible, I assume, but in what complicated or ironic way?!
Wait there was a US Ab Fab? With a different cast or the same one? Was I drinking too many gin and tonics so I missed it or something?
Was I drinking too many gin and tonics Bomb and Dom, sweetie, surely. Or at least Bolly and Stolly. No need to dilute good liquor.US Ab Fab was… something that may never be fully understood. Although this clip is a useful way to answer: “What do you mean, Americans don’t understand British humour?”What’s fascinating about this disasterpiece is the way it’s almost, but not quite entirely, unlike Ab Fab. For example, Kristen Johnston is entirely unlike Patsy EXCEPT for when she yells “NOOO Eddie!” and sounds like Joanna Lumley, for a tiny instant, and this really highlights how the whole energy of the scene is off, and the room is too big, and Kathryn Hahn is drowning.By the time Zosia Mamet comes in and starts cruelly mocking Julia Sawahla’s accent, or whatever the fuck she thinks she’s doing, it’s very easy to see why this never got past the pilot.
WHAT IN THE ACTUAL SHIT??That’s it, I’m fucking voting for Trump, America doesn’t deserve to live.
Oh dear that is not good.
Holy crap, clicked on a random part in the middle and didn’t make it a full minute. What a waste of Kathryn Hahn.
Apparently a pilot for the American Red Dwarf exists too?
With Terry Farrell as the Cat, and Jane Leeves as Holly!
This review and the comments have alerted me to the existence of the original, which I’m adding to my list, so that’s helpful!
And making the comic a big, well-known hit seems ill-conceived. With the current real world proving to be full of conspiracy theorists, much more people would have probably latched on to it and thought like the protagonists do if it was that well known. In the original series the comic itself seemed like a weird piece of outsider art, so it made a lot more sense that only a small group of people were really interested in it and trying to decode it.
The original managed a lot of horror precisely *because* the characters were deeply affected by what they saw and experienced and couldn’t move on. I expected a lot to be lost in translation here, but even *that*? Yeesh.
Yeah, I don’t get how they can two of the show’s major character turns in this thing, considering how hard they relied on the slow burn of the events draining them emotionally to the point of breaking.
And that’s three C- pre-air reviews for new shows in a row…
As a big fan of the British original I was hoping this would be a success, if only because then it might run for long enough to provide a satisfying ending. But the review (which I thought was superbly written btw, and please get Roxana back for more) has put me off watching a single second of it.
Utopia relies on at least one scene of staggering violence per episode to move the plot forward…So they use the bathroom at a Chipotle?
What I’m most curious of is just who drew the comic this time around? In the Channel 4 series it was Ben Templesmith, which blew my mind as I was obsessed with him then. Beyond that, I’m lukewarm on this reboot. It’ll never have the twisted charm of the original series, which was taken from me when it was too young.
João Ruas per their Comic-Con panel, with some strong James Jean vibes. Templesmith’s on the original series? Cool, further reason to check it out.
Sweet jesus, Ruas is great! Definitely some James Jean vibes, which works for me- James Jean has always battled with Templesmith for my personal favourite comic art.The Channel 4 series is really great! It’s technically stylish on all fronts: stylish title card/transitions, the score is great, cinematography is unnerving, apropos to the unnerving tone of the whole series. Acting is great too!
Are you certain it was Templesmith? To me it looks like Paul Miller:
https://www.behance.net/gallery/11674793/UTOPIA
At any rate, I wanted to say that João Ruas’work on this new Amazon series is what pulled me in. Explaining the players and conflict through the pages of the illustrated manuscript instead of living room exposition-dump was a rare improvement over the original.
TBH for how vividly I remember it being Ben Templesmith, it’s pretty impossible to find out who actually did the art- maybe it was Templesmith, or maybe I just read that that art is similar to his- which is funny that they sourced Ruas to do the revival, considering he gets recognition for his uncanny similarity to James Jean’s style (and ended up replacing Jean on Fables). I really like Ruas’s style though, and despite the Amazon series lacking a lot of what I love of the Channel 4 run, I’ll give the series a go.
we also watch a mass shooting
I’ll be honest, of all the things I wasn’t expecting the US remake to keep was the mass shooting scene. Is it still based in a secondary/high school in this version? Definitely one of the shocking moments from the UK version, but of course we don’t those type of events over here.
I really liked the first season of the original show but season two, despite some great ideas, felt like it was treading water and repeating itself. My concern with the remake though, regardless of its quality, is that I’m not sure this is the best time to make this type of show considering all the online paranoid thinking, QAnon, Anti-vaxxers and Covid denialism going on today. I used to find conspiracy theories in fiction fun, but now I wonder if they will just fan the flames…
I hadn’t heard of this before, but thanks for the review! You make it seem really intriguing and pretty good, so I’ll look forward to watching it! Thanks!
but i love john cusack!
This can get 100% fucked.THAT IS ALL
It’s so American to have a character like Jessica Hyde, whose whole thing is that she’s ‘in hiding’ and give her the most distinctive character design of the show.
Just watch the UK original. It’s better on every level.
It’s not available on any US streaming service
There’s a good reason that it doesn’t say anything about our current situation. They finished shooting it a year ago when our current world situation was just science fiction. Releasing a show about a pandemic just as one is starting is considered in poor taste, so they waited till the fall. It was never meant to be a geo-political statement. I for one am looking forward to seeing something new and original on TV instead of reruns of shows that have shut down production and may not return anytime soon.
I hate it so much that a remake was greenlit instead of finishing the fucking original story
It doesn’t sound particularly different from the original, tbh
Yeah, it’s just a bit worse in every way.
Oh that’s shitty to read. I was looking forward to seeing Jessica Rothe in something new. She was so good in Happy Death Day.Is John Cusack the kiss of death? I can’t remember the last thing he did that wasn’t some level of cheese factory. Now Joan Cusack, she needs a show!Regardless of your review or my thoughts on the Cusacks I’ll be watching because, Covid.
Joan Cusack had a memorable role in season 2 of Homecoming, FWIW. Actually that season, and the show in general, is pretty similar to the British Utopia, with a big conspiracy and a dash of black humor, although it lacks the verve and energy of that show. (This could probably be explained by the original Homecoming podcast being influenced by the British show, though I’ve never seen anybody explicitly say that’s the case.)
And there is a scene in the first episode of Utopia that is shot in the same building as the headquarters in Homecoming (forgive me, I forget the name of the company the headquarters is for) so it all comes full circle for the Cusacks!
Cusacks performance was solid, I haven’t seen him that good in quite some time. Unfortunately, while I appreciated most of the actors, it never takes off and becomes an incredibly boring, bleak and joyless affair.
Rothe’s exit is one of the most repellent and nonsensical shock for shock’s sake moments that I’ve ever watched. It immediately destroys the character of Jessica Hyde and makes the idea that the rest of the characters would joing her and absolutely ridiculous one. I instantly stopped caring about watching the show and won’t finish it.
the original series is criminally overlooked and was incredible. i lost some enthusiasm for this remake when fincher left but im still excited to check it out.
“Guys this is so bad why don’t you just watch the original???”The original is only available on Amazon Prime UK.
Yeah glad my skepticism saved me from building up hope for this. It wasn’t *bad* but it was unnecessary. It does nothing to improve upon the original and lost so much visually. I still have amazing memories of the colors in the original even though I haven’t rewatched it since it aired.
I’d rather they took the money they spent on making this, and instead used it to finance a third series and continued the original story…
Watching the first episode, I was a little intrigued and considered maybe watching more, but probably won’t now. The one thing that had me laughing (but probably not intended as such) was the montage of what seemed to be a dozen con-goers just opening their hotel doors to a random, unexpected knock, so they could be shot in the face for plot reasons.
Maybe I’m missing something regarding your review and some comments I’m seeing down below, but where is the humor in the original? There are a few moments here or there that might offer some levity, but humorous? The show is pretty tense and bleak throughout. I just re-watched the original and I don’t recall myself thinking much of it was funny at all, which is a good thing.