When context matters: the central conspiracy hews too close to the bone in late 2020.
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Review: Utopia is a very good series released at exactly the wrong time
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Why would Amazon reboot an english series for US market?
Because they can and determine it would be popular in the American market with Americans. The British do it too.
Its not uncommon.
List of American television series based on British television series
List of British television series based on American television series
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I watched the original. Good but unpleasant. If you watch it, I recommend skipping past the eye-gouging scene, which remains the only thing that has ever made me faint.
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Anyone know where to find the original streaming? I haven't been able to find it.
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Don't be a pearl-clutching granny. It was released at the luckiest, most relevant time imaginable. The timing adds value for the same reason people were watching Contagion in droves six months ago.
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I would assume for the usual reason British shows get Americanized - to make it more palatable to wider audiences by replacing silly things like logical plot and character development with more sex and violence.
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The original UK series is also on Amazon Prime in the UK.
Both series have their strong points. The UK series had unusual music, colour palette and framing, a more sympathetic characterization of Jessica Hyde, unnerving Arby (although the American actor was good in a different way) and a fantastic prequel at the start of the second series. The background story was stronger and more plausible in the US version and John Cusack made a very convincing villain who had a point.
Both series have their strong points. The UK series had unusual music, colour palette and framing, a more sympathetic characterization of Jessica Hyde, unnerving Arby (although the American actor was good in a different way) and a fantastic prequel at the start of the second series. The background story was stronger and more plausible in the US version and John Cusack made a very convincing villain who had a point.
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I watched both back to back starting with the original (both seasons), and the Amazon version is better to be thought of as a the black comedy that fills in context and details the UK severely lacks. The UK is a more "realistic" drama.
Edit: spelling.
Edit: spelling.
Here are some examples:
Let's start with the Utopia manuscript origins. Both have it come from a psych patient. In the UK version the publisher of the original book has been holding on to it but decides to sell it to a seemingly random comic shop and then it's sold without fanfare to a wealthy guy. Outside the main characters, the original book is never mentioned as being popular enough that anyone else cares. The US version has the manuscript originally given by the patient to the worker. It's later found by the family of the now deceased psych ward worker while cleaning out his house. After Googling "Dystopia" (the UK version calls it "Utopia part 1") they find a dedicated subculture and try to make a quick buck selling it to the highest bidder at a fringe convention. The US version makes a more complete and realistic starting point that is spread across a full episode (which can be done since the US has more episodes).
UK Jessica Hyde comes out of nowhere to the groups hiding spot. There is no context as where she learned her skills or her peculiar behavior. How she has the skills to hack into airline databases to find people who are out of town to use their houses isn't explained, or even how she has survived to this point. She is just there, knows everything about everyone and immediately cares about them. US Jessica has avoided detection by hiding and living a transient life. She finds the group by following the trail left by the book. The backstory of her teacher and protector are sussed out and her actions make sense in context. Instead of being a hacker she is barely computer literate and uses her wits to survive, like knowing foreign oligarchs don't stay in their mansions often and houses with lights on timers are empty. She also has no initial need or trust for the rest of the group other than to get her to the book, which makes sense for someone accustomed to living on the streets
UK Becky and Ian first meet get drunk and have sex a feet away from passed out Wilson Wilson in his bunker in matter of hours. US version makes them younger, their romance more awkward, and spreads it out drawing you in. UK Ian has a better history by including more of his job and his brother. US lacks both and his quick turn around to support Jessica is meh. US doesn't have the strange Jessica/Ian/Becky love triangle which is definitely a positive. US Becky hiding her illness makes you more invested in her than when UK Becky blurts it out early on.
The US version shows the art of both Dystopia and Utopia in detail which adds to the story. UK shows a few pages but overall the art and the book's hidden messages are largely unimportant outside the identity of Mr. Rabbit. (The budget clearly plays a part here)
As much as I like Neil Maskell, (excellent in Humans), his backstory and performance are less rich because his transformation doesn't have the personal aspect from interactions with Mr. Rabbit/Dr. Christie and Lily/the twins (who aren't included in the UK story at all). Awkward mouth breathing doesn't compare in creepiness and comedy of Christopher Dehham's portrayal.
Kids are basically a wash (except Grant is an asshole in season 2). US Alice mourning wasn't as good as UK and suffered from the quick flip to team Jessica in the same way as Ian.
Killing off Jessica Rothe was bad. Her performance was on track to match to her role in Happy Death Day.
Rainn Wilson as a basement scientist turned patsy was better comedically, but far less "realistic" than the UK. Also the vast planning in the US version that was needed to put him in the same psych unit at the same time as Mr. Hyde just to be a scapegoat and "just in case" pawn is a little too far fetched. Blackmailing Mr. Dugdale (UK) makes sense and most of his actions are easily explained.
Mrs. Stearns (US) as a plant is interesting and works in the context of the US story (although less realistic). Mrs. Dugdale (UK) extreme desperation for a child that she wants to acquire her husband's illegitimate child with a prostitute is awkward, but Anya (the prostitute) being the plant is logical.
John Cusack plays it over the top to the point of being a Nicolas Cage acolyte. It sort of works, but not really. The same can be said with the "earning your place in the world" and " your purpose" being too cult like. I guess that sells how there could be such a massive number of people involved in the conspiracy.
The UK shadowy cabal sometimes works better than the hiding in plain sight plot of the US, but the US organization matches the current culture accurately.
The additional characters and story in the US helped sell the vast conspiracy and building the world. Artemis, Lily, Thomas, Dale, Cara, Home, etc. all positively expanded the narrative.
US version clearly benefits from a larger budget and more episodes.
Let's start with the Utopia manuscript origins. Both have it come from a psych patient. In the UK version the publisher of the original book has been holding on to it but decides to sell it to a seemingly random comic shop and then it's sold without fanfare to a wealthy guy. Outside the main characters, the original book is never mentioned as being popular enough that anyone else cares. The US version has the manuscript originally given by the patient to the worker. It's later found by the family of the now deceased psych ward worker while cleaning out his house. After Googling "Dystopia" (the UK version calls it "Utopia part 1") they find a dedicated subculture and try to make a quick buck selling it to the highest bidder at a fringe convention. The US version makes a more complete and realistic starting point that is spread across a full episode (which can be done since the US has more episodes).
UK Jessica Hyde comes out of nowhere to the groups hiding spot. There is no context as where she learned her skills or her peculiar behavior. How she has the skills to hack into airline databases to find people who are out of town to use their houses isn't explained, or even how she has survived to this point. She is just there, knows everything about everyone and immediately cares about them. US Jessica has avoided detection by hiding and living a transient life. She finds the group by following the trail left by the book. The backstory of her teacher and protector are sussed out and her actions make sense in context. Instead of being a hacker she is barely computer literate and uses her wits to survive, like knowing foreign oligarchs don't stay in their mansions often and houses with lights on timers are empty. She also has no initial need or trust for the rest of the group other than to get her to the book, which makes sense for someone accustomed to living on the streets
UK Becky and Ian first meet get drunk and have sex a feet away from passed out Wilson Wilson in his bunker in matter of hours. US version makes them younger, their romance more awkward, and spreads it out drawing you in. UK Ian has a better history by including more of his job and his brother. US lacks both and his quick turn around to support Jessica is meh. US doesn't have the strange Jessica/Ian/Becky love triangle which is definitely a positive. US Becky hiding her illness makes you more invested in her than when UK Becky blurts it out early on.
The US version shows the art of both Dystopia and Utopia in detail which adds to the story. UK shows a few pages but overall the art and the book's hidden messages are largely unimportant outside the identity of Mr. Rabbit. (The budget clearly plays a part here)
As much as I like Neil Maskell, (excellent in Humans), his backstory and performance are less rich because his transformation doesn't have the personal aspect from interactions with Mr. Rabbit/Dr. Christie and Lily/the twins (who aren't included in the UK story at all). Awkward mouth breathing doesn't compare in creepiness and comedy of Christopher Dehham's portrayal.
Kids are basically a wash (except Grant is an asshole in season 2). US Alice mourning wasn't as good as UK and suffered from the quick flip to team Jessica in the same way as Ian.
Killing off Jessica Rothe was bad. Her performance was on track to match to her role in Happy Death Day.
Rainn Wilson as a basement scientist turned patsy was better comedically, but far less "realistic" than the UK. Also the vast planning in the US version that was needed to put him in the same psych unit at the same time as Mr. Hyde just to be a scapegoat and "just in case" pawn is a little too far fetched. Blackmailing Mr. Dugdale (UK) makes sense and most of his actions are easily explained.
Mrs. Stearns (US) as a plant is interesting and works in the context of the US story (although less realistic). Mrs. Dugdale (UK) extreme desperation for a child that she wants to acquire her husband's illegitimate child with a prostitute is awkward, but Anya (the prostitute) being the plant is logical.
John Cusack plays it over the top to the point of being a Nicolas Cage acolyte. It sort of works, but not really. The same can be said with the "earning your place in the world" and " your purpose" being too cult like. I guess that sells how there could be such a massive number of people involved in the conspiracy.
The UK shadowy cabal sometimes works better than the hiding in plain sight plot of the US, but the US organization matches the current culture accurately.
The additional characters and story in the US helped sell the vast conspiracy and building the world. Artemis, Lily, Thomas, Dale, Cara, Home, etc. all positively expanded the narrative.
US version clearly benefits from a larger budget and more episodes.
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The UK version was cancelled after 2 series. Perhaps Amazon plan on going beyond that and complete the story. To do that, they needed to remake the first 2 series.
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But this is not really like those examples. This more equivalent to a network in 1930s Germany releasing a series about a Jewish conspiracy to oppress and bankrupt the poor. It's hard to see Utopia not adding fuel to what is an already-dangerous fire.
And re. science fiction writing in the 1930s -- I'd consider the public response to Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds" radio play before pushing that theme too strongly. Pushing the buttons of susceptible people who are already panicking is ... often not the greatest idea.
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chaos215bar2
Ars Praefectus
I can see something more along the lines of The Da Vinci Code (i.e. secret organizations, centuries old conspiracies, and most importantly, knowledge born out of actual research — even if over-dramatized) working fine today. But I haven't watched this yet precisely because a small group of outsiders in the know, pulling (apparently) unlikely clues out of a comic book is indeed way too on the nose right now. Just substitute "comic book" for "social media post", and… well, you know.
That said, after reading the article and comments here (less spoilers), I might give it a try. I can always come back and just finish the article if the series goes downhill (or never gets up the hill to start with).
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Cool lists, and, oh, the name changes!
UK original: Absolutely Fabulous, US remake: AbFab
UK original: Bad Education, US remake: An American Education
UK original: Little Britain, US remake: Little Britain USA (straightforward but still hilarious!)
and
US original: Mad About You, UK remake: Loved By You
US original: Card Sharks, UK remake: Play Your Cards Right
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Unsure whether the problem is with the original story or with the remake. However as interesting as the plot line was, so much of the story was ridiculously improbable even for a show based on a comic book.
The upfront killing of Sam.. annoying, but ok fine.
Using twins to fake a working vaccine for a virus affecting hundreds of children? What happened to all of the testing standards that Mike was so concerned with? And presumably the vaccine had been tested previously and so its functional characteristics should already be known, but complete eradication of viral load in the span of hours seemed legit? And what the hell happened to all of the other children in the quarantine camp? One kid gets fake cured and they close down the entire camp that presumably has dozens or more children? They couldn't have treated them because the vaccine didn't work so where the hell did they all go? Or was the entire camp and all of the parents outside of the camp fake as well? Seems unlikely as they didn't have back stories prepared for the one parent we know was a plant and I cannot imagine that no one suspected reporters might dig in to the background of the various agrieved parents whose children's tragic stories would make such juicey news.
Will only touch on one more of many other ridiculous plot points: the warehouse. WTF? Not the brightest bunch but they all showed moments of impressive insight and none of them them gave a thought as to how they would destroy hundreds of millions of doses (a dose for every man woman and child in the US) of the vaccine? They brought cans of gasoline for a distraction but didn't bother with any explosives or accelerants for the vaccine? And that leaves them stomping on individual viles? Just dumb. Really dumb.
Anyway, as interesting as the overall plotline was, the writing failed miserably in many aspects. A healthy suspension of disbelief is necessary for most movies, but cannot make up for sloppy lazy writing.
And the twist ending... Unsure if that was original or not but... Don't think I will be turning in for season 2... If there is one.
The upfront killing of Sam.. annoying, but ok fine.
Using twins to fake a working vaccine for a virus affecting hundreds of children? What happened to all of the testing standards that Mike was so concerned with? And presumably the vaccine had been tested previously and so its functional characteristics should already be known, but complete eradication of viral load in the span of hours seemed legit? And what the hell happened to all of the other children in the quarantine camp? One kid gets fake cured and they close down the entire camp that presumably has dozens or more children? They couldn't have treated them because the vaccine didn't work so where the hell did they all go? Or was the entire camp and all of the parents outside of the camp fake as well? Seems unlikely as they didn't have back stories prepared for the one parent we know was a plant and I cannot imagine that no one suspected reporters might dig in to the background of the various agrieved parents whose children's tragic stories would make such juicey news.
Will only touch on one more of many other ridiculous plot points: the warehouse. WTF? Not the brightest bunch but they all showed moments of impressive insight and none of them them gave a thought as to how they would destroy hundreds of millions of doses (a dose for every man woman and child in the US) of the vaccine? They brought cans of gasoline for a distraction but didn't bother with any explosives or accelerants for the vaccine? And that leaves them stomping on individual viles? Just dumb. Really dumb.
Anyway, as interesting as the overall plotline was, the writing failed miserably in many aspects. A healthy suspension of disbelief is necessary for most movies, but cannot make up for sloppy lazy writing.
And the twist ending... Unsure if that was original or not but... Don't think I will be turning in for season 2... If there is one.
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I've never watched either version of The Office, but I thought those had different story lines? Similarly, the two versions of House of Cards have different plots. The American House of Cards starts with the same idea, but due to the different setting, the story line evolves differently.
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In my opinion, it is nowhere near or unusual or interesting as the UK version.
I watched this one and it was OK, but only because I'm at home with nothing else to watch.
The original was is an odd show, in a good way. The new one seems unnecessary to me personally, but I guess as a more accessible, mass market thing it's okay.
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I didn't feel the UK series was incomplete. If anything, it should have stopped at the first 6 episodes. The second 6 rehash the same story, and so lack the basic motivation to discover what the conspiracy is about.
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I haven't seen the UK version. I'm 5 episodes into AV's take, and I'm liking it quite a bit. It is, indeed, uncannily on-the-nose given present circumstances, maybe uncomfortably for some, but I have no problem with it; it's almost as though someone released a tv series that mysteriously predicts present and future events...
I especially like the scenes where
I especially like the scenes where
the conspiracy nutters go off on their pet theory, wildly connecting utterly unrelated facts because of superficial resemblance like, "Well, that looks like a 'T', and it's TEA time, so it must refer to the T-shaped rash, and..." because this is actually how these people think reasoning works.
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It's odd to see this described as twisted, when coming from a country that isn't full of religious fundamentalism it sounds a lot less creepy than being forced to say grace before being allowed to eat.
Sounds a lot more like Rainbow Six to me. It feels silly to criticise this series for coming out now when the basic idea has been done so many times before.
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Ok, up to episode 5 and still not impressed that much but its ok I guess. But yeah, was sort of the wrong time to release it.
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Find the original version.
This remake fails to capture the quirkiness of the original.
This remake fails to capture the quirkiness of the original.
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I watched the original UK series back in the 2013 and 2014. The Amazon redo was good but the original is a masterpiece. As a fan of the show I followed the HBO/Fincher fiasco and then watched Amazon take over the remake. Filming of the remake was finished over a year ago so by January many became curious as to what was taking it so to make it to Prime.
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chaos215bar2
Ars Praefectus
So, for anyone who's curious but just can't quite bring themselves to watch the whole series, watching the first two and then last episode is actually pretty decent. (Maybe even the last two episodes would be okay.) Somehow I don't feel like I missed anything especially important in the middle, and even then, I found myself skipping over minutes at a time just to get some of the more ridiculous parts moving a little more quickly.
I attribute part of this to the writing (which was just okay, with at least a couple plot holes large enough to drive a fork lift through), but mostly I just don't get much enjoyment out of watching people do stupid things for poorly justified reasons.
I attribute part of this to the writing (which was just okay, with at least a couple plot holes large enough to drive a fork lift through), but mostly I just don't get much enjoyment out of watching people do stupid things for poorly justified reasons.
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I finished watching this. It was entertaining. I regret nothing.
I didn't care for the very end, which tries to force viewers into watching a second season that I'm pretty sure will materialize, something I really don't like in any show. Here, the central mystery that propelled the entire season has been resolved. Some side-mysteries, not so much, but they're not really enough to carry another full season exploring, so I don't know how they'll approach that. I would have preferred if they had just put a bow on it and called it done.
Not at all bad, though.
I didn't care for the very end, which tries to force viewers into watching a second season that I'm pretty sure will materialize, something I really don't like in any show. Here, the central mystery that propelled the entire season has been resolved. Some side-mysteries, not so much, but they're not really enough to carry another full season exploring, so I don't know how they'll approach that. I would have preferred if they had just put a bow on it and called it done.
Not at all bad, though.
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The show was ruined for me by one early event: the main protagonist cold-bloodedly murders an innocent character in an early episode, and by the finale, the victim's own friends are literally hugging the murderer. The showrunner hints that there's an arc to this character's 'growth' in future seasons but I frankly can't give a fig about the murderer's long-awaited reunion with dad - not after the show actually introduced us to the murdered character's own dad (and so happy that Dad gets his kid back crispy, and not extra-crispy! Yay Super-Friends!). You'd think there was a good reason for the murder, but no, it's a one-liner (basically, survival), and by the end of the series you realize it could have easily and probably should have been applied to any one of the Scooby-Doo squad at various points. I guess that restraint represents 'character growth'.
The protagonist/murderer would have been somewhat bearable without that incident - but someone wanted a shock moment to set the show's tone early, and that's fine if there had been a better reason, but it completely relies on a dumb, pliant audience to participate in forgetting about an inexcusable murder within a few episodes. Hard pass. Get bent, Jessica Hyde.
The protagonist/murderer would have been somewhat bearable without that incident - but someone wanted a shock moment to set the show's tone early, and that's fine if there had been a better reason, but it completely relies on a dumb, pliant audience to participate in forgetting about an inexcusable murder within a few episodes. Hard pass. Get bent, Jessica Hyde.
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The original UK version is now available in the US on Amazon Prime. Both seasons are available.
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