3 episodes into Station 11, I would fallen asleep no longer as soon as, however two times. I wasn’t simply annoyed with Station 11’s self indulgence, I used to be bored.
A post-apocalyptic HBO Max miniseries set within the fast aftermath of a perilous and extremely contagious flu, Station 11 is a display a couple of fictional pandemic — shot, produced and launched all the way through an exact pandemic. However in lots of ways in which pandemic is subservient and unimportant. Station 11 is a display about issues. About giant concepts and issues. It is a display about survival. About trauma. About taking shelter within the transitive energy of artwork and the connective tissue of our shared humanity.
Learn extra: Evaluate: Station 11’s HBO Adaptation Got here at a Bizarre, however Excellent, Time
In different phrases: urgh.
From the outset, it is a display that spells out grand ambitions in transparent phrases. It is a display that opens with King Lear. A display that makes flagrant use of Shakespeare as a story and framing software, but additionally has the gall to position itself on the heart of a grand literary canon.
As soon as once more: urgh. The most important urgh I will be able to muster.
3 episodes deep I jumped into one among CNET’s many Slack channels to dump at the display with my co-workers. It was once self-indulgent. It was once dull. It took itself method too significantly. It was once top by itself provide. It was once basically fallacious compared to a display like, say, Yellowjackets – which masked its personal issues of trauma below the guise of a crafty and compelling thriller field display.
“Station 11 sucks.” I believe that is what I typed. I used to be flawed. I could not had been extra flawed.
Simply seven episodes later, on the display’s conclusion, I went crawling again to that very same workplace Slack, on my arms and knees, to inform everybody that – in truth – Station 11 is without doubt one of the perfect TV displays I believe I have ever noticed in my existence and that each and every human being alive will have to make efforts to observe it.
So pretentious
Jeevan and Kirsten.
Parrish Lewis/HBO Max
My favourite second in Station 11 happens midway thru episode 9.
Jeevan, one of the vital display’s primary characters, has been having a look after Kirsten, a kid actress obsessive about a comic book guide – the titular Station 11. A comic book guide she carries along with her in all places as she travels within the post-pandemic international. A comic book guide that provides her hope in determined cases.
After trekking again to their house base, Kirsten realizes she’s dropped the comedian guide within the snow. Pissed off, no longer somewhat figuring out why it issues, Jeevan angrily stomps again into the desolate tract to retrieve it. Right through the quest, a wolf assaults him, mauling him part to loss of life. As he crawls on his arms and knees, combating for survival in excessive subzero temperatures, he stumbles around the comedian guide, buried within the snow. In entire agony he starts studying it, prior to tossing it apart, screaming: “IT’S SO PRETENTIOUS!”
It is a shockingly cathartic second. First of all, it is humorous! A wonderfully timed second of comedy in the middle of a gloomy, visceral second. I laughed out loud. However additionally it is an acknowledgement, a crystalized second of self consciousness. The display is speaking about itself, at once to its target market. Sure, Station 11 is pretentious. It is a display actively wrestling with giant concepts – swinging for the fences, navigating the worth of artwork in a global full of struggling.
However Station 11 is additionally self-aware sufficient to grasp it is asking so much. Of its target market, of itself as an leisure product. That is essential.
A large ask
Why will have to we care a couple of tv display? Why will have to any more or less artwork topic? In a global the place I to find myself drifting clear of so-called “status TV,” Station 11 compelled me to invite myself that query.
Lately I have been much more likely to eat never-ending, disposable anime, or binge watch feel-good truth displays like Outdated Sufficient and The Nice British Bake Off. Given what now we have all long past thru over the past two or 3 years, it is been tricky to summon the “giant mind power” required to experience a display like Station 11. A display that forces us to reckon with giant questions and massive concepts.
Station 11 is going in instructions you could no longer be expecting.
{Photograph} by means of Ian Watson/HBO Max
That is exactly why I discovered Station 11 so repulsive at first. In the middle of COVID-19, a length of ground-shaking political strife, you are actually gonna inquire from me to interact with a TV display a couple of touring troupe of Shakespearean actors appearing Hamlet in a post-pandemic desolate tract? That is a large ask.
However Station 11 works as it laws on each and every conceivable stage. It is so simple as that. It is a well-written display, with nice performances and soundtrack that may hang-out you lengthy after you’ve gotten completed gazing.
Station 11 swings for the fences however hits the ball blank. It takes time to ship on its daring imaginative and prescient, however for those who stick thru that preliminary sluggish burn – battle thru that preliminary repulsion – you can be rewarded with a display that has nuanced issues to mention on each and every “Critical Matter” it dares to broach. It is a display about households – actual and inherited. It is a display in regards to the legacy of shared trauma. A display about artwork as a shelter. If that will give you the ick, I am getting it. However in an overly actual universe the place we are deep within the desolate tract of our personal ache and struggling, Station 11 is as crucial as tv will get.
