Feb 142013
 

It doesn’t seem like exaggeration to suggest that we’re currently living in a golden age of TV drama.  Shows like The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, TremeThe Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and, more recently, The Following and The Newsroom have demonstrated that complex plots, thrilling action, stunning production design and A-list acting talent are no longer solely the preserve of cinema, and the televisual medium as a whole has undergone something of a critical reappraisal because of it.  One thing that the afore-mentioned shows have in common is that they are all American productions, with all but one of them (Kevin Bacon vehicle The Following) produced by one of two networks; HBO and AMC.  So where, we might ask, are the British contributions to this small screen renaissance?  Granted, UK production companies lack the funding of their US counterparts (despite its mostly British cast, could Game of Thrones ever have been rendered so vividly by the BBC?), but that doesn’t mean they don’t have the capacity for well-written, ambitious television that strives for consistently high quality despite its financial limitations.  Apart from maverick one-offs like Hugo Blick’s The Shadow Line, British TV drama has been surprisingly short on ambition over the last ten years.  We should therefore be all the more thankful for Dennis Kelly’s Utopia.

Since Channel 4 broadcast the first episode on 15th January, Utopia has been turning heads, although not always for the right reasons.  Essentially a conspiracy thriller, the series is notable for its profound weirdness, beautiful cinematography and top-notch acting.  It’s also incredibly violent, although not gratuitously so; despite inspiring multiple viewer complaints, Utopia‘s unflinching depiction of violence, and the brutalising effect it has on human beings, is actually one of the show’s key strengths.  The plot concerns a disparate group of people brought together by their connection to a comic book called The Utopia Manuscripts, said to contain hidden messages about a malevolent global conspiracy in the real world.  Rumour has it that a sequel to the comic has been produced, and the eagerness of five ordinary people to track it down throws them into a world of terror and confusion, as they discover that dark forces with agents influencing every level of government and law enforcement are also taking an interest in the new manuscript.  In a parallel storyline, a civil servant at the Department of Health makes a gruesome discovery about the nature of a new global flu pandemic, the vaccine to which is being produced by a company with shadowy links to the author of The Utopia Manuscripts.

There’s nothing explicitly supernatural about the plot of Utopia, but the unsettling strangeness of its characters and locations lends the series a strong air of ethereal unreality.  The heroes are pursued through abandoned houses, grimy service stations and desolate countryside in a nightmarish odyssey which sees them tortured, traumatised and gradually hardened by brutality into mirror-images of their monstrous pursuers.  The organisation tracking them is under the direction of the mysterious, satanic ‘Mr Rabbit’, and employs any means it deems necessary to secure the manuscript and enact its master-plan.  All of this is beautifully photographed by directors Marc Munden, Alex Garcia Lopez and Wayne Che Yip, but the real stand-out element is the writing of Dennis Kelly.  Kelly’s previous credits include the BBC sitcom Pulling and recent West End smash Matilda the Musical, making Utopia the latest instalment in an incredibly diverse body of work.  His interweaving plot threads are elegantly arranged to keep the audience guessing whilst gradually revealing the awful truth at the heart of Utopia‘s many mysteries, the credibility of the script’s more outlandish elements bolstered by compelling performances from the entire cast.  Fine support comes from veteran thesps Stephen Rea, James Fox and Paul Higgins, but special mention must go to Neil Maskell as the wheezing, implacable assassin Arby, arguably Kelly’s most memorable creation in a series filled with quirky and unforgettable characters.

In addition to its myriad other qualities, Utopia is a TV series with ambition.  Its complex plot doesn’t insult the intelligence of the audience, and its gorgeous, atmospheric visuals (mimicking the panels of a comic book with their quick cuts and elegant framing) draw the viewer in, making it almost impossible to look away.  Clearly inspired by the work of comics writers like Grant Morrison and Alan Moore, as well as film-makers like Davids Lynch and Cronenberg, it’s a series whose sheer imagination and inventiveness should serve as a template for future British TV drama, and stands as a worthy example of TV’s current golden age.

Utopia’s final episode airs Tuesday 19th February on Channel 4 at 10pm.  The series one DVD will be released on 11th March.

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