UTOPIA: C4's dark drama featuring torture, conspiracies and a comic book

genuinely think Alice is one of their creepy little brainwashed kids.

I think we're supposed to doubt every character. It seemed to start to unravel a little tonight - I didn't get where the race thing came into their conclusions about the vaccine. Massive leap there that I missed.

How many episodes of this are there btw?

There was a bit in the previous episode where it was revealed that the Prof who wrote the comic was a massive Nazi and was interested in eugenics, hence the race thing this week.

I feel like they're yanking my chain by making the show so pretty but full of torture and murder

six episodes is it?

apparently i am totally desensitized to (fictional) murder, torture can fuck off but fortunately they haven't returned to the giddy heights of the first episode.

the lethal vaccine + food chain reveal was implausibly speedy but i'm sure there's a switcheroo or two coming. yeah this isn't the most tightly plotted or original story but it looks and sounds amazing.

I searched the hashtag on Twitter last night and it was great to see so many people, mostly young, getting their minds blown by this. I've seen enough paranoid thrillers not to be startled when someone says "You have no idea what these people are capable of" but it seems to be striking a huge chord with teenagers. The conspiracy's outlandishly huge and too many scenes rely on guns pointed at heads but, like ledge says, it looks and sounds brilliant and I like the dearth of big names in the cast. The woman who plays Jessica Hyde is apparently big in Irish theatre but hasn't done much TV so I see her as her character rather than thinking, oh, her again. And the character of Arby is fascinating - a ruthless killer slowly regressing to a damaged child. I miss the humour of the first episode though.

i missed the first episode (and the 4seven repeat) and home network isn't up to 4od. guess i have to wait for them to repeat the entire thing.

Particularly liked the "RB...'Raisin Boy'" exchange last night, produced a very hollow chuckle from this viewer.

best chuckle last night was the scientist complaining that the press ruined his life by telling the world that he like prostitutes and cocaine : 'i mean it was true, i do like prostitutes and cocaine, but they didn't have to tell everyone'

About to watch ep 4 but as a side note to gyac's observation about Alice:

I just assumed Alice was the kid at school who might talk to random people that turn up, but the way her mum behaved in the first two eps was just weird. In ep 2, when Danny breaks in and spends the night in Alice's room he gets disturbed and in the morning because Alice's mum shouts that it's time to get ready and leave. Danny then just leaves through the door and up the corridor that she's apparently in with no alarm, no shouts and no checking he's not being seen. Then in ep 3, when Alice is being told by the police they know about Danny and Arby turns up etc, her mum is calm as you like throughout. She's just found out a kid that cold-bloodedly murdered a school of other children was skulking about in her house the other night. Her reaction is just "Pff. No biggie. Where's the manuscript?"

Is it just me that thinks that's a bit odd? (Rhetorical, I know, as the answer is obviously yes)

I still think there's a reveal to come where Jessica/Not Jessica is shown to share the Nazi opinions of Karvell (whether he's her father or not). The scene where she gets Danny drunk has her (imo) wanting the Utopia to come after the virus is released.

The series is definitely at its worst when moving chunks of plot around. Otherwise, still fun.

Biggest plot hole this week (besides the food chain revelation): Why didn't the Network tail civil servant guy to make sure he didn't go near the medical lab?

Speculation: Did Jessica pass something on to Ian when she kissed him?

Why does a sterilisation contagion need to be hereditary? Other than that, great episode.

This is still holding together imo (to my surprise). Arby/RB/Piotr's character was so good this week. Brother-sister revelation not really a surprise, nor that Janus is a Watchmen-like plot to save humanity by hurting it (or maybe Letts was lying/doesn't know the truth?).

Revelations to come: If Janus affects 95% of people, which 5% are not affected? We still don't know what Jessica's motivation is. Also unclear what Dugdale will do - did he call the police because he thinks he has negotiated peace with the Network and his wife, or because he knew he was being watched and needed to allay suspicions? As for Mr. Rabbit's identity, I'd guess he's either Carville (and still alive?) or he doesn't exist.

Plot-holes or not-holes: Did Letts say that Deal's was a test to see whether they could introduce hereditary changes, and the change they want to introduce now is sterility? [xp - started writing this an hour ago] How did the gang get Milner's address?

why would the doctor guy be all "oh i need to be rich, being old in the future will be hell" when he is like easily 50, at least, and so there'd be plenty of young people around. does it even make sense that with no babies nobody would bother to care for the old? surely the reverse is true?

Like initially at least it's hard to see how he'd be affected.

Heh, good catch. The way around it might have been to have him say "The world is going to go through a massive upheaval and I need to stockpile cash to make sure I'm buffered from the chaos".

I just think he's too old to have those concerns. What would practically be different that would mean the elderly would be left to die while there were still as many adults as always (giving him a 25 year life expectancy and that's generous)

Surely efforts to prolong lifespan would be concentrated more in that world, while viable.

Can't believe I'm wasting mindspace on this.

No, I agree with you completely. I was just thinking that in the immediate term, people are going to notice that everyone's become sterile and that will have unpredictable effects on society. Could drive everyone a bit mad for a while.

Children of Men iirc

That was my reaction to the plan too. Janus dude, haven't you seen Children of Men? It doesn't work out well.

lesser of two evils though. arguably.

re: sterility and heritability, maybe in the 5% who can conceive the condition is present but dormant, so the following generations are also 95% sterile.

although really there would be little point in trying to engineer that, the problem is overpopulation right now. once you've reduced the population by 95% in one generation that's the problem solved, whether or not it grows to dangerous levels in another 2000 years is not a major concern.

do you all think that rea's character was actually honest about what was going on?

they could pull another twist i suppose, but rea's idea is more interesting than the standard eugenics stuff they thought was going on before. also rea thought, correctly, he'd been given up so he had no reason to bluff.

I didn't get the bit abt the stones. Did JH dream/flashback to getting one out of the guy's stomach too?

I don't know, it's beginning to collapse under the weight of Wouldn't It Be Cool If-isms. Yes, we're back at the TRUST NO-ONE shitstorm I predicted in the beginning but for me it went over the top when it turned out that the doctor that Dugdale went to is also the one who is selling the Deal's vaccine to Becky - so if he was already on the other side of the conspiracy, or at least knows what is going on, why did he even bother to test the sample that Dugdale brings him if his intention was always to run like fuck as soon as Dugdale's back was turned?

Although that scene with him does exactly explain his motivation that Ronan ponders above. He says there that he wants to be rich, really rich because it'll be his way of seeing out the rest of his life in whatever the world looks like if 'they' succeed. (In other words, pretty much exactly the line that seandalai was looking for.)

I think Dugdale thinks turning them and the vaccine will give him the ability to keep the promise he and his wife made to Anya, that new evidence will set her free. I'm guessing they were bluffing when they went to see her, just in order to see whether she would agree with the adoption/surrogate plan. My favourite bit of the episode was how quickly he put back the vaccine when he heard it sterilised people.

fwiw I think James Fox will be revealed as Mr Rabbit in the last episode. And possibly Carville.

fwiw I think James Fox will be revealed as Mr Rabbit in the last episode. And possibly Carville.

Feels a bit too obvious, but yeah it could happen. Not sure if Mr. Rabbit == Carville works then - why would they need to find the manuscript?

do you all think that rea's character was actually honest about what was going on?

Had the same thought - he (and other downstream characters like Donaldson) might not even know the extent of the plan.

I'm not sold on the idea of Mr Rabbit == Carville myself, but it feels like something the writer might throw in as a DYS. Also the idea of Mr Rabbit as a dissociative personality which allows him to carry out experiments on his son (and maybe daughter) may well be too tempting to him. As to why he would then want the manuscript, I'm guessing potentially his time in the asylum showed him the error of his ways and he wants to destroy it - but he needs to be on the inside to get it and the trial is already too far underway for him to stop it. I would call that complete bullshit but I can see it on screen for sure.

James Fox has only ever been credited as The Assistant btw, which is surely the biggest clue that he's definitely supposed to be Mr Rabbit.

Yes, we're back at the TRUST NO-ONE shitstorm I predicted in the beginning

hang on, we still trust wilson, ian, grant, there's no evidence that jessica is actually a double agent...

dugdale just turned them in to protect his own skin.

becky isn't an actual double agent, she's effectively being bribed by the doctor.

There has to be a reveal about Ian, doesn't there? Every other "hero" is interesting in some way.

Also The Assistant said Letts had provided a good cover, ie for The Assistant aka Mr Rabbit to run things. The soul patch always struck me as rather odd, particularly for an establishment figure. Another hint that The Assistant is not all he seems.

I'm with Ledge on the trust issue. I don't think the plot is anywhere as complicated as some are trying to make it and the characters motivations are fairly clear. I think one of the strengths of Ian is his ordinariness. He's the likeable everyman figure who has managed to keep the gang together mainly through his lack of agenda. While he's made a few mistakes, he's been proven his mettle.

I don't think the plot is anywhere as complicated as some are trying to make it and the characters motivations are fairly clear

yep

The reveal re: Becky's motivations was well-handled. I'd have been disappointed if she'd been just a traitor working for Mr Rabbit. The characterisation is pretty strong - stronger than most paranoid thrillers - which means you can't fuck around with the characters' allegiances too much without destroying a lot of good work and the audience's faith. I don't want Becky or Jessica or whoever to be cold-hearted liars. Arby continues to rule - his scenes with Jessica were the best bits of the episode. I like the way she thinks he's arranging a rendezvous when really he just wants a fry-up. "Talk to the man." "Which man?" "The one behind the counter."

He sort of is arranging something, doesn't he say later he gets a gun from there? The actor is doing sterling work though, agreed.

Yeah that's true about the gun but she doesn't know that at the time. She's expecting an introduction and comes away thinking it was a waste of time. I loved it when he said it was his local and she said, "It's a motorway cafe! It's nobody's local!"

Anyone?

meh

It was entertaining enough but all the big reveals were pretty predictable in the end.

I'd like to watch it again because I got confused. I also want to know what happened to Arby

well, i would suggest that the Arby story will be picked up in Series 2.

(note the presence of 'Series 1' declaration on the cover of the DVD)

Only just started watching this and OMG 'hidden in my greatest creation' is such an over-worked and lazy trope I can't believe it's actually going to be that.

There's no Arby story to pick up - he was in the old hospital building where Jessica took the manuscript from him. Either he was killed by the agents that were following (and he had started to torch the hospital to delay) or he was in on the plot to bring Jessica to Milner and this was just another strand to it.

The end was really predictable, but the Becky reveal proves (I think) that Becky was working for Milner the whole time and was the double agent I thought she was. Think about it - the only people we ever hear of that have Deal's Syndrome are Becky, her Dad and Milner's son (who is only used as a fake-out device by Milner). It's a rare disease which only has experimental medication to cure, and Becky happens across the one guy (who also is the bent scientist in the Department of Health labs) who can get his hands on the cure? What was it she said about James Fox? "He even had words carved into his stomach to maintain his cover. You wouldn't believe the lengths people will go to." The cover of 'Becky' has served its usefulness so she can just leave Ian and Grant to it.

I'd give Becky the benefit of the doubt. She wanted to spare Ian the horror of seeing her succumb to Deal's. If she was part of the plot, why would she need to go through the palaver of bargaining with the scientist?

Because he's needed to keep Dugdale?

The whole thing's overly complicated tbh. If Milner's plan has always been to get hold of Jessica then she's always known that the manuscript said Jessica was the key. She's also always known Jessica was chasing the manuscript. She could have caught her in episode 1 in that case.

I think it's less complicated than you suggest. Making the manuscript the MacGuffin was a fine twist. It provided great cover and allowed Milner to gradually pull in her real quarry.

No, you only need the manuscript as a MacGuffin if you're going to make it complicated.

If you are head of a super-secret agency (which may be within a different agency) that is as powerful as has been demonstrated in the plot you don't gradually pull someone in, you just take them. And Milner has always knows where Jessica was - Jessica gave Milner's number to Ian and Becky in the first place as someone she trusted, remember.

The only justification for gradually reeling her in is that she wants The Network destroyed before she takes Jessica - but given she would be using and risking Jessica in order to do that, it would be an amazingly stupid plan. What if Jessica died in a park toilets in the middle of nowhere? How would that help you get Jessica?

Ok, but if she took her at the start you wouldn't have had much of a series...