Amph Travelers

Anyone else watching this show here? It showed up on Netflix last month and, despite being hesitant on the premise (I'm not a fan of time travel shows), it really grew on me. They bring up some interesting and terrifying concepts in the show.

 

Someone raved about this to me today actually. What's terrifying about it? That sounds intriguing.

 

Not watched it yet but the missus really likes it

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It would requiring spoiling certain things in the show, but the implications of the technology involved is actually scary.

 

Sorry. Some of us are still trying to keep up with honorable shows like Blacklist.

 

Wocky most people don't describe one person as "some."

 

Rogue1.5 watches it too you jerk!

 

I binged it all over Christmas. Really enjoyed it.

 

I expected a diatribe about gypsies.

 

Just started it tonight. It's pretty intriguing.

 

All of a sudden I got flashbacks to this 80's time-travel series called "Voyagers", but I see the concept of this show is vastly different. So, the time travel concept is akin to that of Quantum Leap or Days of Future Past. But how exactly does the "traveler", well, resurrects their host?

 

Spoiler

It definitely has some 12 Monkeys vibes, although the time travel obviously works a little different as the timeline is --so far as I am aware two episodes in--not fixed.

It is somewhat bizarre that the travelers have no way back, since the teams seem to be initially put together to fulfill one specific mission. It seems they are then tapped for more missions for their duration in the 21st, as the leader of the team who handed off the package to McLaren's team had been there a full year, but at the same time they have strict protocols to follow and attempt to adhere to their hosts' original lives. This feels needlessly complicated, and I am worried it's just an excuse so the show can focus on the dramatic problems of the team (e.g. being a drug addict or having potentially fatal brain damage because your host had mental deficiencies) and how future people adjust to the alien world of the 21st century ("this is cow's milk" *laughtrack plays*).

Maybe the jump isn't permanent and I just haven't watched enough, but that is the impression I got from the first two episodes. Even if it isn't, there are travelers all over the world, for what appears to be extended periods of time. The potential for something to go wrong--they seem very concerned with keeping up appearances, or at least the men upstairs do--seems huge. Why on earth did this current team even need to be assembled? If the leader of that team had been there for a full year, and they had the equipment necessary to contain the anti-matter, why couldn't they have simply done the same thing this new team did?

I suppose I'll learn more about that kind of thing as I keep watching, but I can't say I am at all interested in the prospect of watching them attempt to balance their "normal" lives with their super important world ending missions.

 

As I remember it they don't; what they do is snuff-out the original host's mind a second or two before they do whatever it is that would have killed them, i.e. taking that fatal drug overdose. You get to see the original personality scream in pain as they are overwritten by the traveler, making each traveler essentially a murderer, albeit they are murdering a mind that is about to die anyway.

 

It would be funny if the traveler is immediately killed the same way the host would have been. Like, they know that the host is going to be hit by a bus, so they send him to 20 seconds before it happens, but upon arrival, he is distracted by the same thing that originally would have distracted the host and is hit by the bus.

 

That basically happens in episode 2.

 

Ugh, how dishonorable. Wock would definitely skip. And I'd have a hard time condoning such methods, regardless the intent.

 

And this is part of what makes the series interesting. They are playing God, and some question this more than others.

 

He's just impersonating Wocky.

 

I've just finished episode 8. Before this episode, I would have said it was a solid sci fi thriller with an interesting premise. It doesn't have any of the problems I feared it might. It does suffer from the same problems most apocalyptical television series have--that is to say a problem of creating world threatening tension and struggles with a shoestring budget and a handful of extras standing in for large scale events. Overall, I was into it. I like sci fi and I love time travel, I had zero qualms, and, with a lack of any other fresh sci fi drama until Sense8 returns later this year, I wasn't complaining--at least it hadn't devolved into a procedural.

Episode 8 changes that. The twist at the end is some of the best, seat of your pants tense and intriguing television that I haven't seen since early seasons of Lost. However, unlike lost, the stakes and players are known, and there are not threads dangling everywhere. There are some threads, and there is plenty of mystery in the wake of episode 6, but they all have a clear path from which you can get your bearings and understand all of the consequences.

This series, which otherwise doesn't stand out among the myriad other competently executed offerings from Netflix recently, suddenly becomes one of the most ripe for Lindelofian labyrinth without any of the drawbacks. There are no smoke monsters here, only the director, and the unclear motivations of the future folk. It successfully compartmentalizes the mystery, drama, and action in a neat package.

My only concern now is that it could so easily be drawn out to accommodate more seasons with more episodes, simply to keep the show going. Of course, it's much too early to determine if anything like that will happen, but the shadow of Lost looms large overhead, with the promise of unresolved rabbit holes and forced, romantic entanglements. If Travelers maintains its present course, however, that should be a problem.

 

So season 2 is on Netflix.

 

For real?

 

For real

 

Is you joking?

 

SINGLE MOM IS BACK