I’ve been dealing with a particularly persistent and annoying bout of insomnia (a lifelong problem). Sometimes I’ll reread favorite books and rewatch movies and TV series when sleep is hopelessly elusive.
Recently, I rewatched BBC/HBO’s six-part series “Years and Years,” which stars Emma Thompson, Rory Kinnear, Anne Reid and other notables. If I recall correctly, we discussed it here in comments several years back, when it was current in the U.S.?
I may even have shared a link to the clip below? I can’t remember and can’t be arsed to look it up.
Anyway, for those who haven’t seen it, “Years and Years” is a dystopian drama that follows an extended family through 15 years of political, social and economic turmoil. The action opens the year of the series’ real-life release, 2019.
I think I first saw it in 2020-2021 or thereabouts because I think I remember being smugly relieved that they got the 2020 U.S. election wrong (they had Trump winning reelection). In the series, Emma Thompson plays a corrupt, Trump-style clown who becomes the UK’s PM.
Each episode contains scenes that set the timeline, which extends to 2034. One shows the family matriarch (Reid) sadly watching TV coverage of the 2022 death of Queen Elizabeth II. Remember, the series was released in 2019, so the writers correctly predicted the year the Queen would die. Given QE2’s advanced years, I put that down to a lucky guess.
That said, having just watched it again, I’m impressed anew by how much they got right about the ensuing years. God help us, Trump is back. The world is going to shit in all kinds of ways, what with corrupt oligarchs consolidating power, climate change, conspiracy theory madness, technological advances that outstrip humanity’s ability to handle the fallout, social fragmentation, etc.
The following scene contains at least one major spoiler, but I include it because the family matriarch sums up her view of how we weaved the handbasket that’s currently conveying us all to hell.
She’s not wrong. Anyway, it sure as fuck didn’t help lull me to sleep, watching that damn show again.
So, I’m going to go make a giant tray of lasagna. It is my firm opinion that a dystopian timeline cries out for lasagna. I’ll share a pic later, if it’s a photogenic lasagna.
For now, here’s a photo of an extremely photogenic gopher tortoise I met on the trail earlier today. As you can see, it is not worried a bit about anything. I wished it a good day, and we went our separate ways.
Open thread!