A couple of weeks ago when we were discussing Netflix and its success, someone in the comments brought up Snowpiercer TV series. I have seen Snowpiercer, the movie before and remember it as one of the great movies. When I heard there was a TV show with the same name and the storyline, I had to look it up. Unfortunately, it wasn't available on Netflix, at not in the US. But I found the show on HBO+. On HBO+ there are two full seasons available. The new season 3 is not finished yet is still going on TNT. To watch season 3, you may need a subscription to TNT. I don't have TNT subscription, and will probably wait until season 3 is finished and is available on other streaming platforms like HBO+ or Netflix.
The Snowpiercer movie was great. What I normally enjoy about movies and tv shows is the storyline. I don't pay too much attention to cinematography and acting. I ranked they as I like it or not. However, I find myself having a conversation with the story presented and looking at the story from a critical point of view. In the movie the idea of train being a last hope for humanity, and last remaining humans surviving the extreme climate change in a train and living as a society is a unique one. The class system established within the train society and oppression and struggles of the lowest class know as tailies, their uprising and revolutions have portrayed that perhaps even at the end of times humans will just continue to behave as they have been throughout the history. I do find issues with this storyline, battle between evil and good, rich and poor may make a good movie. If you haven't watched the movie, I would highly recommend it. It is interesting and entertaining. If you already have seen the movie, I think you will love the TV show.
Snowpiercer TV show follows the same storyline of a train in the end of times carrying the last surviving humans. However, the storyline is not the exact same as in the movies. The movie, in my opinion, portrayed characters as either good or bad. The TV show makes the story even more interesting and realistic by allowing main characters to be both. There isn't necessarily good or bad for characters or situations in the series. Some may do good things for bad reasons, other do bad things for good intentions, etc. Characters evolve throughout the series, the society itself also changes and evolves as things progress. The story could take any turn at any moment, and it is not quite clear for the viewers where the story is heading. I think that makes the series more interesting and entertaining compared to the movie. Also, there are side stories for main characters to explain their motives and behavior.
So what happened? Earth was experiencing extreme level of global warming. The scientists came up with a solution and created a chemical solution CW7, which was suppose to cool down the Earth. This solution worked and Earth started cooling down. But it worked too well that now there was a global freezing problem. The entire planet froze and temperature outside went to extreme lows that no living thing could survive. Wilford Industries in the leadership of Mr. Wilford himself saw this problem happening in advance and started building a massive train that would become Noah Arc of this catastrophic events. Not only Wilford Industries build this 1001 cars long train, but they also built railroads that go around the globe and keep circling around the Earth endlessly. I don't quite understand how, but this train has self sustaining power and as long as it keeps moving it generates energy for it to keep moving and sustaining life in the train.
In real life I highly doubt anything like this would be possible. Yes, humans are smart and come up with all these technologies and keep gaining more and more knowledge and understanding of the universe. But everything we create does require some kind of human maintenance, without everything stops working really quick. So, I am not sure how it would be possible to build a train that can self sustain without any requirement for maintenance from the outside of the train. They do provide some sort of explanation that there are dedicated crew members who suit up and can go outside for repair work. But still. Anyway, still an interesting idea to explore.
The train is 1001 cars long, and each car is gigantic. Not like a regular train. Each have different sections to sustain life, farm animals, grow food, even a huge aquarium. The total population of train is about three thousand people. The train was designed for people who invested in Wilford industries, bought or were given tickets to board. However, before its departure there were many ordinary people who were trying to get on the train. Some were successful in doing so, but they ended up in the tail cars. Now my question is why they were only board the tail cars? There are thousand cars, they could have boarded everywhere. Or maybe they did and they were placed in the tail sections afterwards. That wasn't clear. Even then, with the population of only 3000 people in thousand cars long train, it seems there would be enough place for everybody. I guess if everything was great for everybody, there wouldn't be movie or a tv show.
I liked the flow of the story from one episode to another. They were able to keep the viewers attention throughout the series. They also did a great job in closing chapters and starting new ones between seasons. This idea is great, the story is great, stories within the story are great. I am sure there is a lot more that can be developed to this story and the destiny of the survivors in the train. So, I think this is turning out to be one of the successful TV shows. Have you seen the series yet? Let me know in the comments. If you haven't, I recommend watching it. If you think tv shows are too long to watch, you can always watch the movie. But remember, the tv show has a completely different story to tell.