Devs

Atmospheric, gorgeous (those tree lights!), and hypnotic. Determinism seems to be one of the most philosophically interesting ideas, but also the most difficult to create an interesting story around. Garland found a way to do so, but it still leaves something to be desired by the end. Overall I think it's the kind of sci-fi where the questions it raises are better than the answers it has.

The acting was the worst I have seen on TV in a long time. Garland wanted to make a (probably interesting but not thaaaat smart) 2-hour movie and decided there is more money and more eyeballs on TV. So he stretched a simple story with extremely slow dialogs, unnecessary detours, infinite mood footage and a script that lets the characters learn things the audience knew since the pilot. Devs is a testament that TV and movies are completely different artforms. Which makes Devs arrogant, boring TV.

Genuinely unique; and the basic ideas are interesting. Though it takes a few turns into less engaging tangents to fill its running time (it does need a 1.08x speed treatment and a hefty editing knife), Devs manages to be a solid sci-fi about some huge and profound thoughts.

Devs strike you as a bad and lame wannabe fiction at first. You gradually get into it and realise that it actually is a thoroughly thought fiction, but eventually, you become disillusioned with the ending. In overall, it is very intriguing. Terrible cast choices (except Allison) -maybe it was pre-determined as well-.

Visually captivating, but this seems a juvenile and tropy attempt to ask the 2000yo questions about free will. Garland as usual seems a bit out of his depth here, exposing the "science" through pretty awful dialog. Would have preferred seeing more timetravel instead of the inert spy story. People staring with watery eyes talking in poems or philosophical quotes might appeal to a younger audience that hasn't been on this scifi-merry go round 100 times before. Some offensively bad needledrops.

Free will is one of my favorite subjects and I love Alex Garland, so my expectations for this were through the roof. First off, the craft in this is the tippety top. Gorgeous visuals and a nearly divine score. Loved the philosophical bent of the show and anything happening inside the cube of gold with the Devs team. The biggest problem is Sonoya Mizuno, which gave a subdued performance I never really believed and I also felt the way her arc ended was a cop-out regarding free will from Garland.

The last episode spoiled it for me. Trivial ending.

Feels more like a long movie than a TV show. Very cinematic. The final payoff isn't as good as "Ex Machina" was. Loved that one. This was still good though, but as the show went on and the plot built up and up and up...it got my hopes up that it would be great.

good series

If I watch a show at 2x playback speed, how much bearing does my rating have on the unaltered show? Devs follows the standard formula for a TV show: fantastically implausible levels of conspiratorial violence, not much cohesion or intelligence or payoff