HBO are about to show the BBC made mini-series “Years and Years”. This has already been shown on BBC television and has won wide praise. The Hollywood Reporter has a preview (others are on line).
There is a searing quality to HBO's latest series, the BBC One import Years and Years, a relentless and depressing though often funny and acutely smart take on the here and now of blind populism, Trumpism, technology and politics.
With aggressive creativity, writer and creator Russell T. Davies (A Very English Scandal, Doctor Who) manages to leap over three very difficult hurdles almost immediately — commenting on current events, tackling the horror of Donald Trump and including elements of technology paranoia that will draw knee-jerk comparisons to Black Mirror (because of the ease and laziness of the comparison but also because of how Black Mirror has dominated the sci-fi/tech genre).
Spanning 15 years into the future lives of a disparate, extended family in Britain, Years and Years spends the first hour jumping around feverishly and compellingly among those years, setting the stage for a series that is the latest but most direct exploration of Trump, America and totalitarianism masquerading as populism.
I have seen the whole series and will not give any spoilers except to say that bearing in mind how long ago it was written and shot, it provides a worrying prospect on the rise of the Brexit Party in the UK. I can throughly recommend this story of a dystopian future built on current circumstances.