Invasion Season 1 Episodes 1-3 review: A slow start to an expensively produced TV show

3/5

Story:

The narrative is built around the perspectives of people from around the world on how they would react as an unknown threat launches an attack on humanity.

Review:

The series goes to great lengths to flesh out individual stories of its characters who are scattered across the globe. It is aimed at providing insight into how people would process an unprecedented global catastrophe. It also provides parallels to the initial panic and uncertainty that was present during the initial phases of the COVID 19 pandemic. However, any credible logic or explanation regarding the invasion itself is scarce. This is unfortunately a flaw, if not rectified at least halfway into the season, could be detrimental in keeping the audience engaged.

Golshifteh Farahani's Aneesha Malik, the ‘perfect’ mother and wife, is the central character of the series. Farahani perfectly captures the plight and resilience of her character, whose perfect world comes crashing down when she discovers that her husband has been cheating on her, moments before their affluent neighbourhood is devastated by the mysterious attack. Aneesha’s realisation that her husband is not the man she thought he was, makes her task of getting her family to safety far more complicated.

Sam Neill’s portrayal of Sheriff Jim Bell Tyson serves as an excellent plot device to set up the tone of the series. However, despite his excellent performance, the character should have ideally been better utilised. The characters in Japan and the army officer stationed in Afghanistan also offer intriguing storylines with an added subtext of xenophobia, homophobia, and trauma woven into the narrative. The story about the English school kids seems redundant at this point, but will hopefully offer something as the story unravels.

Despite the show firmly establishing itself as more of a character-driven narrative, showrunners Simon Kinberg and David Weil should have added more lore about the aliens in the opening three episodes to keep the audience hooked. There is excellent production value on display, as expected from an Apple production, with excellent cinematography. However, if the show does not pick up its pace soon, it will have great difficulty in keeping people invested in waiting every Friday for a new episode.

Verdict:

While the series so far is a slow-burn that delves a little too much into the human stories of the narrative, it has shown signs that it could offer a truly unique take on an alien invasion story -a departure from the typical ‘alien invasion’ story.