Netflix's 1899 is a darker, damper Lost
This multilingual thriller is a strange, strange ride
Kia ora and welcome back to Rec Room, The Spinoff’s pop culture and entertainment newsletter brought to you by Panasonic. This week my (TV) screen time has gone way down, due to being glued to Twitter while it experiences what appear to be its death throes. Will the site actually go down while I’m in mid-scroll? It’s more than likely. I did get some watching in – here’s what I’ve enjoyed, along with an excellent guest rec from my colleague Sam Brooks.
- Catherine McGregor
Netflix’s 1899 is a darker, damper Lost
The cast of 1899 (Netflix)
The lowdown
In the closing year of the 19th century, a motley group of passengers and crew from across Europe are traversing the Atlantic on the steamship Kerberos. There’s an Englishwoman searching for her missing brother, a mysterious geisha and her servant, an even more mysterious Welshman, a newly married French couple, and a Spanish businessman and his brother, a priest. In steerage, a family of poor and devout Danes are hoping for a better life in America; there’s also a Polish coal boy and a grief-stricken German sea captain to keep track of.
The melange of languages and subtitles is just one reason you’ll need to pay close attention to this new series by Jantje Friese and Baran bo Odar, makers of Netflix’s German-language hit Dark. Much like that mindfuck of a show, 1899 is a byzantine mystery with a disorientating sci-fi twist.
Andreas Pietschmann as captain Eyk Larsen in 1899 (Netflix)
The good
As a child obsessed with strange phenomena and unsolved mysteries, I remember being freaked out by the true tale of the Mary Celeste, a ship found floating in the Atlantic Ocean, its contents undisturbed yet all its crew missing. There’s something inherently creepy about ghost ships, and 1899 makes great use of the concept with the introduction in episode one of the Prometheus, which the Kerberos finds abandoned in the middle of the ocean. A distress signal had been sent, but when a rescue party boards the Prometheus just a single person is found – and he’s cowering inside a locked cupboard. So who sent the message? Where did the hundreds of passengers go? And what’s with that iridescent beetle which seems to have made its way back from the Prometheus to the pocket of Kerberos passenger Daniel Solace (Aneurin Barnard)?
It just gets weirder from there, as nightmares and reality collide in increasingly surreal fashion and a peculiar symbol starts showing up on everything from hallway carpets to the back of a child’s neck. This is the sort of mystery box show that requires viewers to accept that most of what they see will be confusing, sometimes off-puttingly so. Every passenger has their own dark secret, and for many episodes we get only tantalising hints of their back stories and connections. The sense of dislocation is heightened by the show’s multiple languages – a very cool idea that only Netflix could ever pull off, but one that naturally limits the interactions between characters of different nationalities. The show may have some of the same DNA as metaphysical mysteries like Lost, but 1899 has none of that show’s camaraderie and humour.
Thank goodness, then, for our heroes, brave English doctor Maura Franklin (Emily Beecham, so good as Fanny Logan in The Pursuit of Love) and troubled sea captain Eyk Larsen (Andreas Pietschmann, who was ‘The Stranger’ in Dark). Much of what we encounter is through their eyes, and they seem – at least initially – to be operating under some kind of moral code, unlike their shady shipmates. Pietschmann in particular is mesmerising as a broken man trying to keep himself, his passengers and his crew on an even keel (bad pun, sorry).
Aneurin Barnard, Emily Beecham and Andreas Pietschmann in 1899 (Netflix)
The bad
There’s no getting around it, 1899 is dark. Not just visually – though the ship does seem perpetually shrouded in a dank grey fog – but in the tone of the thing. It’s not until episode two that we’re treated to anything approaching a joke (two coal shovellers discuss the likelihood that the Prometheus passengers were killed by wolves), and it’s only a brief respite before we’re plunged back into the dourness and dread.
This pervasive gloom makes the characters fairly one-note in the early episodes, with few of them – save Eyk and Maura – expressing anything like natural human emotion, unless you count terror, menace and deceit. All those stern faces and clipped sentences can get a bit exhausting.
The verdict
For all its gloominess, there’s something about 1899 that keeps you coming back. Like Lost without the sunshine, or Westworld without the ultra-violence, 1899 is a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a creepy ghost story. Lower the lights, turn off your mobile, and prepare to be confused. In a good way. (Netflix)
TV, movies and pop culture of all kinds have been at the heart of The Spinoff since day one, and I’m so happy to be helming our weekly newsletter about great things to watch and listen to. So far on the new Rec Room I’ve sung the praises of excellent German costume drama The Empress, delightful medieval romp Catherine Called Birdy and stellar (sorry) Star Wars show Andor, and shared heaps more recommendations from me and the rest of the Spinoff team. We love being able to celebrate smart, funny, thought-provoking television and podcasts with our readers, and it’s the support of our members that helps us do it. Tautoko mai, join up here.
Drama rec: Fleishman is in Trouble
Adam Brody as Seth (not that one) and Jesse Eisenberg as Toby in Fleishman is in Trouble (Disney+)
For a few months back in 2019 it seemed like everyone was reading Fleishman is in Trouble, the smash-hit debut novel by celebrity profile writer extraordinaire Taffy Brodesser-Akner. The story of a newly divorced New York doctor who throws himself back into the dating pool while dealing with the sudden disappearance of his ex-wife is now an eight-part miniseries starring Jesse Eisenberg and Claire Danes as Toby and Rachel Fleishman, with Lizzy Caplan (Party Down, Masters of Sex) and Adam Brody (The OC) as Toby’s friends Libby and Seth. Perhaps unsurprisingly given that Brodesserr-Akner also wrote the series, large chunks of narration have made their way unchanged from page to screen, so much so that Libby’s near-constant voice-over can begin grate. Still, this is a handsomely done retelling of a great novel about dating, divorce and the unseen labour of working women. (Disney+)
Podcast rec: If Books Could Kill
Do you have that uncle who raves on about Freaknomics, or an annoying cousin who won’t shut up about Malcolm Gladwell and his 10,000 hours? You need this podcast that takes the shine off those famous books and their smug authors. If Books Could Kill is hosted by Michael Hobbes (whose previous podcasts include You’re Wrong About and Maintenance Phase) and Peter Shamshiri (5-4), and the pair tear apart the dumb books that fill up the shelves of airports, and then, eventually our homes. Not only do the hosts provide salient analysis, they give context and clarity around why the books blew up the way they did, and the harm they caused. There are only three episodes out so far – about the aforementioned Freakonomics, Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers and David Brooks’ execrable Bobos in Paradise – so you’ve got more than enough time to catch up. (All podcast platforms)
- Sam Brooks
On The Spinoff now: The Real Pod’s Celebrity Treasure Island special
The Real Pod is ranking every Celebrity Treasure Island contestant ever – all 58 of them. In the second part of this two-part special, Jane, Duncan, Alex and Susan Boyle assemble to count down the top 20 most memorable contestants in Celebrity Treasure Island history and have an absolute freak out about the CTI double-header we'll be getting next year.
Documentary rec: Pepsi, Where’s My Jet?
Ignore the tortured pun of a title. This documentary about two friends’ attempt to get Pepsi to make good on a foolish promotional offer goes down as easily as a cold glass of cola on a hot day. Like the McDonald’s documentary McMillions, currently on Neon, it’s a story of normal people turning the tools of capitalism back on the mega-corps who wield them. The difference here is there’s no scam involved, just two guys who dream of owning a Harrier jet and won’t back down when Pepsi tells them no. Series like this succeed or fail on the charisma of their talking heads, and Pepsi, Where’s My Jet hits the jackpot with its main duo, especially Todd Hoffman, the wealthy businessman who financed the harebrained scheme and whose joie de vivre all but radiates through the TV screen. Amid the current tidal wave of true crime, think of this as a documentary palate cleanser – one guaranteed to make you feel a bit better about the world. (Netflix)
Random links
Netflix’s Ancient Apocalypse argues that compelling evidence of an advanced prehistoric civilisation is being ignored by historians. A historian explains why that’s nonsense.
Read Toby Manhire’s great essay on Rupert Murdoch’s attempt to gain a foothold in New Zealand? Go deeper with the UK series The Rise of the Murdoch Dynasty on TVNZ+
TV’s true crime obsession is reaching a tipping point
Our own Ben Gracewood explains why Twitter may not survive the Fifa World Cup
That’s it for Rec Room for this week. If you liked what you read, why not share Rec Room with your friends and whānau.