New space series “The Ark”
Ingenuity in a vacuum
Actress Christie Burke in her role as Lt. Sharon Garnett.
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Will Dean Devlin’s new sci-fi series “The Ark” manage to give a new facet to the struggle for survival in space?
Space has now been traveled far more frequently than in reality in books, films and series. It has become correspondingly challenging to keep capturing the sheer infinity of the vacuum on paper, canvas or the TV screen in an innovative way. The new series “The Ark” by creator and showrunner Dean Devlin (60), which will start on June 22 on SYFY, is preparing to do just that thanks to its interesting starting point. Because what happens if, from one moment to the next, a spaceship that is as huge as it is badly damaged is spinning through the vacuum with only all-trainees on board?
Captain Disembarked: That’s What “The Ark” Is About
“Collision warning” – with this alarm, the catastrophe and with it the series takes its course. The Ark One spaceship is rocked by a sudden impact. The crew, who are on a mission to colonize alien planets, are abruptly awakened from their cryo sleep by the accident. Only with a lot of luck can Lt. Sharon Garnet (Christie Burke, 33) and around 150 other crew members survived. But others weren’t so lucky.
The entire management team around the captain, the chief engineers, the trainers – in short, everyone who could have been a guiding hand through the catastrophe – is dead Designed solely as a means of transport for a cryosleep crew, food and water supplies are also limited to a few weeks. The problem: The Ark One is still over a year away from its destination…
Second row heroes
Just imagine, at the beginning of an episode of “Starship Enterprise”, Captain Picard, Data, Commander Riker and the entire other “The Next Century” bridge crew were sucked into space – and Ensign Wesley Crusher suddenly had to fight the Romulans and lead Borg. “The Ark” starts with this premise, albeit with one big difference: “The antagonist in our series is space itself,” says Devlin. “Space is constantly trying to kill you. Not on purpose, but by its very existence.”
Here “The Ark” follows in the tradition of such disaster films as the sci-fi film “The Martian” or the “Apollo 13” based on real events. But instead of concentrating on a very small crew or even on a single stranded astronaut, as in these examples, the remaining crew of the Ark One becomes an involuntary social study: How do the individual individuals react when they suddenly join together, but without a leader face an almost hopeless situation? Who takes the initiative – and who swims against the current?
Elon Musk and Co. thought further
The showrunner describes this desired dynamic as a “pressure cooker” – under high pressure and much faster than usual, everything on board the Ark One must now take its course. In addition to all kinds of exciting high-risk decisions, this also involves a lot of interpersonal friction – especially when human lives are at stake.
The decision not to have cast not too well-known actors for the series definitely contributes to this tension. With big Hollywood names, one would certainly not be afraid episode after episode that they could pay for the fight against the vacuum with their lives. But with Burke, Richard Fleeshman (33, Lt. James Brice) and Shalini Peiris (Dr. Sanjivni Kabiron Garnet), among others, actors are at the center of the action who have not yet been given an imaginary protective shield thanks to star power.
Another interesting aspect of “The Ark” is the reference to the present. In contrast to many other science fiction series, the action of the series takes place only about 100 years in the future. Instead of warp drive, food replicator and holodeck, the protagonists find themselves surrounded by much more realistic circumstances. It starts with the actual mission: Instead of a government, they were sent into the unknown by very rich private individuals to open up new living spaces – so to speak, by the grandchildren of today’s billionaires like Elon Musk (51), Richard Branson (72) or Jeff Bezos (59) .
More space disasters are on the way
Creator and showrunner Dean Devlin describes his series The Ark as a “love letter” to all the sci-fi shows he loved growing up – from Star Trek to Battlestar Galactica to Lunar Base Alpha 1. . He has also worked on films such as “Independence Day” and “Stargate” as a producer and screenwriter. So it’s fair to say: this man loves science fiction.
With “The Ark”, he has now created a promising space adventure from individual set pieces from these and other films and series. Because emergency in space not only makes you inventive, but also damn exciting. In any case, the US audience was exactly of this opinion, after strong ratings for the first season, the second was promptly ordered last April.
“The Ark” starts on June 22 as a German premiere. The latest of the twelve episodes is broadcast on SYFY every Thursday at 8:15 p.m. After that, all episodes are also available on demand.