“Set in the future when technology has subtly altered society, a woman discovers a secret connection to an alternate reality as well as a dark future of her own.”
That’s the official synopsis for Prime Video’s The Peripheral, which is a little like saying that Flamin’ Hot Cheetos are “a corn puff snack.”
The series stars Chloe Grace Moretz as Flynne Fisher, a young woman grinding out her days at a server farm in a dystopian-tinged United States whose Marine brother (Jack Reynor) lets her use a headset that connects the user to what seems like cyberspace. Obviously, it goes a lot deeper than that. The novel was a return to sci-fi futurecasting by William Gibson, and it’s great to see a real production budget behind this adaptation. It’s even more exciting to see that Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan are lending their tech-and-philosophy-warping Westworld prestige to the proceedings.
It’s also great to see Moretz return to sci-fi after the gremlin-fighting Shadow in the Cloud and the only-watchable-because-of-her-performance Mother/Android. It’s high time she put those action star bonafides back to the test, and if some brain cells get warped in the process, then all the better. Hopefully, she doesn’t have to fight a weird Mark Zuckerberg pixel puppet.
The Peripheral hits Prime Video October 21st.
