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A misbegotten and poorly paced attempt to update the 1976 cult sci-fi classic wastes stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Naomie Harris Why this, and why now? These are questions that viewers of the new Showtime series The Man Who Fell to Earth may find themselves asking in the expansive existential sense, wondering what combination of choices have taken them down the path that leads to the zillionth and perhaps most inessential entry in the recent streaming-motivated miniseries boom. But this is also worth asking in literal terms: even in our current showbiz paradigm of ravenous, unchecked IP-gobbling, what could’ve compelled TV executives to license a semi-obscure 70s sci-fi gem with dense philosophical underpinnings, and renovate it so thoroughly that it might as well be its own thing? Does Nicolas Roeg’s 1976 film have such a strong cultural market share that the brand recognition of its title can’t be passed up? And more to the point, why take one of the greatest movies ever made and elongate it to ten hours, trade its borderline experimental cinematography for blandly functional digital shooting, and force a perfectly serviceable star like Chiwetel Ejiofor to stand comparison with the inspired inscrutability of David Bowie playing the alien he’d always been?The show gives us the real answer to all this quickly enough, introducing Faraday (Ejiofor) midway through one of the buzz-generating product launches that give today’s CEOs a platform for Steve Jobs cosplay. In his hand, he holds a small box containing something that he announces will change the world, though he’s got more to back up his claim than most self-fashioned gadget gurus of Silicon Valley. Like Bowie’s Thomas Newton before him, Faraday hails from the planet Althea (an Avatar-type land rendered in budget CGI), and he also brought the key to quantum fusion with him when he fled the drought killing his people on a mission for life-sustaining water. Alex Kurtzman and Jenny Lumet’s miniseries positions itself as a sequel to Roeg’s film, alluding to the memory of Bowie and checking back in with aged, recast versions of the extant characters. But they’ve still recycled the original premise, with the most topical aspect now moved to the fore. This extraterrestrial’s relevance is renewed by turning him into a start-up douche, his dreamy parable of corrupted purity converted into a more earthbound address of big tech. Continue reading...