The love that Apple TV+ has for science fiction is undeniable, with more than half a dozen series based on this genre and all with an enviable level of production. For this quarter we have scheduled the anthology ‘A challenging future’, but it arrives before’for a better tomorrow‘ (Hello Tomorrow!) a dramatic comedy that, to play with the title, I would have liked it to be better.
Which is a shame, because on paper this defined comedy-drama series shouldn’t have too much trouble winning over audiences. On the one hand, we have that setting in a retro-futuristic world, with those “vintage” technology gadgets, robot waiters, autonomous delivery vans, etc. Aesthetically, visually, it is tremendously attractive.
On the other, it is a story of smoke sellers. Well, not so much smoke but timeshare houses on the Moon. The interest of Jack (Billy Crudup) and company is to sell them as the next step of the American dream, or the dream of the American jaded with life. And, as this changes people’s lives, many times (as we will see with Alison Pill) for the worse.
Stylish… and little else
Although on an aesthetic level, fostered both by the friendly vintage era and the neatness of the production design, and a certain latent dark aspect of the plot (and its protagonists) it can remind us of ‘Separation’ (Severance), this It is quite far from the drama of Ben Stiller and Dan Erickson.
Perhaps the most interesting thing about the proposed world is that this retro-futuristic society is far from happy. Technology changes lives that they enjoy at a significant cost, not only economic but social. A work-absorbed Jack has to deal with some such fallout as he sees potential clients out of work being replaced by machines.
The problem lies in how superficial this series is, in general terms. The script signed by Amit Bhalla and Lucas Jansen is very given to exposure of one of the themes of ‘For a better tomorrow’: the disappointment of modern life, the frustrations over dreams that are dissipated. Other: the material and the material of dreams.
No you think they leave something for the subtext since we have entire monologues and dialogues around this. This causes some loss of connection with the characters, which are only explored above. Which is a shame as we have a pretty solid cast, including the always excellent Alison Pill (which we last saw on television in season 2 of ‘Star Trek: Picard’) or even Crudup (Emmy winner for ‘The Morning Show’).
Actually, the problems of ‘For a better tomorrow’ are not so much in the ingredients that make up this dramatic comedy but in how they are used. There are certain somewhat interesting subplots and there are even some clever comedic glimmers here and there, but overall one feels that the series is less inspired than it needs to go on.
It is, again, a problem of style and substance. of the first wasteof the second there is hardly any.