MIMDB score: 9.0
Current IMDB score: 9.1
Director: Lucy Tcherniak
Main Actors you care about: Mackenzie Davis, Himesh Patel
Why I liked it: The first time I watched it I just thought it was good enough episode. In context as I kept thinking and rewatching the series I noticed that this episode can be viewed on multiple levels making it in my opinion the best episode in the series and probably one of the better episodes in any tv show. It's hard for me to say since I watched all the previous episodes, but I think you could watch this one episode by itself and understand most everything important anyway. So even as a one-off episode you could just watch it and be entertained, I think.
Without seeing the rest of the series, you could just view this as a coming-of-age story. Where the girl wants to put on a play during some type of post-apocalyptic event while they are couped up in some high-rise apartment. She naively is living in a family-like setting and then a stranger comes in tearing up her world where she then takes up arms (the stranger's knife) and grows up almost instantly considering she has to now live in a post-apocalyptic world. Her older self or imaginary friend could leave her at the same time she has to now instantly grow up.
With seeing the rest of the series, you can interrupt a bit differently. I think this is the episode where you could make the jump that none of this happening. It could all be an internal story to Mackenzie's character. Station Eleven could just be a book that she is using to cope with just regular life and she could be viewing everything in a post-apocalyptic way. Maybe her parents died at the same time as she saw Arthur die and she came up with virus/flu that knocked out most of her world but in reality, it's just her way of dealing with it. Her troupe is doing Hamlet which is one of the best examples of a play within a play. The year before they were doing Romeo and Juliet which could easily explain the love she actually had before all the deaths.
Thing(s) I would change:
I don't understand why the apartment door wasn't locked? The stranger seems to just come in through an unlocked door? I think that needs to be fixed a bit for that to make more sense. Most high-rise apartments have automatic locking doors but also since Himesh seems to be thinking through almost everything it's hard to believe he wouldn't have locked it. The stranger could knock down the door but the surprise of him just being there wouldn't be as impactful so you'd have to fix it another way which I think could easily be done.
Favorite Line(s)/Scene:
Somehow, I kind of like the rap scene. When Frank starts surprisingly rapping and they all start dancing it's quite happy inducing in an episode of unhappiness.
Similar Movies/TV Shows:
Probably only The Leftovers. Maybe Contagion?
"Side" note:
It's a book. It was filmed before, during, and after Covid was big.
