While I can’t speak for every film or television critic in the industry, I know that I want to enjoy everything I watch. As such, I often find myself looking for the good in every upcoming property. When TNT announced a television remake of Bong Joon-ho‘s “Snowpiercer,” I figured the fact that the show starred Daveed Diggs and Jennifer Connelly was more than enough to maintain my interest for an entire season. And with an intriguing trailer and today’s not-bad sneak peek both in the books, I can’t say I’ve seen anything that convinces me otherwise.
In this new “Snowpiercer” clip, Diggs narrates the events leading up to the series, culminating in humanity’s catastrophic attempts to reverse global warming. While the blend of animation and live-action used in the clip is nothing new for fans of science fiction and fantasy, it’s a good fit for this particular narrative. The destruction of Earth – and the subsequent salvation of mankind – has taken on a mythological status in the minds of the train’s passengers; using animation to quickly rehash these events makes them feel like something from an animated children’s book, precisely the kind of storytelling decisions that might make “Snowpiercer” a fun watch.
Then again, the road to network television has been a bumpy one for the cast and crew of “Snowpiercer.” After losing high-profile director Scott Derrickson in a behind-the-scenes struggle for creative control, the network later decided to move the series from TNT to TBS (a noted bastion of high-concept dramatic storytelling). Eventually, network executives reversed course, announcing earlier this week that “Snowpiercer” would air on TNT after all. This isn’t the kind of back-and-forth one typically expected from the world of television – where shows that are picked up during pilot season rarely struggle this long to set a premiere date, let alone a premiere network – but it seems that powers-that-be are reasonably confident they have a hit on their hands.
While no dates have been announced, the odds are good that ‘Snowpiercer’ will keep the TBS premiere of spring 2020.
