Some people think that it’s a bit odd how little we talk about the end of the world. They see the factual data and scientific reports, they know that everything is getting hotter each year, and they think that this can only end one way — apocalypse. Other people think that it isn’t a big deal, and see no reason why planes, trains, and automobiles shouldn’t burn through the earth’s fossil fuels more and more each year. These two groups of people view the world and the future in diametrically opposite ways, and at some point, they must have a confrontation.
Last Light, a new miniseries streaming on Peacock, dramatizes that extremely relevant struggle mainly through the lens of a wealthy family. The father, Andy (played by Matthew Fox of Lost, after a seven-year absence from the industry), is a petrochemical specialist, working for big Middle Eastern oil companies, but his daughter Laura is a prominent environmental activist. Andy is attending to an emergency in the Middle East with an oil company while his wife Elena (played by Joanne Froggatt of Downton Abbey) is taking their blind son Sam to France for a special surgery. Andy realizes that something is terribly wrong with the oil supply, which is when the proverbial poop hits the international fan in this big, sprawling, topical thriller.
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The Slow Beginning of Last Light
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Last Light begins somewhat slowly, taking about an hour of expositional development before anything really happens. In some ways, this is for the best, as the Yeats family dynamic gets to be explored before the actual plot kicks in, but the meandering first episode may also bore some viewers and scare them away from what is essentially a very gripping show.
The Peacock original takes its time setting up the relationships within the family, the political situation surrounding them, the surgical procedure Sam is undergoing, and the suspicious problems at the big oil company where Andy is sent to days before his son’s operation. It could have been handled better, but it sets every piece of the story into play.
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By the end of that episode, though, everything literally changes. Corporate espionage and possible terrorism strands Andy with the MI6 agent Mika (played by Amber Rose Reva) while societies begin a slow collapse around them. Andy has discovered that something very particular has infected the oil supply, and it’s spreading like an extremely contagious disease. Cars are lighting on fire, airplanes are crashing, the electric grid is shutting down, and chaos is traveling throughout Europe and perhaps the rest of the world. Meanwhile, people want to kill Andy for the knowledge he has about the chemical warfare, and he has to trust himself with MI6 if he wants to save his family. Only, MI6 thinks he’s involved.
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After that first episode, things happen very fast with Last Light, as if it were a rollercoaster building up to a drop and then unleashing itself down the narrative tracks. The miniseries generally bounces between Andy and Mika in the Middle East, Elena and Sam in France, and Laura and her boyfriend in the UK, where everyone will ultimately converge. Last Light feels like a truly international show, reflecting the scope of these dire problems with a broad, global narrative.
Climate Change and Peak Oil in Last Light
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A great villain is never only villainous, which is partly why this limited series works. Within the world of Last Light, a radical environmentalist group is suspected of poisoning the petroleum infrastructure in order to initiate a new worldwide change in economic production. The way they see it, literally preventing humanity from using fossil fuels is actually the safer, more humanitarian option compared to the societal, ecological, and economic devastation that climate change will have over the next century. Yes, a large number of people will die (those flying in planes or driving in cars that crash because of poisoned oil, for instance), but it’s a relative drop in the bucket for these activists.
It’s a clever idea, though scientifically illogical on a global level. This way, Last Light gets to have its cake (a massive climate catastrophe) and eat it too (with a very specific group of so-called terrorists responsible, rather than everyone in ‘first world’ countries). Then again, who has cake and doesn’t eat it? It’s understandable that Last Light would want an actual, tangible threat — a group of ‘bad guys’ is easier to depict than the more nebulous, abstract notion of the planet’s slow death due to human actions.
It may have been more interesting, however, to depict a world in which oil actually runs out and the world’s governments and corporations haven’t implemented and developed the right infrastructure and science to replace it. That is a very real threat as opposed to the boogeyman of some climate terrorists, and would elicit basically the same reaction as seen in Last Light; the MAHB at Stanford estimates that the world’s oil reserves will run out by 2052 (while natural gas will be depleted by 2060 and coal by 2090), so to invent an environmentalist group as the responsible agents seems unnecessary at best and a cop-out at worst.
Matthew Fox and Joanne Froggatt Lead Last Light Well
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Regardless of the actual cause of the catastrophe, Last Light depicts the ramifications with startling suspense and gripping realism. Hospitals rush to transfer patients after the electric grid falls, looting and rioting take place amidst the blackouts, the military is brought in to police curfews and control the borders by force, and highways are littered with broken down and burning vehicles. Last Light truly excels at this dystopian imagery, none more so than when it’s following Elena and her son Sam as they must evacuate the hospital and attempt to head back to the UK through masses of bodies and the wreckage of society.
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Froggatt is the real emotional center of the show as Elena, and the three-time Emmy nominee does an excellent job carrying the burden of a mother left alone with her blind child during a terrifying situation. Fox is very good as well here, playing a scientist who knows too much in a business where that could get you killed. He’s surprisingly subdued and soft, convincing as a man with many regrets who absolutely loves his family even when he feels very distant from them emotionally, ideologically, or just physically. Whatever one believes about the rumors behind Matthew Fox, it’s good to see him acting again after a nearly seven-year-long absence; he looks more aged and weary than in his familiar roles in Party of Five, Lost, and even Bone Tomahawk, and it suits him here.
The jittery, suspenseful sequences with Andy in the Middle East are great as well, as Andy runs for his life against the gorgeous desert backdrop, palaces, and city alleyways. Director Dennie Gordon does an excellent job with the sparse and no-nonsense action sequences, proving herself to be one of the best television directors today after a string of great episodes for Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, Waco, Legion, For All Mankind, and countless other shows.
Last Light Ends Poorly But is Worth Watching
Peacock
Last Light runs out of fuel by the very end, however, having to tidy up a slew of plot strands to varying degrees of success. It’s not entirely satisfying, and it ends on a cheaply optimistic note that’s almost too saccharine to be taken seriously, what with its montage of stock footage and voiceover narration describing how great humanity is as the sun rises in one shot and a butterfly flaps its wings in the other. For a darkly serious miniseries about a terminally topical catastrophe, Last Light ends on a phony note of sentimentality that seems to say, “Don’t worry, even if we are destroying the planet with climate change, we’ll be just fine.”
Like the aforementioned terrorist group, it’s another cop-out and instance of the series’ unwillingness to commit to the dire relevance of its subject. Nonetheless, the middle of Last Light makes for some fantastic, emotional suspense, a grave depiction of the possible future. If only the beginning and ending had a bit of a re-write, Last Light could’ve been one of the best miniseries of 2022. All episodes of Last Light is now streaming on Peacock.
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