Season 1 |
Episode Guide
Last Day – | Review Score – 4/5
Crash – | Review Score – 3/5
Orion – | Review Score – 3/5
The King Is Dead – | Review Score – 2/5
Going Home – | Review Score – 2.5/5
Home Invasion – | Review Score – 3.5/5
Hope – | Review Score – 2/5
Contact – | Review Score – 2.5/5
Full Of Stars – | Review Score – 2.5/5
First Day – | Review Score – 2/5
Invasion is a character drama disguised as an alien invasion thriller. It’s a show that promises big things, looks close to delivering on that and then ultimately disappoints.
The first episode starts off really promisingly. An eerie atmosphere descends over the world as aliens begin to show up. Four separate groups of characters (five if you count Sam Neill’s brief appearance in episode 1) across the the world each deal with their own close encounters, trying to survive and thwart the threat.
In Japan, engineer Mitsuki finds herself emotionally invested in a failed space mission in JASA. It seems aliens have smashed into the shuttle holding her lover, Hoshi, and she struggles to communicate with her and figure out what the aliens want.
Occupying the military boots on the ground is Trevante, a soldier in Afghanistan. His whole squad investigate a strange signal, only to come face to face with the alien threat.
In London, Casper and his classmates end up in the middle of this invasion when debris crash around their school bus, tumbling down a steep cliff. There’s a real Lord of the Flies angle to this before Casper’s significance in the invasion itself – and some of the meaning behind his foreshadowed sketches – is explored.
Finally, the Malik family round out this quartet of story lines, with Aneesha and Ahmed going through marital issues when the latter cheats on his wife. However, they’re both thrown into a pressure cooker situation, forced to team up to try and survive.
The trouble is, Invasion is so preoccupied with its soapy character drama that it forgets about the aliens completely. The invasion itself though is one of the most uninteresting and lackadaisical ever shot, with episodes 4, 6 and 9 the only examples of significant action. While that in itself isn’t bad, the show is just outright boring at times.
The characters just aren’t that interesting and don’t have enough depth to carry this one. With the exception of Mitsuki, no one really grows or changes or has a definable arc. Numerous questions remain unanswered and worst, the final episode concludes everything and then teases a last minute cliffhanger for a second season that may or may not arrive.
Invasion is certainly lavishly produced and there are some moments of genuine tension. Some of the cliffhangers are unnerving and episode 1 in particular is fantastic at building up a sustainable level of suspense. The trouble is, this soon dissipates and stagnates into a humdrum of boredom.
Given the sheer wealth of good TV content this year, Invasion is a below-average disappointment. Its an indifferent shrug to alien invasion fiction and doesn’t have interesting enough characters to carry its long, drawn out scenes of fluff. A real boring disappointing; Invasion is not one to remember.
You Can Check Out More Of Our TV Show Reviews Here!
-
Verdict - 3/10
3/10
It’s interesting to compare Invasion to The Last of Us, since both are character dramas set against the backdrop of the world succumbing to an “invasion,” both are lavishly produced and both have numerous episodes in which there’s no action against “the invaders.” What’s the difference? The Last of Us is brilliantly written and acted while Invasion has the worst, most-cringeworthy scripts I’ve ever heard, one-dimensional characters who are each given a single trait to play over and over and over again (my heart goes out to the actors saddled with this crap) and no plot to speak of. It’s an embarrassment for Apple TV and the quality I normally associate with its productions and it blows my mind that this junk was given a second season. The writing for Invasion isn’t even at the level of daytime soap operas, which seem to have been its inspiration. If I have a quibble with the 3/10 rating, it’s because it might be too generous.
Strong production but absolutely awful, pathetic and/or unlikeable characters. The soldier who just yelled and swore at everybody, no matter how much they tried to help him. The cheated wife who only seems to have one facial expression (perhaps due to her incredibly annoying kids). The spineless schoolboy who falls over in a strong breeze and lies there groaning. The JASA tech who just pined, and pined, and pined and then pined some more. Managed to watch it until S1 E5 I think, which began with the soldier once again yelling and swearing, and gave up.
I will agree that there are gaps in the story line and some plot points go nowhere, but overall this series kept me involved. The ‘pining for her dead lover’ was dragged on too long and other areas were slow to develop, I liked the alien development and much of the imagery was imaginative. Like others, I’m hoping season two cleans up many unanswered questions. I will follow season two.
The worst two hours of my life were episodes 1 and 2.
I watched the first three episodes last night and that’s all I could take. This show is the absolute worst TV I’ve watched in ages. The positive reviews I’ve read rave about the incredible character development. Who cares when all the characters being developed are not just unlikeable, but are anti-likeable. I couldn’t stand any character in the show except the kind Afghani man who saved the soldier so he could continue his miserable, one dimensional, stereotypical, movie trope life. I found it impossible to care for any of the main characters or their unlikeable kids. After three episodes I was cheering for the aliens to kill off the human race if it’s comprised of these boring, miserable, self-absorbed, uniteresting excuses for human beings. I’m glad I read reviews with spoilers as it seems this show does not get any better in later episodes.
My wife and I watched all ten episodes over a two day period. We were hooked but also at times frustrated at holes in some of the storyline. I do hope season 2 will be released soon and will fill in the gaps. I’m anxiously waiting to see what comes next
I made it through episode 4 and gave up. That’s 4 hours of my life I’ll never get back.
One of the worse alien invasion series ever. No character depth and too much time spent on Mitsuki pining/grieving for Hinata. What was the purpose of the sheriff’s (Sam Neal) storyline? That was a big dud with no reason for it even being in the series. What did the aliens want? To take over the earth? Duh they all do but no clear reason why. I would love to see a good alien storyline with a clear plot with characters you cared about.
Started out fine, then devolved into a mediocre two-hour movie stretched into 10 hours of utter banality. I may have worn down my Apple Remote forward button while chanting “boring, boring, boring” as the humdrum characters explored their feelings in place of something called a plot.