"Paul Levinson's It's Real Life is a page-turning exploration into that multiverse known as rock and roll. But it is much more than a marvelous adventure narrated by a master storyteller...it is also an exquisite meditation on the very nature of alternate history." -- Jack Dann, The Fiction Writer's Guide to Alternate History

Friday, February 16, 2018

The Cloverfield Paradox: Fringe Meets Star Trek



Well, there really wasn't any paradox in it (things going very wrong does not equate to paradox), and the story was at least much horror as science fiction, but The Cloverfield Paradox on Netflix was pretty good science fiction of the alternate-reality variety anyway.

Earth in the future is in the throws of a grievous energy crisis.  Hope is placed in a new particle accelerator, to be tested in the Cloverfield space station.  A slightly nutty scientist or sooth-sayer warns that the energies that will be released in this test could rip reality apart and unleash untold monsters.  Of course, no one pays him any heed.

But indeed the tests do rip reality apart, or at least bring it into interactive smashing contact with another reality.  This is manifested by a woman who shows up in the metalwork of the station - literally - and a guy who loses his arm to the other reality (the arm comes back and writes our crew vital information), and you get the picture.  This is what I meant by Fringe (the Star Trek part comes from the crew in space).  The Cloverfield Paradox somehow mixes horror and humor in a way that only J. J. Abrams, one of the producers, can do it (hey, maybe that's the paradox).

There are good surprises, double-crosses, and breathtaking scenes throughout.  The protagonist, Ava (well played by Gugu Mbatha-Raw, pictured above) is given the choice of reuniting with the family she lost in her/our reality - she can do this by going to the alternate reality - or saving our reality.   I won't tell what she does.

I will say that the changes unleashed by the particle accelerator usher in all kinds of horrors not only in space, but Earth as well.  Enjoy.



more alternate reality - "flat-out fantastic" - Scifi and Scary

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