Tales from the Loop

An artsy retro sci-fi with fantastic visuals and captivating music. Each episode is good in a different way, even though they all set out on a similar mystery tour. The loose ends are the most annoying thing here. And the imbalance of the storylines of this otherwise well-made project trip it up a little. (07.11.2020)

As is the source work, so is the adaptation to a significant extent, though for completely different reasons, since how can you possibly adapt almost 140 pages of illustrations in eight episodes, right? The book Loop is based on illustrations (borrow it, google it, it's worth it), where the genius loci is the crucial aspect of every single painting. Each is brimming with nostalgia for the 1980s, a children's expedition for adventure, alternative “retro-future" history, cold and damp autumn and chilling, snowy distances. Unfortunately, the book Loop has a shortcoming in the form of the redundant “so-called storyline", i.e. padding. In the book, images paradoxically do not serve as illustrations, because the text itself is an illustration. How was all of this dealt with in a drama series? Surprisingly well. The atmosphere and design of Stålenhag's paintings are portrayed phenomenally (and strongly supported by Glass's music). It is undeniable that the stories are not in the spotlight, but despite that, they play a significant role, unlike in the book, where they are in the background. Whereas in the book the basic outline of the good storyline was expressed in one or two sentences if only someone was able to grasp it and elaborate it properly, that's exactly what Halpern / Amazon did really well. Not memorable, often lengthy, even for a series that is based on an intimate environment and a deliberately slow pace. The storyline is often not enough to fill up the almost one-hour running time, but it is sufficiently well done so that it does not diminish the quality or induce boredom. At first glance, this may give the impression of a cross between Stranger Things (poetics, children, retro, adventures) and Black Mirror (episodes, overlap, themes), but this is not the case. Tales from the Loop is original. Sometimes in a good way, sometimes not, but in any case it has (thanks to the atmosphere and audiovisual aspect) all of the prerequisites to become a sci-fi cult classic and a work that will discussed a lot. And it deserves that, despite it's shortcomings. | S1: 4/5 | (03.04.2020)