Dark Matter (2024)

Edgerton brings subtle shadings to each of his Jasons, and watching the original version try to find his way back to his world through a seemingly infinite array of portals makes for a wildly entertaining and compelling ride. [3 - 23 Jun 2024, p.4]

What can be disclosed freely is that there is a high level of suspense, tangible tension created by Jason's dilemmas and by the action-thriller aspects of "Dark Matter," and that the acting is first-rate.

It's a perfectly chilling and beautiful sci-fi tale and, despite the complications of parallel worlds, boils down to a love story. It's the final two episodes that really elevate the series, with Edgerton's performance at its best and a chilling twist in the story injecting genuinely heart-racing danger into the story.

The concept might seem silly, but the story by author Blake Crouch — who serves as showrunner and executive producer here and who also wrote many of the episodes — works, and challenges us to ponder what lengths we would go to if we were in not only Jason’s shoes but his wife Daniela’s as well (Connolly gives the role more dramatic shading than usual).

“Dark Matter” is a visually stunning and heart-grabbing journey of the mind and heart featuring show-stopping performances by Joel Edgerton and Jennifer Connelly, who (along with a number of other cast members) are tasked with playing different versions of the same character and succeed in creating fully formed personas. It’s elevated acting. Also, not gonna lie to you, there are times when the storyline goes so deep down the rabbit hole you’ll feel as lost as the characters themselves.

“Dark Matter” may falter here and there, but its cerebral and emotional texture—about regret, how the subconscious marches to its own beat, why we make the wrong choices, and the fear of learning what we’re truly capable of, et al.—is some meaty, memorable stuff, worth the mind-altering trip.

Crouch and his writers aren’t trying to confuse the viewers. As far as science fiction stories like this go, it’s a refreshing approach. .... Edgerton does a good job of showing both Jasons’ motivations.

The show delivers some really strong performances that bring home its emotionally powerful themes – but like its world-hopping protagonist, it nearly gets lost along the way.

Even though the series isn't quite on the level of the flawed yet focused novel, it makes for a mostly serviceable and frequently stellar adaptation.

If we’re being brutally honest, Dark Matter should probably be better than it is, but its basic storytelling shortcomings aren’t fully heinous. And it’s a price worth paying for some TV that absolutely flies when it’s on a roll and sticks a tricky landing in the end with the finesse of an Eastern European Olympic gymnast. Much like its author-turned-showrunner, this is definitely one to watch.

A lot of the concepts in “Dark Matter” work well. Edgerton is impressive in his depictions of both versions of Jason. .... Unfortunately, as fascinating as the character studies within “Dark Matter” are, the scientific aspects – especially regarding Jason2’s magical multiverse traveling machine, The Box, take away from the story’s core.

Crouch has made a few improvements to character arcs and closed a few loopholes from his page-turner of a book, but he has also stretched a propulsive plot that kept the physics accessible to more than nine hours that make you feel every minute. There is a lot of wheelspinning and longueurs that make you wish it was either a six-parter or perhaps a really good, tight four.

Whether Dark Matter absorbs as drama depends on how much anyone can take of Edgerton. With a smudgy sort of straight face, he’s good at veering from vaguely hunky everyman to conscienceless brainiac. .... Whether he will turn out to be the hero or villain of his own life/lives plays out across nine episodes, which feels too many.

It can make you tired after awhile, keeping things sorted, and “Dark Matter” does go on for a while, though Crouch is careful to turn his midlife crisis drama into an action film at regular intervals. Things grow more and more complicated, as the very premise suggests they must, and at some point you may just be wondering how, or even if, Crouch is going to dig his protagonists out of the hole he’s dug for them; I’m sure some of you, smarter than I, will have worked it out.

Not as ambitious as Foundation, nor as brain-taxing as Constellation, this ‘what if?’ series hits the spot nonetheless, maintaining Apple’s status as the default home of thoughtful, adult-orientated sci-fi.

Notable epiphanies and lasting meaning are glaringly absent, which feels all the more unjustifiable since the series is so devoid of fun. It’s unflagging gloom and one-note characters limit its capacity to shake anything loose within the audience.

Dark Matter falls somewhere in the middle of that pack, which is to say, you ultimately won’t miss all that much if you leave this door closed.

Everything that it offers can be found somewhere more interesting, and we are all better off putting ourselves in front of those pieces of media instead of something that feels uninspired in the way that this show unfortunately does.

It’s a series that doesn’t lack for ingenuity and, especially in the last two hours, ideas pop up that border on inspired, but the lack of tonal variation ultimately dooms Dark Matter. It’s an unrelenting dirge that could have benefitted from an occasional dose of fun and perhaps an occasional willingness to trust whimsy delivered without momentum-draining explanations.

Nine hours feels punishing. And even when the later installments finally start embracing the weirdness of the premise, the specific idea is introduced so poorly, it takes multiple scenes across two different episodes before it’s completely clear what’s happening. Too much of the earlier plot is so telegraphed that the audience is perpetually ahead of the characters; by the end, the reverse has happened, but too clumsily for the surprise to properly land.