Devs

It’s an engrossing series, using Garland’s trademark affinities for blending cerebral cautionary tales with emotional beliefs about empathy and, in this case, the intellectually flawed designs behind trying to play god. Yet, “Devs” isn’t at all rarefied, challenging brain texture—though it’s there if you want to engage with it—and functions as a captivating thriller with the hint of both sinister menace and mysterious unknowingness.

Garland uses his time wisely, and his beautiful vision of a ghastly future is undeniably insightful. Some of its ideas may not be welcome — they sure as shit aren’t comforting — but “Devs” sticks with you, whether you want it to or not.

This page-turner of a miniseries may not be predicting our future, but it sure leaves you wondering if somewhere inside a Big Tech compound there's a roomful of coders working on it.

It’s a deep dive into the twilight zone and at times I had to work hard to keep a grip on certain plot machinations — but Garland has a keen sense of timing when it comes to providing the answers to nagging questions just as we’re getting close to the point of frustration. By the time the finale wraps up, no major mysteries remain.

Devs is a very intellectually heavy piece, and one which Garland has done a fantastic job of breaking down into true episodes.

Whether Devs feels like a revelatory piece of intellectual science fiction or another droning, navel-gazing prestige drama is in the eye of the beholder. But for those who can get past the slow pace, some dodgy Russian accents (sorry, Brian d’Arcy James, but you know it’s true) and the occasional forays into House of Cards-level psychodrama, Garland’s latest feels like the kind of thought-provoking science fiction that no longer has a home at the cineplex.

Plugging into "Devs" requires acceptance or at least tolerance of the overriding chill in its look and some performances. ... This is the aspect of "Devs" that went farthest in earning my appreciation, its ability to dole out shocks that I didn't see coming, which gets tougher to do with the more TV shows a person watches, and the assuredness with which it milks the utmost tension out of developments we're meant to see coming.

“Devs” is a cerebral pleasure that gets very philosophical and presses its brainy atmosphere with lots of ponderous soundtrack music and deadpan acting.

A mind-blowing concept that doesn't entirely come together at the close, but which remains unsettling and provocative throughout.

There were some moments watching Devs—so intense and saturated—when I began to wonder if maybe a little bit of Garland goes a long way. For the most part, though, it proves a strange, somber pleasure to wander the corridors of his mind for such a long time.

“Devs” is quietly captivating and beautifully envisioned, propelled mainly by Sonoya Mizuno’s subtly fierce lead performance as Lily Chan, a software engineer at a large but clandestine high-tech corporation called Amaya.

There are moments throughout Devs that left me frustrated with how similarly hollow they felt, and I’m not sure the ending entirely lands. Yet the way that Garland and his collaborators composed and arranged the pictures on the screen left me entranced throughout. I’m still not sure I know what the point of the Devs project is, but I loved watching Devs unfold.

These are heady, brain-warping ideas. And it is to Garland’s credit that he has the courage to confront them head-on, resorting to neither the gratuitously gamified narrative of Westworld or Black Mirror’s sensationalism. As a result, Devs is able to balance challenging concepts with clear storytelling.

The collision of visionary science and tormented humanity with a jaundiced eye, and, ultimately, a life-affirming heart. [2 - 15 Mar 2020, p.8]

Devs emerges as an indisputably stunning mystery.

It's haunting and hypnotic, a show of marrow-seeping mood and a unity of vision that carries through every frame. If it also turns a corner from entrancingly opaque to a bit on-the-nose by the end, for fans of Garland's Ex Machina and Annihilation, chances are that you'll be too absorbed to be bothered.

Fans of Ex Machina and Annihilation will easily recognize the landscapes and tenor of FX's Devs as Alex Garland's creation without his name even scrolling across the screen. The show exists in the same state of elegant modernity as his movies, and the mystery-building is just as intense, if unhurried.

If you want to take a hell of a head-trip, Devs is just the ticket.

The first nine minutes of the pilot did more to hook me than months of FX’s aggressively cryptic ad campaign ever could. ... Devs sets you up to believe that it’s going to be some kind of chilly, Black Mirror-esque dreadfest, but the show starts undermining that idea almost immediately by infusing scenes with small and unexpected touches of emotion. [Kristen Baldwin: A-] It’s a frustrating missed opportunity. I’d be more convinced by all the predestination soliloquies if the plot didn’t feel tram-lined through so many clichés and phony notes of unearned catharsis. Of course the characters don’t have free will. That would require imagination, something Devs can only simulate. [Darren Franich: C]

It’s a niche series that can be visually stunning but chilly and dark. ... After one episode, I had no interest in watching more “Devs”; after four, the series has me quite intrigued.

Garland hasn’t overlooked a thing in constructing the setting of his techno thriller. It’s the story within it that struggles to be cohesive and compelling.

Devs is a show made on a large, seemingly expensive scale, encompassing high highs and low lows, the good and the bad and, by the end, the everything – and as such, it works and it doesn’t, aiming high and not quite landing, trying to reboot the game but giving it a slight update instead.

Obvious and subtle, intriguing and tiring, icy and sentimental, “Devs” has the flavor of a late-night dorm room conversation: excited, searching and a little sophomoric. ... The action often proceeds with the ritual slowness of Noh theater or a Robert Wilson opera, if you like, or with frustrating lethargy, if you don’t. It does give you plenty of time to think about things, and to see where Garland might be going before he gets there.

It showcases what Garland does well — ideas and atmosphere — while amplifying his weaknesses in character and plot. As the techies say, it scales — for better and for worse.

Garland’s singular vision is in full effect — Devs contains some of the most stunning imagery I’ve seen on TV in recent years — but unfortunately, the story gets stuck at the starting gate, bogged down by dense tech jargon and a frustratingly cryptic conspiracy plot.

At first, Devs’s straightforward murder mystery and broader philosophical questions dovetail seamlessly. ... Devs frustratingly comes too sharply into focus at the expense of leaving some of its more evocative ideas unsaid. The story’s metaphors become increasingly obvious.

Garland, who wrote and directed all eight episodes of the miniseries, takes an approach that’s restrained, deliberate, and more concerned with what the characters do and think than what they’re like. Those latter three qualities, however, stand out more clearly as flaws in the television world, which demands a narrative that can go deep, with characters we care about, and stay compelling over an extended runtime. Devs struggles on that front. ... That said, I was intrigued just enough to want to keep watching, partly because I was invested in the story but even more because I was impressed by certain elements of the series.

Garland’s vision is in the forefront here, and the result is a limited series with a frosty emotional tone, and a story heavy on cutting-edge techno-speak, but skimpy when it comes to characterization.

“Devs” exists in a world where anything is possible. But, apart from a very few moments deep in its run, it withholds grandeur from us. ... In all, “Devs” is a misfire for a talented creator, one whose next work is worth awaiting even or especially if it comes in a nimbler, smaller package.

Devs is immediately ponderous, alienating, and full of unintentionally funny details. ... Devs is only the latest in a series of puzzle-box shows more preoccupied with their own cleverness and their labyrinthine twists than with the burden of watchability. ... And the show’s aesthetic details—the score by Ben Salisbury and Portishead’s Geoff Barrow, the Kubrickian jumps and color-blocked portrait shots—feel so detached from the story that they’re often insufferable.