My issue with this episode is the way the world responds to the problem that it has become sterile. No more children will be born, at least "normal" children. First of all it is through utter carelessness and lack of oversight that the whole thing happened (sort of like we are doing with climate change). Secondly, the governments that are responsible for this now form a kind of gestapo group, waiting for a normal birth that they can then test and figure out their next strategy. This, of course, leaves the mother no more than a cog in their wheel. There is an underground anti-government movement that is seen as a terrorist cell. We don't know what they are up to. This has shades of the book "Children of Men." A young couple becomes pregnant and apparently the wife going to have a normal, healthy baby. Enter the fascists, led by one of the men who was responsible for the problem in the first place. This is an intriguing effort to that point, but for me the conclusion is a bit too pat. See it anyway and just ask yourself what would our civilization be like if there were no more children.
3 Reviews
ENVIRONMENT AND A NEW BEGINNING FOR HUMANITY
asalerno1015 July 2022
Environmental pollution has unleashed a strange black rain around the world, this has caused the change in the PH of drinking water and has degenerated human fertilization, causing babies to be born with horrible mutations and deformities. When everything indicates that there are no more possibilities for the human species to continue in time, a pregnant woman appears whose medical tests indicate that she will have a normal and healthy baby. The couple is taken to a guarded government hospital with the intention of helping them continue with a controlled pregnancy, but they sense that something strange and sinister is hidden behind this situation. Without being outstanding, the episode is correct, good performances, Mario Azzopardi's direction is perfect as always, there is suspense and mystery until the last minute and the story ends with an encouraging ending.
very flawed implementation of an interesting scenario
nelladarren25 August 2013
Warning: Spoilers
What if humankind goes sterile - that's an interesting premise to base a story on. But I have some serious issues with this one.
The beef I have with it is the way they see the mutant babies.
Very few people are still fertile and (so they say) all of the babies carried to term in the last 10 years have had mutations. The prospect of having a handicapped child is so gross to the main character that she recoils at the news of her pregnancy and wants to terminate even when she's told she's "the one" and the child will be fine.
Knowing your child will be handicapped is seriously sad for a parent, I'm not trying to make light of this, I'm not even on the side of those who condemn abortions in cases you learn prenatally of a serious birth defect that will give the child a short life of pain and suffering.
But seriously, in a world (IN A WORLD...) gone sterile, who wouldn't at least try - and the mutation-babies we get to see are just not overly pretty, they have skin problems and well, maybe they are mentally handicapped, maybe not, but they surely are no monsters. Because, newsflash: people with disabilities ARE NOT MONSTERS. People who aren't just PERFECT are not monsters. If you think like that it's a very good thing if you die out.
They wouldn't even have had to change the story so much - they could have mixed in that the evil government doesn't want non-perfect babies and that they'd kill them - that would give a mother a good reason to dread her pregnancy and evil governments tend to be *very* horrible.
That's actually another, minor point, I cringed at. For a world gone sterile they don't seem do be doing very much about it and you'd expect a much *greater* infringement on citizens' privacy and self-determination such as mass invitro fertilizations, treating people like cattle, etc - if they had focused on that (they grazed it a bit) it would have made a better basis for the issue of how women's bodies tend to be taken away from us, treated as the property of men.
The beef I have with it is the way they see the mutant babies.
Very few people are still fertile and (so they say) all of the babies carried to term in the last 10 years have had mutations. The prospect of having a handicapped child is so gross to the main character that she recoils at the news of her pregnancy and wants to terminate even when she's told she's "the one" and the child will be fine.
Knowing your child will be handicapped is seriously sad for a parent, I'm not trying to make light of this, I'm not even on the side of those who condemn abortions in cases you learn prenatally of a serious birth defect that will give the child a short life of pain and suffering.
But seriously, in a world (IN A WORLD...) gone sterile, who wouldn't at least try - and the mutation-babies we get to see are just not overly pretty, they have skin problems and well, maybe they are mentally handicapped, maybe not, but they surely are no monsters. Because, newsflash: people with disabilities ARE NOT MONSTERS. People who aren't just PERFECT are not monsters. If you think like that it's a very good thing if you die out.
They wouldn't even have had to change the story so much - they could have mixed in that the evil government doesn't want non-perfect babies and that they'd kill them - that would give a mother a good reason to dread her pregnancy and evil governments tend to be *very* horrible.
That's actually another, minor point, I cringed at. For a world gone sterile they don't seem do be doing very much about it and you'd expect a much *greater* infringement on citizens' privacy and self-determination such as mass invitro fertilizations, treating people like cattle, etc - if they had focused on that (they grazed it a bit) it would have made a better basis for the issue of how women's bodies tend to be taken away from us, treated as the property of men.
See also
Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews