If you get to the end of the last episode of an audio drama, stop in your tracks and scream, "What the fuck? Are you kidding me? What happens next?!", that is a good sign, a very good sign indeed, and that is exactly what happened to me when I reached the end of the final episode of Blackout.
Blackout isn't really a secret, I can't claim it as some independent, underground discovery, it's probably one of the biggest budget audio dramas of the last few years but my goodness that money was well spent. Here's the blurb...
Academy Award® winner Rami Malek stars in this apocalyptic thriller as a small-town radio DJ fighting to protect his family and community after the power grid goes down nationwide, upending modern civilization. BLACKOUT stars and is executive produced by Rami Malek and produced by QCode and Endeavor Content. BLACKOUT Written and created by Scott Conroy. Directed by Shawn Christensen. BLACKOUT is presented by Sonos. New Episodes Tuesdays. To see how we use your data, visit https://www.endeavoraudio.com/.
So, what's good about it? It opens big; a conversation between a pilot and ground control, all distorted radio vocals, wind rushing by, alarms going off. He's lost control of his aircraft, he has no idea what's going on, he's going down, he's going down, he's gone - what the hell just happened?
Enter the opening titles with music by Jamie Schefman and Noah Gersh; a creepy four note phrase repeated over and over, highly reminiscent of John Carpenter's horror movie scores. It sets the tone, creepy and unsettling, and the show begins in earnest. The next voice we hear belongs to our protagonist, Simon Atani played by Rami Malek. He sounds shaken. He doesn't know quite where he is other than it's "somewhere on the border between New Hampshire and Massachusetts, I think", and, "it's 103 days since the blackout began."
Like a great pop record, I'm hooked in under three minutes. What's the blackout? What happened to the pilot? Are the two things related? Who is Simon Atani? Why is he lost? Simon goes on...
"My family and I come from a small little town in northern New Hampshire, it's not far from the Canadian border, you've never heard of this place I promise you, it's called Berlin and, yeah, that's how you pronounce it. Pretty much everyone in this town used to work in the paper mill but that was shut down years ago. As for me, I was, no, I still am actually, an aspiring author - emphasis on the aspiring part because my real job was as a radio DJ at 86.7, The Moose, that's the north country's only independent rock."
So, what's he telling us here? Well, the choice of name for the town is no accident and any historic associations with Berlin that come to mind will become relevant later. It's an old manufacturing town, the kind that went to seed in the late 20th century never to recover, its inhabitants forgotten and left to fend for themselves. This is fertile breeding ground for the type of extreme libertarians and doomsday preppers who, despite being abandoned by business and in dire need of state intervention, have convinced themselves that government is their enemy. Simon, being an aspiring writer and radio DJ, is clearly the polar opposite of his fellow townsfolk. He is a "soft-handed office boy," as my former electrician flatmate used to call me. And he doesn't listen to country OR western, he's an "independent". Simon is blue, Berlin is red and Blackout is America.
The show charts the transformation of this small 'everytown' after the lights go out. Disconnected from the world, will they come together or push apart? Will they stick to old organising principals or invent new ones? Will they become a post-technological pastoral utopia or simply plunge back into pre-industrial poverty? It wouldn't be much of a drama if the former happened but it's how the town descends that makes it so fascinating.
The show was released in March 2019, a full year before the current pandemic - uncanny timing considering the world was about to be locked down providing us a once-in-a-generation chance to see how communities really react to extreme events. I think most of us were gratified to see people come together and neighbours help each other out...at first. A year on and we have seen an intensification of the culture wars with everything from masks to vaccines politicised by left and right (in the West).
*SPOILER ALERT*
The fall of Berlin happens much faster than in real life, partly for dramatic purposes but also because the blackout was no black swan, it was planned, though I cannot say by whom. I can, however, guess at the political affiliations of those who produced it as our protagonist Simon is the liberal-arts-educated voice of reason and everyone else is a gun toting redneck. This certainly plays into my own smug political world view, but also further entrenches the political divide that liberals are often so keen to blame conservatives for. I hope, in season two, we may see some more bipartisan cooperation with both sides compromising for the greater good - the signs at the end of season one look promising but compromise must go both ways if this podcast is to avoid becoming a polemic.
Season one closes with the opening up of the conspiracy; Berlin it turns out is not the only victim of the blackout, it is a nationwide phenomenon but who is behind it? Where are they based? What are their objectives? And how will Simon and his family bring them down? I am riveted to find out. Every episode ends of a cliffhanger and every character and motivation feels real enough for me to want to know what happens next, not just for entertainment but my education; so I can know what might happen should the blackout ever come to pass.
My only complaint, and it's a tiny one, is occasionally Malek's delivery. His attempts a naturalism can be clumsy because, let's be honest, Rami Malek is not natural. He's possessed of a 'weird energy', which makes him utterly compelling to watch and enables him to play unique characters such as Elliot Alderson and Freddie Mercury, not 'everymen' like Simon Atani. But as I say, this is a minor complaint, Malek's natural talent and charisma more than make up for the the odd stilted line and the story propels him quickly into unnatural situations that make better use of his unique gifts.
If I were the type to award star ratings I would give this ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐. Blackout is an absolute must-listen for quality of writing, acting, music and sound-design, it is a riveting ride from start to finish that makes you wonder what you would do if the lights suddenly went out.
Blackout is available to listen, free, on iTunes, Spotify and in all the usual places.