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I didn't get this film one bit. It was so alien to me. It's not because I don't understand clubbing - I was an original old school person, attending probably every club and rave all over the UK at least once or twice between 87 and 92 (when it ended for me). It was truly great, a cultural experience that is so great it defies description. The sense of being together and love was amazing. I knew every underground club from Shoom, Future, Spectrum, Clink Street, Hacienda, Sub Club, Coaches (and the huge numbers of clubs which didn't become so famous) and every day was a truly great experience. I spent sometimes most of a week in the same field, still dancing and chilling - so many fields, hangars, warehouses, mills, beaches, country houses etc. The name ecstacy for the feeling of those seven years inclusive (87 to 92 for me) from Dundee to Antrim Town to Penarth to Ipswich, whether you took stimulants or not, was very understated.

Conversely, I recognise nothing about this film and I don't even know what it's about. If Human Traffic really were connected to clubbing in Cardiff (where I had some amazing times), and if I hadn't experienced the reality myself, from watching this film I would join the local Country and Western society and never think twice about going to a nightclub.

I guess the film chimed for some people. I had an indescribable time back then - seriously so, seriously good, not just a laugh - being simple and open. I know the nineties got a lot worse from 93 onwards but this film looks like the kind of clever, 'look at me' but hollow, synthetic TV episode I wanted to escape to fields, clubs and warehouses from back then.

Terrible. Avoid.

What a rotten film.

Don't waste your time or your money.

A year or two ago I thought that Bruce Willis appearing in a film had become a true marker of real trash. I didn't realise how low things could go in that direction. Still going?

I'm very much in two minds about this adaptation. I'd like to give it six out of ten but don't think I ought to stretch to that, despite recognising that obviously a lot of talent and hard work went into this series. The professional critics are divided with, for example, The Guardian, Independent & New Statesman giving decidedly negative reactions but a few publications such as The Times commending the series.

The 2022 Midwich Cuckoos series is very soapy to me, British soapy. It's filled with "look-at-me, respect me" cardboard characters who are one or two arguments away from a huge breakdown or hairy plot development of their characters in their own rights, forget about the funny goings-on. Unrelenting high maintenance people, one after the other, demanding attention and with something of the familiar, "We're 'ard 'ere, see, don't mess" kinds of prissy attitudes associated with British soap operas. In other words, very self-concerning characters probably with little real genuine mettle behind. The effect is that, knowing the basic plot, I was left wondering if any of them would have the chutzpah to challenge the children in the end! However, perhaps all of this could have been a part of the vision of the production - perhaps for these times.

Aside, I thought of the irony of this lot in the 2020s playing the 1960s warning of the 1960s novel! There we are. *They're* doing 'The Midwich Cuckoos!!!'

Whilst I'm may be critical of the 'soapiness', at the same time, from distant memory, John Wyndham's excellent fable may, purposely or otherwise, occupy stylistically something of the territory of Sci-Fi pulp novels, so the characterisation may not be too great there anyway.

It is certainly a challenge for the adapters. Though I generally hope that the excellence of the storyline itself and its great importance in the Sci-Fi canon would inspire adapters to bring something more in elements where needed.

Since this series has begun screening I've read fans ridicule the old 1990s "Village of the Damned" big screen adaptation, which is unfair for what was generally a well-judged, effective, exciting production which remained easy to identify with in human terms.

I think with a source like Wyndham's novel it's right to consider showing the majesty of the storyline in ways best suited to the screen format. For an example, Kenneth Branagh' s perhaps nobly oriented, very faithful and near gothic seeming adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express was a real downer on the screen. Whereas the classic, star-studded 1970s film adaptation, unfaithful in so many ways to Christie's novel, was yet undeniably a great cinematic success, a tribute to the underlying storyline and most ideas of the author.

There are quite a lot of good elements in there but I don't think I'll be watching this again, even 3 or 4 years down the road. Sadly that is a disappointment for an adaption of such an iconic Sci-Fi classic as The Midwich Cuckoos.

I think with this series the soapy, lacking elements of characterisation, interest and dimensionality might well be very thought out, intended decisions. In watching, it might very much help to be aware of that, taking a few steps back (which might even bring me back to have another go in the future). At the end of the day though, what's mostly made of cardboard is still just made of cardboard.

Pacing and editing and a general lack of human interest focal points are a major part of this problem. One is left wondering if the actors did well, in-between or poorly with the materials they had. I don't know actually and I don't even know if it's possible to make such a judgement. This affirms my feeling that, in the main, something has gone wrong with the overall vision. I know it's very possible to appreciate a quite minimalist, intentionally formulaic, even rather severe production for what that means itself (I suppose possibly particularly in our present day). Perhaps also the decisions behind this production jar with me personally more than most viewers.. Nevertheless, at the end of the day this series really doesn't leave the kind of impression desired, which the novel's story undeniably has the potential for.

It's not to say that, overall, the producers got much or perhaps even anything wrong, and again a lot works and there are definitely points of interest in thought which the production creates.

The main thing to report though is that the whole thing feels both quite uninspired, as if those pulling the strings behind didn't really have the kind of fervent respect for the novel and story that the challenge to make a series of it probably requires.

Is it worth watching? Certainly, and there is definitely a reasonable amount of reward from the series. However if it was on a streaming service I was not subcribed to I don't think I would pay for a month's subscription to watch this, where that is exactly what I do & have done with some other series.