---
title: Devs
rating: 6
type: Television
status: Finished
date: 2024-03-17
author: Alex Garland
year: 2020
image: devs.jpeg
tags:
  - television
colorSortKey: [1, -113, 1]
---
 It's hard to watch this series and not feel like Garland had a couple lynchpin scenes and concepts in mind — the general monologue about determinism, for instance [^1], or Lyndon's deliberate suicide, or Nick Offerman [^2]'s supervillain origin story — built a plot around it, and then incorrectly chose (as so many talented auteurs did from 2016—2020) to make it a miniseries instead of a film.

There are a lot of beautiful moments in Devs: it is shot and set in a way that reminds me of Legion, a sort of scientific retro-futurism that gives you the impression less of a point in time and more a slightly alternate reality, and there are quiet moments that make the entire enterprise worth watching (Jamie cutting a lemon for Lily's water; Stewart's terrific and haunting recital of _Aubade_; every shot of the exterior of _Devs_), but the entire thing feels so _padded_ and filled with unnecessary moments of repetition and melodrama.

Folks who like Garland qua Garland will find this worth the investment; it could have and should have been two episodes shorter. (The reveal with the title was funny, though, and I'll give him creit for that!)

[^1]: Which, don't worry if you don't quite grok it the first time — because there will be seven other identical monologues delivered in the same neutral deadpan spaced out evenly, one per episode [^2]: Who I thought did a terrific job, and was the only performance outside of Stephen McKinley Henderson that felt noteworthy