Atomica arrived on our screens with very little fanfare earlier in 2017 and has achieved a 4.1 out of 10 rating on IMDB.  Whoop whoop!

Not the greatest score but I think a fair one.

It reminded me in some ways of two recent Netflix offerings; Spectral and ARQ.  Both of these were kind of small-time sci-fi films introducing new characters in new worlds that had to draw the viewer in to make them care about the outcome of the story.

Both films get higher ratings on IMDB, 6.3 and 6.4 respectively, and it reflects the greater ambition they have to tell a new story in a new world with different rules.  Both films build a world that is different from our own in more ways than one.

Atomica on the other hand is just a tale of a few people doing some shit in a nuclear bunker.  The extent of the world building is that some nuclear development breakthrough means that one company controls all the nuclear plants and the plants are a bit different because of “things”.

But somehow they still leave one of these plants in the hands of just 2 people.  And when something goes wrong they send a single, solitary person to go and see what the problem is and fix it.

I mean, I’ve never been in charge of a nuclear facility but I’m pretty sure if I was put in charge of the one on Atomica my security procedures and emergency plan would be better than the crap they have in place.

The most disappointing thing is the lead character.   She’s obviously a highly intelligent, strong-willed person, so why make her so wishy-washy when it comes to the security of this facility.

She goes in and believes the story of Robinson, even though she has doubts.  She then believes everything the doctor tells her without question and as a result she double-crosses Robinson.  Then the Doctor escapes, locking her in with Robinson and she again immediately believes everything that she’s told by the man in the room.  Eventually she realises that once again she’s been duped.  That’s 4 times she’s believed everything she’s told without questioning it.

Surely at some point she would have the brains to realise she was being played.  Even if she didn’t know who by, she could come up with a plan to gain a bit of control of the situation.  Instead she’s just a lackey, a pawn in the games being played by the 2 male protagonists.

That’s what makes me saddest.  It’s a crap setup, a crap world, a crap story and even the strong intelligent lead character is crap.

Crap!