In 2020, though, of course, none of these shows feels quite as easy to get swept up in as Utopia.
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However in recent years we’re seeing more and more prestige TV dramas, from Mr Robot to Black Mirror to Homecoming, whose plots use conspiracy theories to address very tangible and ever-present societal dangers, such as the role tech, government surveillance and Big Pharma have in our lives. In the 1990s and early Noughties, conspiracy theories were at the foundation of the drama in mainstream shows like The X Files or Lost, but they notably avoided very real and present dangers or atrocities still in the public memory, like 9/11. Then, in the 1970s, the fallout from the Watergate scandal (which ironically centred on a president, Richard Nixon, who himself fuelled a distrust of elites) caught the public imagination and led to a whole new wave of conspiracy thrillers about nefarious goings-on in the corridors of US government: The Parallax View (1974), The Conversation (1974) Three Days of the Condor (1975) and of course, the great film about Watergate itself, All the President’s Men (1976).
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Such stories in turn spawned a series of TV and films from The Twilight Zone (1959-64) to The Manchurian Candidate (1962). Often the early period of the Cold War – a time of worldwide paranoia about seemingly pending nuclear annihilation – is cited as the golden age of conspiracy theorising, having given rise as it did to a whole range of suspicions about the ‘other’, from concerns that communists had infiltrated the Western establishment to the theory that the US government were covering up the existence of alien life. And where conspiracy theories have sprung up, cinema and TV have always been quick to follow. From the Lindbergh baby kidnapping case of the 1930s, through to the assassination of JFK and the 9/11 bombings, history shows us that when there’s a moment of societal tension, there’s then a slew of conspiracy theories that seek to blame underground organisations, a global elite or certain religious groups. Or perhaps we have always been just as quick to lean on far-fetched narratives to explain tragedy. Indeed, in August, the US president himself endorsed the support of him by prominent conspiracy theorists: followers of the movement QAnon, who allege that Satan-worshiping paedophiles have infiltrated the world’s most powerful positions, and that President Trump is on a mission to root them out.
The rise of social media is undoubtedly the key to this era of dark speculation, as people can ever-more easily spread and amplify their suspicions.
Whether the issue is Covid-19, climate change or US politics, it seems like we have never lived in an age more filled with conspiracy theories, where these narratives have become a way to explain the biggest problems our planet faces.
But its mood of paranoia could not be more topical at a time when people regularly take to the streets to decry shadowy forces controlling and manipulating our world. While the edit of Utopia was only finished in April, right at the height of the coronavirus outbreak in the US and Europe, the show has been long in the works – it is, in fact, a much-delayed remake of the 2013 cult UK drama of the same name. After spending their lives wanting to decode the graphic novel’s contents, they now have the truth in their hands, even if it could lead to their deaths. This comic book is obtained by a gang of geeks who have to go on the run to escape numerous murderous enemies, intent on stopping anyone seeing the book’s revelations. A graphic novel manuscript foretells its events – it depicts a scientist who created a flu-like disease designed to thin out an overpopulated Earth.
Released today, the Amazon Prime drama focuses on the threat of a global flu pandemic. Utopia is a new TV series so prescient that it feels like the timing of its release could itself have been part of a conspiracy theory.
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