George (Pappa Essiedu) leads a seemingly perfect life (thriving app creation career, beautiful wife and family) until he wakes up one day and feels like he’s living the last six months again. It turns out he is as he’s recruited by The Lazarus Project, a government agency that prevents mass extinction events by utilising a time loop to reset reality.
It’s a strong high concept, mixing action and espionage with sci-fi to very good effect. The series is at its best in the first three episodes as it sets out the time travel conceit, then explores the full ramifications of what happens when you reset time. Episodes two and three even work as time travel horrors as reality has to be reset over and over as they tackle a particularly difficult mission. The show explores the ethical questions raised by the idea (should you alter time if someone you love dies? How does one simple change impact the possibility of the new present?), as well as psychological ones (how does experiencing the end of the world multiple times affect people mentally?) to very good effect.
The main story doesn’t quite live up to these first few episodes and the ideas of the concept, but it does enough to keep you entertained throughout with good action, entertaining characters, and narrative twists even as it feels in danger of tying itself up in time-bending knots. Essiedu is a charming lead but you may find your allegiances tested by his decisions. Still, the show just about sticks the landing with interesting ideas and a cliffhanger that’ll have you wishing you could jump forward in time to see series two.
