Binge on This - L'Effondrement (The Collapse): Society Passing its Breaking Point

Granted, I have addressed end-time themes and the downfall of society in several posts in my Binge on This collection. (I wish PeakD would fix the issue regarding collection posts, so we could look through them!) This means, not only are there a good number of apocalypse related TV shows out there, but admittedly I am also a bit fond of the concept. While each take on the collapse of industrial society is a bit different, some being more interesting / realistic than others, one thing they all have in common is imagining what would happen if the systems around us came crashing down.

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In this regard L'Effondrement (I prefer using the original French title, since there are other series by the English one.) offers a spectrum of approaches, all in easily digestible packages of eight 15-20 minute episodes, so you don't have to be a serious binge-watcher to easily finish it in one evening. What's more, each episode is only slightly related to the rest, offering a number of facets of this end-time scenario.

Competition or Cooperation?

One central topic in a typical discussion about a zombie apocalypse is whether survivors would start ruthlessly competing for resources, or if the situation would make them realize the value of cooperation. (And no, there are no zombies in L'Effondrement, unlike in most contemporary talks about a hypothetical end-time scenario!) The reason is obvious: once food trucks stop running, it's pretty much everyone for themselves... Even though it doesn't take too much insight to realize that outcompeting everyone else for the last can of beans, one is bound to be left pretty much helpless once those beans have been eaten up.

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Most episodes of L'Effondrement deal with exactly this issue. At first it's simply a supermarket that happens to be short on certain items... Bummer, though very quickly things escalate to the level where customers storm out of the store with loaded shopping carts of unpaid groceries. The second episode is probably the most violent one, when peoples' cars start running out of fuel, including the police, and the gas station results to bartering gas for cans food. The resulting chaos falls right into what everyone agrees they don't want to let themselves be caught in. By the time episode 4 rolls around, it's wandering city people encountering an apparently self sustaining community. While at first everything seems to be handled decently, the final result is not pretty.

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No Zombies, Really?

The heaviest episode in my opinion is 6, which introduces a young worker at a nursing home, who refuses to leave his residents, while everyone else he knows packs up and leave. This wouldn't even be a problem, but these people, many of whom he seems to know quite well personally, take all the food supplies with them, including those in the nursing home. He is not left with many options, but he preserves his human dignity all the way until the end of the episode.

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So what did I say about zombies? No, nobody is infected by getting bitten, turning into a stumbling undead corpse. However, the patterns are very similar! People who have raided grocery stores, gas stations, and nursing homes, keep coming down the road in search of something to eat. Unable to help themselves, let alone contribute to others, they become a serious menace (all the while remaining caring parents of young kids). Close enough to your stereotypical zombie, except they are still people you can relate to, up to the point where this very relateability raises its head in disgusting reality. But that is precisely what I appreciated so much about L'Effondrement.

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Escape for the Elite

So what about the super rich? The billionaires with their underground cities or remote islands? This miniseries addresses them too, though not so much in regard of what those top-dollar refuges would look like. Instead, it deals with people trying to make their way there. Episode 3 introduces one man from this upper crust, who simply needs to catch the plane that will take him to such a place. What gets in his way, ironically, is everyone else, from his girlfriend to his chauffeur, as one can easily imagine that in such times the last servant's servility would vanish into thin air.

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Episode 7 takes an even more severe turn, showing a woman on her sailboat trying to get to "the island", and even getting awfully close. The things she encounters on the way keeps raising the same question: What kind of people would leave the rest of the world sink into chaos, only to barricade themselves off in such a manner? And once again, the answer is always right there in front of you... No need for blind guesses.

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Don't Look Up!

For those who are familiar with the recently released motion picture about how society reacts to scientists announcing the impending end of the world (due to an asteroid, climate change, or whichever other reason): The very experts are ridiculed, not taken seriously, and ultimately ignored. This same idea is driven home in the last episode of L'Effondrement, taking place five days before the collapse, when an environmental scientist crashes a TV debate with the Minister of Ecology. Needless to say, he ends up looking like a doomsday lunatic. The interesting part, however is that the Minister of Ecology ... turns out to be the lady on the boat, trying to get to the elite island! Would she have known? Would either of us have?

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How could we not?!?

This point becomes painfully obvious in episode 5, where a number of engineers and dedicated helpers try to keep providing cooling water for a nuclear reactor. The opening scene of the bucket line (apparently their last pumps have broken down) already seals the hopelessness of the situation. Eventually the inevitable disaster strikes, and the formerly heroic (up to the point of fanatic) volunteers are forced to admit that there is nothing they could have done differently. In fact, they had known it all along! The meltdown was a consequential part of the collapse, though it took a bit longer before it happened. In this light of these things... was there even a point in the scientist's warning?

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See for Yourselves

For such a short series, L'Effondrement is packed to the brim with unsettling scenes, provoking even more uncomfortable discussions or trains of thought. If you feel I have given you spoilers, you haven't seen the least of it! So whether you enjoy the hypothetical question of what if things stop running? or like to imagine how you would react in any of these extreme situations, L'Effondrement is definitely worth watching. Here is the trailer to give you a first taste: