Boreas 1.1 - Pilot

Boreas - Pilot

Genre: Thriller / Drama

Director: Mark Romanek

Writer: Ann Morrow

Cast: Merritt Wever, Thomasin McKenzie, Shea Whigham, Lars Mikkelsen, Mikael Persbrandt, Ben McKenzie, Sunny Suljic, Betsy Brandt, Alistair Petrie

Plot: Alice (Merritt Wever) is cooking dinner in her kitchen, lit only by a candle and the fireplace she uses to cook meat. She looks outside by the window, it’s submerged in darkness. She can barely see the light coming from her neighbour’s house, as the snow keeps falling and the winds keep blowing. She looks at the food she cooked and looks at her kids, Emily (Thomasin McKenzie) and Jimmy (Sunny Suljic), playing a card game in the living room. She takes food off her plate and separates it between her two children. She calls them to the dining room and they start eating, in silence. Alice’s ancestral home usually cracks, like every old house do, but the noise she hears now isn’t simply her house cracking. It becomes louder and louder, she knows what’s coming and her kids do to. They run around the house, putting out the candles and placing barricades on the window. They hide under the table.

Outside, raid leader Bernhard (Mikael Persbrandt) is leading his men on a raid, near Alice’s home. He says it’s been a long time since they’ve come here, so they don’t know if they should expect resistance. Bernhard sends a handful of men to the neighbour (who also barricaded his home) and he goes over with a few men to Alice’s house. They knock on the windows as Alice holds on tight to her rifle. Emily is shaking under the table and the old wooden table squeaks as it moves. Bernhardt can hear a faint squeaking and he signals his men to enter. He starts hitting the front door, blocked by a night table and he opens it. He sees Alice under the table and she points her gun at him. Bernhard and his men circle Alice and her family, while she threatens him with her rifle. He asks her if she really thinks he’s afraid of her and he moves closer to her, so the barrel hits against his chest. He hits her with his right hand and Alice drops the rifle. A man seizes Emily and he wants to do something with her. Bernhard grabs Alice’s rifle and Jimmy tries to defend his sister. Bernhard grabs him too and he hits him so hard that he’s knocked out cold. Bernhard caresses Alice’s cheek as he wants to get intimate with her, while his men try to do the same thing with Emily. They hear gunshots from coming from the neighbour’s house and leave. Bernhard guarantees Alice he will come back. They leave with Jimmy and when Alice tries to prevent them, Bernhard kicks her down.

Barricaded in his house, Frank (Shea Whigham) tries to shoot the raiders through cracks in his window. He shoots two of them and when Bernhard comes back and he sees two of his men down, he orders everyone to retreat. They scavenged enough from the other houses today. As they retreat, Frank shouts at them that he will kill them all of he has to, and he suggests them to never come back here. He exits his house and swears when he finds out that they left with his propane. 

Erik (Lars Mikkelsen) stands tall behind a podium. He’s dressed from head-to-toe in black. He looks down at the crowd, all dressed in white. He reminds them that the end of the blizzard is near, he can feel it. He also reminds them that they will benefit from his protection until this is all over. He says new tasks will be assigned shortly and they must remain strong in the face of adversity. They all applaud him as he heads off the stage and he retreats in his quarters. He’s followed by a man, all dressed in dark green, Richard (Alistair Petrie). Erik asks Richard how is everything going amongst the tenants and he says that everything is going nice and easy. 

In another attached bunker, in a tiny room, Spencer (Ben McKenzie) looks at a photograph of Alice, Emily and Jimmy. His roommate, Justine (Betsy Brandt) asks him how long it has been since he has seen her and as a tear drops down his face, he says it’s been way too long. She hugs him for a long time. 

Alice tries to comfort her daughter after they kidnapped Jimmy. Emily wants to head back out to look for her brother and Alice has to physically restrain her from leaving the house. She calms her down as they hug and she says perhaps Jimmy is better with them than he would be here, there’s only so much she can do and at least he’ll be protected and fed with them. Emily asks her mom if she’ll ever see him again and Alice says she’ll do everything to find him once this is all over, but there’s nothing she can do about it. They decide to light some candles to get out of obscurity and they remove the barricades from the window. Alice stops dead in her tracks, she heard another squeaking and cracking, but much lighter than the last time. She holds tight to her rifle, looking around her, Emily hiding behind her. The door opens an it’s just Frank coming over to see if everything alright. Alice sighs in relief and is relieved that it’s just her neighbour. Frank curses, saying they stole his propane tank. Alice starts crying when she says they stole her son. Frank tries to comfort her and she starts crying in his arms. 

Back at the bunker, Erik walks around the facility with Richard. He’s walking near a series of small cells and he looks around, smiling subtly. Richard looks as serious as ever. Erik glances on his right as he walks and he sees Spencer and Justine in their cells sleeping. Erik whispers something in Erik’s ear and they cut their walk short to go back in Erik’s quarters. Erik asks Richard if they have enough people, because they need to strike soon.

Miles away, in the middle of nowhere, Bernhard comes back to his hideout with his group and they start inventorying what they managed to get today. Once they’re done Bernhard sits near a fire and someone brings Jimmy next to him, who’s freezing. They put some furs on him and Bernhard tells him he’s one of them now. Jimmy refuses to eat and Bernhard advises against it, or else he’s going to regret it. As the camera zooms out, we see an enormous village built by Bernhard’s men. 

With a great duo of actresses in lead roles and a good supporting cast around them, Boreas looks like an intriguing and welcomed addition to Last Resort Television's schedule.

I have mixed feelings about this series following the pilot episode. It seems to go in every direction without a clear objective. Writer Ann Morrow has failed before in such a series, let's hope it doesn't happen again.

The pilot episode of Boreas does a good job of setting up the world through introducing us to its characters and their circumstances. I appreciate that it doesn't attempt to beat the audience over the head with the set-up, allowing it to happen naturally.