I’ve seen a lot of movies recently and I plan to review them all, but the show I’m reviewing today is by far the only one of its kind I’ve seen. I’m not saying it’s the best show out there. I don’t think it is. But… its style is unique.

And I’m so excited about it that even though I haven’t seen the entire thing yet, I can’t wait any longer to talk about it!

So, what is it about?

Well… there’s no plot. Not one anyways.

The closest thing to liken it to is an anthology series. But it’s still quite different because unlike a regular anthology series, this one screens a concept most people don’t know about, or that those who do know simply don’t talk about often.

Sonder

I want to give you a very accurate description of what Sonder is, so let’s take it from Merriam-Webster.

Merriam-Webster defines Sonder as the realization and understanding that all other people have lives as complex as one's own.

Now back to the unique plot I was talking about

So the series follows the lives of the different people that The Guy, a weed distributor in New York City, interacts with during his deliveries. Their daily lives, their worries, joyous moments, insecurities, you name it.

So this one is not a completely disconnected anthology because the weed seller is the connection between all the stories, even though the episodes are not centered on him. In some episodes, you might wonder if he’s even a part of the episode because of how little it actually has to do with him.

I love it because it really allowed me to decenter myself and become more curious about the people around me. It allowed move from seeing the people around me as NPCs, to seeing myself as the NPC. I am already a very weird guy, and from time to time, I find myself wondering what might be going on beyond the little glimpse of people of the lives of the people I see.

The storytelling has great variety

This sounds pretty cliche to say for an anthology series, but the variety I see in most anthology series is usually just in the story writing, characters and style (mixture of movie, animation, etc.).

Like I earlier mentioned, because this series is primarily centered on Sonder, the variety here focuses on exploring the different things you’ll actually wonder daily about the things happening around you: where's this person going, who are their friends, what keeps them up at night, who do they talk to through out their day, are they happy. You know, bits of the complexity of their lives beyond your short 5-10 minutes interaction with them out on the streets.

In fact, it stretches as wide as how pets see and bond with people.

Play Time

Episode lengths see a very wide difference, which I found out was because the show initially started out as a web series. At that time, episodes were between 5–15 minutes, and later when the show moved over to HBO, they became a bit longer cos, you know, TV episodes are typically slightly longer than just 5 minutes, even for anthology series.

So the HBO series screens episodes about 25–30 minutes long. But I assure you, you’ll love them!

What makes the 25–30-minute-long episodes better is that unlike the web series, where an episode focuses on one customer, the HBO episodes give more room for the stories of each customer to develop at different points in time: before meeting The Guy, during their encounter and after.

So when the camera pans out of one customer’s life, another’s begins to develop, and you later see how everything fits together, all in one episode.

The web series is 6 seasons long, but I haven’t seen it yet because I can’t seem to find it. Subreddits I’ve checked about it say to check Hulu and Prime Video through HBO Max, but I don’t have these, so nope.

If it’s anything like the HBO series, though, I’d really love to see it.

If you're looking for something different with a non-continuous plot that fills in the gaps of your curiosity about what the lives of the different people you meet might be like, this show is for you!

Spark of inspiration

After seeing the show, it inspired me to shoot a Ghanaian version of it.

I recently moved to Accra (Ghana’s capital), and there’s so much individualistic/mind-your-business-and-keep-to-yourself character that I think people don’t really get to see into the details of what the lives of the people they interact with daily look like.

And it's a shame because there’s such a rich diversity of people in every way you think about it here: Trotro drivers, the rich mix and complexity of the passengers they carry (parents, 9-5ers, students,traders...) the thousands of people in the markets, the untold stories of the junkies on the streets, just so much.

I have zero ideas how to begin this, but I genuinely hope that this doesn’t become one of the things I start with excitement and drop when I meet some resistance.

And if I eventually make it, you guys will be one of the firsts to know.

The last photo is mine. All others are from the Warner Bros Discovery collection for the show

Rating: 90/100

Originally posted through scrobble.life/tv.