About a year ago, word first broke that the US SyFy Channel was planning the unexpected move of turning Terry Gilliam’s cult tale of time travel, terrorism and tragic fate Twelve Monkeys into a TV series. The pilot was successful and now the show is due to hit screens next year. While we’re not sure when or even if the show will make it over here, the first trailer has nevertheless arrived.
With a similar plot to Gilliam’s film – itself partially adapted from Chris Marker’s short La Jetee – the Monkeys show is nevertheless clearly trying to establish its own identity. That's probably a smart move, since no one can really channel Terry Gilliam’s mad genius apart from the man himself.
So what we have here is the tale of James Cole (Aaron Stanford, stepping into the chrono-troubling togs of Bruce Willis’ character) who is sent back in time from a future where a deadly virus has wiped out much of the human race. Staggering through the past – our present day – he must find and convince some of the key people involved of the dark future posed by the plague and that he’s not a crazed, paranoid lunatic. No easy task.
With Amanda Schull, Kirk Acevado, Zeljko Ivanek and Shannon Lucio aboard, 12 Monkeys will air in the US in January.