Falling Down

Strange occurrences and alien ships mix in Debris, the new show from one of the creatives behind Fringe

- Debris

WHEN FRINGE HIT THE airwaves back in 2008, plenty of critics labelled it as a clone of The X-Files, thanks to its mix of science and supernatural cases investigated by the FBI. But then showrunners Jeff Pinkner and JH Wyman moved the series into deeply emotional territory, with complex serialised storytelling that made it a contemporary classic.

Pinkner now writes movies, but Wyman is trying television again with Debris. It’s set in the near future, where alien existence has finally been confirmed because parts of a destroyed spacecraft are raining down on Earth. And those pieces interact very strangely with the human species. To investigate and protect us, Orbital – a new coalition between MI6 and the CIA – sends out agents like Finola Jones (Riann Steele) and Bryan Beneventi (Jonathan Tucker) to collect the debris.

“To me, the best sci‑fiis more about the human condition that it talks about,” Wyman tells Red Alert, when asked why he’s returning to genre storytelling. “There’s a lot of people out there that do the ‘little green men’ thing better than me. I’m not that guy. I’m more of the, ‘What does it look like when there are questions that are asked that really shine a light on the human condition?’ I just always find that fascinating.”