TV Review: The Day of the Triffids (1981) – 6/10

‘We’ll work and we’ll learn, and maybe someday, either we, or our children, will be able to return…’

If you’re going to call something The Day of the Triffids, then you better hope by the end of it that the titular triffids have indeed had their day. Alas, across six 25-minute episodes, the triffids in this adaptation of John Wyndham’s classic sci-fi novel appear only sparingly…

Not content with massive plants running amok (these are the triffids), our protagonist Bill Masen (John Duttine) has to contend with 99% of the population of England going blind and a mystery disease that is wiping out much of society as well. Mondays, am I right? This adaptation never makes clear whether these things are linked or not and while a little narrative ambiguity is always welcome, here it only leads to confusion.

While Duttine does a wonderful job as our hapless protagonist, and the comments on class and gender towards the end are both prescient and compelling, The Day of the Triffids often feels rushed, unfinished even. This may just be as a consequence of how it compares unfavourably with modern-day television, or it may be poor pacing (or more likely both) but what’s not up for debate is that The Day of the Triffids flirts with greatness without ever actually becoming great – an interesting adaptation but not a vital one. Also, not enough triffids.

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