TV Review: The Beauty and the Terror of "Scavengers Reign"

The new HBO Max series is a haunting and evocative look at what life on another planet might be like for humans (un)fortunate enough to be stranded there.

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The other day I was trying to find something to watch, and I happened to see Scavengers Reign emblazoned on one of the pages of HBO Max (I steadfastly refuse to call it by its abbreviated name). The premise–a group of survivors of a spaceship crash try to survive on a dangerous and vibrant planet–called to me, and so I decided to give it a try. I was immediately hooked, because the series manages to capture, in a way so few sci-fi adventures do, the strange, the deadly, and the beautiful nature of life on other planets. It’s the type of show that leaves you feeling pleasurably unsettled.

The series focuses on several characters who have survived the crash of their ship, the Demeter. Stranded on the planet Vesta Minor, they all try to make their way back to the ship’s remains so they can both wake up the rest of the crew and escape the planet, which is as beautiful as it is deadly. Ursula and Sam are blessed with technical know-how, while Azi is fortunate enough to be in the company of the robot helper Levi. Tormented Kamen, on the other hand, crosses paths with a sinister lizard-like predator who slowly consumes him, both literally and metaphorically.  

Indeed, it isn’t long before the series is diving into some pretty ominous territory, much of which betrays a body horror sensibility. There are numerous scenes in which one or more of the characters finds themselves confronted by some exotic plant or animal which wants to either devour them or use their bodies as a host. In one of the most viscerally disturbing moments, Sam is attacked by a nasty little plant that extracts a piece of his DNA, which it uses to create a clone which, in turn, tries to kill Sam and establish a new colony. They’re only saved by Ursula’s quick thinking and a lucky bit of fire. What makes this whole sequence so viscerally upsetting is that it’s all natural, at least from the organism’s perspective. It isn’t trying to kill Sam out of any sort of malice or ill-will. It’s just trying to spread its biological material, and he happens to be the nearest useful vector. The same can be said of an even more virulent parasite, one which managed to overcome a pair of previous colonists and comes close to taking over Sam’s body altogether. 

The biological imperative is what motivates so much of the wildlife (and vegetation) on this strange planet, and this makes the series both comforting and terrifying. Take, for example, the strange predator that manages to ensnare the feckless Kamen. Though it seems to have more cognitive abilities than many of the other creatures on Vesta Minor, it doesn’t seem to harbor any malice for Kamen. When it uses his own haunted memories against him in order to bend him to its will, it seems to be doing so out of a desire to use his hunting abilities, and the same can be said of the moment when it literally absorbs him into its body to use as a form of incubator for its young. It might become an antagonist for the other survivors of the Demeter, but this doesn’t mean that it’s a villain. It’s simply an animal, doing what it can to survive. 

Not all is bleak and dark, however. The robot assistant Levi, for example, plays an important part in keeping Azi alive but, at the same time, it also starts to gain a consciousness of its own once some of Vesta’s fungi begin to invade its circuitry. This little biological blip allows Levi to survive being brutally dismantled by Kamen’s predatory companion and, somewhat later, even allows the robot to defeat it altogether. The alien biology which has proven so deadly to the humans becomes, in the case of the robot, a literally life-changing agent. 

If a simple biological imperative to survive motivates the creatures of Vesta Minor, something far more cynical motivates some of the human characters, particularly Kris, one of a trio of interlopers who arrive on the planet in the hopes of being able to despoil the stranded and shattered Demeter. Kris cares for nothing other than the survival of the fittest which, in her thinking, is herself. For this reason, she continually bullies her young companion Barry, and she even cuts the throat of their other companion Terrence once he is ambushed by a predatory plant that crushes his body. Callous and more than a little cruel, she is a far more imposing, and villainous, entity than any of the animals and plants Ursula and the others face as they try to save their friends and escape the planet. 

I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that Scavengers Reign is one of the most exciting pieces of sci-fi animation to have emerged from the 2020s. If you’re a fan of films like Annihilation and Alien, then I think that you’ll find much to enjoy here. It’s the type of series which immerses you in a totally foreign world even as, like all great science fiction, it asks you to ponder the big questions facing humanity: is it possible to survive in such a hostile environment? Is it possible for humans to adapt to an ecosystem that has no place for them and which is populated by creatures against which they have no reliable defense? It doesn’t necessarily answer any of these questions–it is more than a little like 2001: A Space Odyssey in that regard–but therein lies, I think, it’s true brilliance. 

And, of course, it’s gorgeously animated, with a style that clearly owes much to Hayao Miyazaki.

Let me, then, join those other pop culture writers who have proclaimed the series the most underrated show of 2023.I don’t know whether there are any plans for a second season, particularly since the first manages to tie up its major plotlines. However, there are also some hints that there are plans for a sophomore offering, and if so I know that I will be one of the first ones queued up to watch it.