At the time of its release in 2018, the Danish Netflix Original, “The Rain”, was a flop among critics. The primary criticism of the show was that it added nothing new to the dystopian, sci-fi genre. I understand this critique, as the premise of the show is a group of adolescents holding the key to saving the world from a deadly virus that spreads through the rain, but extracting the cure means killing one of their own. This is a frequently overdone conflict, but at the time of the show’s encoding, the writers could have had no idea that the reality in “The Rain” would one day be our future.
Watching this show amidst a global pandemic, I respectfully disagree with the two year-old articles claiming the show’s blandness. In scenes where government officials wear masks while swabbing people’s mouths for antibodies, I don’t see a poorly developed fictional world, but rather a show that could be the shorthand version of Contagion or, more frighteningly, a nightly news update on COVID-19.
In 2018, these connotations were nonexistent in the decoding of the show, unlike their undeniable presence during my own decoding today. Therefore, it is understandable that the messages understood by viewers were more mainstream. The dominant 2018 reading of “The Rain” is maintaining personal morals at the expense of others. The protagonist, Simone, expresses this reading as she prevents her friends from killing those chasing them, and refuses to turn in her brother, Rasmus, even though he holds the cure. As Simone develops in Season 2, she also portrays the negotiated reading of this text: at what point does survival overtake your personal beliefs? Despite her high moral ground, Simone shoots and, ultimately, kills someone in a panicked moment of protecting her brother.
Finally, the oppositional reading would be to simply sacrifice Rasmus, an individual, for the good of humanity. If this was the intended dominant reading, the encoding stage would have looked very different. The characters would’ve been developed in an entirely new framework, in which their morals were substituted with cold, heartless exteriors.
Watching this show with 2021 eyes is honestly difficult. After the first 15 minutes of Season 1, Episode 1, I wasn’t sure I would be able to keep watching the show. After a few days, however, I found myself drawn back to the show. I wasn’t sure why, at first, because I’ve been finding relief from the pandemic in lighthearted sitcoms, recently. I realize now, though, that I don’t know when the COVID-19 pandemic will come to an end or what that end will look like, but, with “The Rain”, I know that there will undoubtedly be a resolution.
