Mai-Li (Sarah Hollis) and Kurt Glemser (a pre-fame Damian Lewis), both with Psychic Powers and Supernatural Gold Eyes.
Life Force is a British children's science-fiction drama series made by Childsplay Productions for CITV. Produced in the late 1990s and aired only once in its country of origin during early 2000, it is set in a Post Apocalyptic Dystopia, where Global Warming has flooded nearly all of Earth and an oppressive Orwellian government rules what little is left of Britain.
Against this backdrop, some resistance groups remain. Among them is Greenwatch, an international collective of ecologic scientists that have been forced underground by federal agency The Commission outlawing their practise and scapegoating them for causing the floods. Husband and wife team Richard and Amy Webber seek to assist them by raising a new generation of physicists at their school; however, they are soon imprisoned in a raid by malevolent Commission agent Kurt Glemser.
Four children displaced by the arrest — teenage Webber siblings Greg and Karen, and students Mai-Li and Ash — pick up the pieces to continue their mission despite the danger to their lives. The latter two are 'senders', given extraordinary telepathic and telekinetic abilities by genetic engineering. This makes them targets for The Commission, but also powerful assets in fighting back. With new guardian Goodman, they become the titular Life Force — aiming to protect lives and help rescue the world.
The series' single thirteen episode run originally premiered between 10 January 2000 and 9 April 2000 in the United Kingdom on ITV. Reruns were shown only in Australia by ABC during the early 2000s. Though planned to continue and receiving considerable praise from critics
and viewers alike at the time of its release, it was swiftly Screwed by the Network, Cut Short, and Cancelled, with the excuses of lower than expected ratings and a few viewer complaints of it being "too scary". Life Force has not been made commercially available since.
Though differing in part to its wholly serialised format, Life Force is considered to be the Spiritual Successor to Eye of the Storm, another environmentally-conscious children's drama made by Childsplay for CITV.
This series provides examples of:
- 20 Minutes into the Future: The series is set in 2025, a quarter century away from present day at the time of its original broadcast.
- Actor Allusion: Pauline McLynn as demented robot killer granny Polly Phemus in episode #6 ("Yesterday Island"). The role bears similarities to her more well-known part as Mrs. Doyle in Father Ted, albeit with a more crazed, sinister edge.
- Artistic Licence – Biology: Genetic modification was becoming a bigger topic at the time of the series' inception, and this is made clear by its explanation for the existence of psychics. Even allowing for concepts such as cloning being made possible by it, most recently seen in Dolly the sheep at the time of the series' creation... could GM telepaths really be possible, especially with the range of powers they have here?
- Artistic License – Geology: Although Global Warming is an inescapable truth, the finer points about it in Life Force may have not been exactly watertight. Needless to say, predicting that much of Earth could be underwater all at once in 2025 seems slightly premature at best and outright inaccurate at worst from today's perspective... as all of the ice caps melting would generally result in coastal areas disappearing.
- Artistic Licence - Nuclear Physics: Seen most prominently in episode #11 ("Paradise Island"), where Greg, Ash, and Mai-Li meet Hepzibah McKinley, an ageing eccentric scientist who off the back of her father's old research claims to have discovered the secret of something long theorised to not actually be possible — cold fusion. Though significant breakthroughs have been made, many still contest its viability.
- Big Bad: Kurt Glemser, a malevolent psychic agent working for The Commission.
- Body Horror: Plenty for a series of its type, right from the start with episode #1 ("The Girl Who Flipped") with the hand/pencil impalement scene that allegedly caused many of the complaints about the series and facial rashes from the nerve agent in episode #4 ("Greenhouse Effect").
- Breather Episode: The series is first and foremost a dramatic thriller, but episode #6 ("Yesterday Island") serves as a slightly lighter entry with a comedic tone not evident elsewhere.
- Brother–Sister Team: Greg and Karen Webber, strengthened after their parents are arrested in episode #2 ("Greenwatch"). Both have each other's backs, portrayed in the likes of Karen's bid to rescue Greg from the clutches of the sun cult in episode #9 ("Siren Song").
- Creepy Child: Subverted a lot of the time, but invoked in episode #5 ("The Village That Dreamed Itself to Death") with Gemma, a disturbed young girl who appears to be the only living inhabitant of her village.
- Dark and Troubled Past: There's a reason that Goodman, the children's guardian for much of the series, is in hiding at a secret laboratory within a mill — he was connected to Greenwatch, the group of ecologic scientists that tried in vain to prevent the devastating floods.
- Drugs Are Bad: Heavily implied in episode #12 ("No Quick Fix") with 'tags', holographic chemical strip patches used to stimulate and enhance psychic abilities at the risk of burnout if used constantly. Ash gets addicted to these, and comes perilously close to health complications.
- Fantastic Racism: As a direct result of their very nature as products of science, the psychics are not exactly treated well by The Commission.
- Fantastic Slurs: Psychics are often referred to as 'senders' both in a derogatory and scientific sense, due to it being descriptive of their telepathic abilities.
- The Fagin: Skylar in episode #12 ("No Quick Fix"), who convinces Ash to steal for him with his psychic powers in exchange for supply of 'tags'.
- Flooded Future World: Most of Earth is said to have been flooded by the ice caps completely melting in the series, which takes place in 2025. The effect this has had on the United Kingdom is particularly depicted, with the opening credits and first episode showing that the south has been completely submerged via a map graphic, and all subsequent episodes taking place on the collection of islands that remain in the north. One episode in particular even uses a sight gag showing the Blackpool Tower protruding from the sea.
- Free-Range Children: Though they have a guardian in the form of Goodman, this applies to the four main young protagonists throughout much of the series.
- The Group: The Commission, an oppressive federal task force agency employed by the government to outlaw science and generally break the people's spirits.
- Hunter of His Own Kind: Kurt Glemser, the series' main antagonist who hunts the 'senders' despite being one of the genetically-engineered psychics himself.
- Inside a Computer System: Played with in episode #6 ("Yesterday Island") and #8 ("Return to Sender"), the former with Cyberspace, the latter with a Computer Virus.
- Kid Hero: Greg, Karen, Mai-Li and Ash. Invoked out of pure necessity for their livelihoods a lot of the time, with the former two's parents imprisoned and the latter two the subject of a hunt by the government.
- La Résistance: Greenwatch, the now-underground group of ecologic scientists that are trying to right The Commission's wrongs. Suffers a setback when Richard and Amy Webber are arrested, but their children and students try to continue the work passed down to them.
- Left Hanging: Numerous plot threads were left unresolved by episode #13 ("The Thought Fish"), the series finale — e.g. who was the shadowy boss of the Commission, and what were their real aims? Where is Richard Webber, father of Greg and Karen and husband of Amy?
- Mutants: Seen with the strange people in episode #7 ("Beware of the Dog"), that have been raised to live like a pack of dogs in amongst the waste of a dump.
- Not Using the Zed Word: The psychics are pretty much always referred to as 'senders'.
- People Jars: Featured in episode #11 ("Age Before Beauty") for the purposes of imprisonment and taking actual life force energy from Mai-Li in an experiment.
- Post-Modern Magik: Pretty much every single seemingly implausible concept introduced in the programme receives a scientific explanation by the end of each story — e.g. the strange shared hallucinogenic coma in episode #5 ("The Village That Dreamed Itself to Death") being the result of a disease passed on by fish to gulls, then to humans via consumption of eggs.
- Powers in the First Episode: Mai-Li is the focal point of episode #1 ("The Girl Who Flipped"), as she discovers her abilities — first by turning a tennis ball inside out with her mind ('flipping'), then impaling a pencil through her hand with little harm done.
- Psychic Children: Seen most significantly with Mai-Li and Ash. Not Creepy Children, but are being hunted by the government. Also touched upon with supporting characters Skylar and Luke in episode #12 ("No Quick Fix"), as well as Joshua in episode #8 ("Return to Sender").
- Psychic Powers: Not only possessed by the children. Amy Webber, mother to Greg and Karen, has particularly advanced powers similar to Mai-Li's. Kurt Glemser additionally has his own.
- Psychological Torment Zone: Created telepathically by Kurt Glemser for fellow psychic Amy in episode #3 ("On the Run") to make her give up information against her will.
- Rapid Aging: Gradually experienced by supporting character Marianne in the form of a seemingly incurable disease during episode #11 ("Age Before Beauty").
- Religion of Evil: Episode #9 ("Siren Song") features a weird sun-worshipping cult, who are determined to stop people from 'interfering' with nature.
- Science Is Bad: The Commission's outlawing of scientists and their practise, done on the basis that they were the ones who were supposed to save the world from disaster.
- Season Fluidity: The series is both episodic and serialized. Though it launches with a linked serial format, this is jettisoned as soon as the main plot has been fully established — episodes #4-12 are all largely self-contained Monster of the Week-style instalments. The initial plot threads from earlier in the series are then reactivated in episode #13 ("The Thought Fish").
- Short-Runner: The series lasted only one season of thirteen episodes. Would be an example of British Brevity were it not for being Cut Short in the first place.
- Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: A prime example in episode #4 ("Greenhouse Effect"); if the farm using highly illegal toxic nerve agents to promote the growth of plants wasn't enough, they are also enslaving French climate refugees for labour.
- Supernatural Gold Eyes: All of the psychic characters' eyes glow a golden yellow whenever their telepathic or telekinetic powers are used.
- Trilogy: All three initial episodes of the series ("The Girl Who Flipped", "Greenwatch", "On the Run") make use of a linked serial format and gradually set up the foundation for the rest of the series, which is otherwise largely episodic and self-contained.
- Visual Pun: Particularly potent in episode #6 ("Yesterday Island"), when technologically-modified old woman Polly Phemus plugs a wire into her 'eye socket' (groan!).
