Sense8’s Christ­mas Spe­cial cel­e­brates the pow­er of human connection

Every once in awhile we are intro­duced to TV shows that defy the con­ven­tion­al for­mats in a most dar­ing, ambi­tious man­ner. The fact that a sci-fi show with arche­typ­i­cal Heroes types would do so is all the more sur­pris­ing, see­ing as how these worlds typ­i­cal­ly fol­low a very spe­cif­ic pace and tone. But Sense8 man­aged to do just that. Cre­at­ed by J Michael Straczyn­s­ki and the Wachowskis, Sense8 offers much more than an intrigu­ing sto­ry­line and bril­liant per­for­mances by an inter­na­tion­al cast. The series cap­ti­vates with a vari­ety of stun­ning back­drops as it dips in and out of dif­fer­ent cul­tures and envi­ron­ments. Visu­al­ly it is as mes­meris­ing as the pro­tag­o­nists’ blos­som­ing rela­tion­ships and the many ques­tions their sto­ries leave to ponder.

Sun (Doona Bae), Kala (Tina Desai), Nomi (Jamie Clay­ton), Capheus (Aml Ameen, now por­trayed by Toby Onwumere), Will (Bri­an J Smith), Wolf­gang (Max Riemelt), Riley (Tup­pence Mid­dle­ton) and Lito (Miguel Ángel Sil­vestre) are ​“sen­sates” – unre­lat­ed peo­ple in dif­fer­ent cor­ners of the world psy­chi­cal­ly linked to one anoth­er, to the extent in which they feel each other’s pain and joy, taste each other’s food and drinks, hear each other’s music and expe­ri­ence each other’s sex­u­al activ­i­ties. As this con­nec­tion inten­si­fies, they find they can com­mu­ni­cate with one anoth­er by ​“vis­it­ing”: while their phys­i­cal bod­ies remain in their respec­tive coun­tries, they are able to see the oth­ers’ sur­round­ings, feel the change in tem­per­a­ture and even speak the local lan­guage. In extreme sit­u­a­tions, they are able to chan­nel the skills and abil­i­ties of their fel­low sen­sates by allow­ing them to take over.

Filmed across nine dif­fer­ent coun­tries, Sense8 thrives on cul­tur­al authen­tic­i­ty. It per­fect­ly cap­tures Wolfgang’s Berlin blues and the shady under­bel­ly of the city, empha­sis­es Riley’s lone­li­ness through the vast fields and nev­er-end­ing roads out­side of Reyk­javík, and mir­rors Kala’s pos­i­tive ener­gy in the warm, rich colours of Mum­bai. Straczyn­s­ki and the Wachowskis orches­trat­ed a sen­sa­tion­al view­ing expe­ri­ence by throw­ing a cast of excep­tion­al actors into real-life sit­u­a­tions and cap­tur­ing the adren­a­line felt with­in and around them. Plane land­ings, cul­tur­al fes­ti­vals such as San Fran­cis­co Pride’s Dykes on Bikes, the lucha libre in Mex­i­co City’s Are­na Nau­cal­pan and Riley’s gig at the Koko in Cam­den were filmed live dur­ing the actu­al events. The buzz we feel from the pro­tag­o­nists is thus entire­ly real.

Hav­ing come to under­stand a man by the name of Whis­pers (Ter­rance Mann) intends to wipe out their kind, the sen­sates faced a dif­fi­cult real­i­sa­tion by the end of sea­son one: things were about to get weird­er. Today Sense8 opens our Christ­mas sea­son with an incred­i­bly pow­er­ful episode fit to turn the grump­i­est Grinch into a blub­ber­ing mess. Not that the series ever becomes over­ly sac­cha­rine. It’s sen­ti­men­tal and melan­cholic but always per­tains its edge and casu­al sense of humour; and yet ​‘A Christ­mas Spe­cial’ is one of the few hol­i­day episodes to tru­ly bring the spir­it of the sea­son to life this year.

While their tight­en­ing bond allows them to con­nect with their own iden­ti­ties in a man­ner they didn’t think pos­si­ble, cer­tain rela­tion­ships between the sen­sates are com­pli­cat­ed as a direct result there­of. Kala and Wolf­gang, two bla­tant­ly dif­fer­ent per­son­al­i­ties drawn togeth­er by much more than their tele­path­ic link, are surf­ing the waves of denial. Des­per­ate­ly try­ing to con­vince them­selves they are not right for one anoth­er, they can­not achieve the dis­tance need­ed to dis­en­gage com­plete­ly. After a strik­ing­ly explic­it scene typ­i­cal of Sense8’s steamy psy­chic orgies, the audi­ence is allowed to – blush­ing­ly – come up for air when Kala and Wolf­gang con­front each other’s sex­u­al pref­er­ences and inse­cu­ri­ties in an uncom­fort­ably com­i­cal situation.

The main con­cern through­out the episode – and pre­sum­ably sea­son two – is Will, who is forced to spend his days in a drugged haze to pre­vent Whis­pers from enter­ing his mind, a task Riley is over­see­ing in his con­stant com­pa­ny. But every time Will allows him­self brief moments of men­tal clar­i­ty, Whis­pers finds his oppor­tu­ni­ty to vis­it. It’s get­ting hard­er for him to keep up this lev­el of intox­i­ca­tion and he is start­ing to con­front his only oth­er alter­na­tive in his dreams: death. The sen­sates are all on the run from their indi­vid­ual chal­lenges, but while they’re all feel­ing some form of iso­la­tion, their abil­i­ty to chan­nel one another’s strengths allows for a sense of per­son­al empowerment.

The show’s mes­sage of uni­ty and empa­thy – I am we – is con­veyed through serene and equal­ly intense imagery paired with an out­stand­ing sound­track. The sen­sates nav­i­gate through their indi­vid­ual set of cir­cum­stances as a unit­ed front, and while the episode may not end on a hap­py note, it allows us to get swept up in their togeth­er­ness. After a par­tic­u­lar­ly try­ing year steered by a myr­i­ad of alien­at­ing pho­bias, ​‘A Christ­mas Spe­cial’ is one of the great­est gifts TV has to offer: a show cel­e­brat­ing cul­tur­al and sex­u­al diver­si­ty and the pow­er of human connection.