Warning! This post contains spoilers for the first five episodes of Apple TV+’s Dark Matter.
Dark Matter, the limited series adaptation of Blake Crouch’s book of the same name, has had just over half of its episodes released on Apple TV+. To celebrate the occasion, Crouch—who also served as showrunner—sat down with Variety to discuss what’s happened so far in the series and how things stack up with his 2016 book, which centers around a man, Jason, who is abducted by another Jason from an alternate universe who aims to take his place.
One thing Crouch discussed is how the TV series expands perspectives to give us more than the single point of view of Jason Prime (aka the Jason who is abducted). “About a year after I finished the book, I realized there’s a better version of this where a hundred pages are devoted to questions like: What is it like for Daniela [Jason’s wife] to be living with this imposter? What are those scenes where your husband is doing things he’s never done? It can be something as simple as grabbing the wrong toothbrush,” he said. “So, when the opportunity came to me to make this as a show, I thought it was like I get to do a do-over on the book.”
Crouch also added that he was glad to remove one scene from the novel since his scientific advisor told him it could never happen. “There’s a moment where Jason is in The Box [a hallway with doors to alternate universes] walking in the corridor alone and he sees this figure—it’s a version of him and he’s naked and all cut up. And I realized that’s actually impossible. That was the only thing I corrected from the book,” he said.
Why isn’t this scientifically accurate? “If you open the door and step into The Box and you close the door, you’re in superposition,” Crouch explained. “What we see inside The Box is a manifestation of a five-dimensional probability space from inside the minds of the people who step into The Box. So to have someone else in the corridor—where does that other Jason come from? Don’t get me wrong, it looks cool, and we had a lot of conversations about putting it in. But it ultimately didn’t make sense.”
The whole interview is worth reading if you’re a fan of the book and/or series. New episodes of Dark Matter start streaming on Apple TV+ on Wednesdays.
