ZOOMERS
concept in development
web/TV series
James Ricketson
NOTE: “Zoomers” will be shot on state-of-the-art smartphones, in such a way that the eight central characters (and the actors who play them), along with the skeleton crew, never have to be in the same room at the same time, thus adhering to government edict in relation to ‘social distancing’ and ensuring that there is zero possibility of any member of the cast or crew transmitting Coronavirus to each other.
Eight ‘stressed-out’ young men and women (18 – 27) , forced into isolation by a pandemic that has locked down the world, meet in online forums and chat rooms, become friends, ‘frenemies’, quarrel, argue, debate, fall in and out of love, seek meaning and solace in their new lives, as they use the Zoom, online, to create a mutually supportive ‘cyber-tribe’. Their attempts to do so are sometimes successful, sometimes not, often humorous but always emotionally intense as they deal with their generation’s version of Ground Zero.
Cammie, Mathew, Reece, Li Na, Thomas, Hannah, and Elias, each ‘imprisoned’ in their bedroom, chat intimately, animatedly (and with generous doses of black humour) about ‘meaning of life’ questions which, as lucky beneficiaries of 21st C safety-netted Australian consumerism, they have largely avoided - living as they have been able to, carefree, responsibility-free pleasure-driven lives in which ‘likes’ on social media, Tik Tok, playing Fortnite and the posting of ‘selfies’ were highlights. (They are a diverse, multi-cultural group, these young Zoomers, as will become apparent in due course.)
The Zoomers is a self selecting online club, in theory, (the membership will grow beyond eight in future episodes) in which new members must be voted in by a majority of the other members and can be voted out by the same majority; not unlike a Reality TV show. This is not the only similarity with Reality TV, as will become apparent as the story unfolds as we discover the role that Cammie, late teens, has played in bringing this unlikely group ouf young people together. (Cammie’s name is actually Olivia. Cammie is short for ‘chameleon’. Cammie is not what she seems at all, as her fellow Zoomers will discover soon enough.)
Denied the chance to kiss, to cuddle, to touch, to be in the same room with each other, the Zoomers have no choice but to conduct their relationships totally online. They learn that whilst online romance is difficult (to say the least!), and while cyber sex may be safe, it is no substitute for the joys of kissing, cuddling a warm partner; for making love. (Trying to replicate physical intimacy in the privacy of their bedrooms gives rise to a good deal of humour and, as one Zoomer discovers when his mother walks in during an R-rated cyber sex session, the need to be able to lock your door on the inside.)
The world these young Zoomers have grown up in no longer exists; a world in which there were few constraints (financial or cultural) on what they were allowed to do. Parents and grandparents, more concerned with protecting them from harm (physical and emotional), nurturing their self-esteem, with being ‘friends’ to their kids and grandkids and making them ‘happy’, have not equipped these young adults with the resilience they need to deal with hardship, uncertainty and the possibility that they could catch ‘the thing’, as they euphemistically refer to the cause of the pandemic. Their obsession with individual ‘rights’ is challenged in a way that it has never been before as they have no choice but to live without so much they have taken for granted and learn to live within boundaries imposed by government edict.
The culture that has nurtured them into young adulthood, obsessed with consumerism, celebrity worship and questions of gender and identity, (to name but a few influences) has taught them next to nothing about how to identify themselves as members of the planetary tribe that is the human race.
The Zoomers, also known as members of ‘Generation Snowflake’, must learn fast how not to melt as the world they have grown up in, that is so familiar to them, that they have taken for granted, in crashes and burns around them.
As with the kids stranded on an island in “Lord of the Flies” the Zoomers, stranded in cyberspace on ‘Zoomer Island’ (as one member describes it) are faced with the challenge of re-inventing an online tribe that fulfils their emotional needs in a way that the discredited fraying mainstream culture of which they are a part cannot; a tribe that inculcates its members with the new set of values and priorities that see the health and continuity of the tribe as more important than the rights of each individual member.
As the world grinds to a halt the Zoomers are on a sharp learning curve; their emotional, social and economic survival depending, more than ever before in their lives, on focusing less on their individual rights and questions of identity, than on caring and sharing with other members of their ‘Zoomer tribe’ and the larger Australian and world ‘tribes’ that they must now acknowledge they belong to. As their relationships with each other deepen and become more complex, this is how they come to see themselves – as members of a tribe that is not all that different from tribes in ancient times, other than the size of the tribe.
Just as their ancestors, in pre-historic times, sat around actual fires, (warm, with flickering flames and hot coals) these young Zoomers sit with their warm laptops, their iPads and smart phones in their bedrooms, dealing with existential angst as they confront an unknown (and unknowable) future, and the very real possibility that one or more of them may not survive the pandemic.
Fast-moving, entertaining, challenging, confronting, outrageous, dangerous and often frivolous drama though ‘Zoomers’ will be, beneath the surface there is a seriousness of intent. These kids, a microcosm of their generation, are asking the same questions, facing the same challenges we all face as we look to an uncertain future. The questions they ask are not that different from the questions all cultures have asked of themselves since time immemorial, and neither are the answers.
James Ricketson 31st March 2020
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