Yahoo News Bodies creator was ‘scared s***less’ of adapting Si Spencer’s graphic novel for Netflix
Actor Jacob Fortune-Lloyd also spoke to Yahoo UK about the new series
Adapting Bodies was a daunting task for the Netflix show’s creator Paul Tomalin, so much so that he tells Yahoo UK he and the creative team were "scared s***less" of potentially doing Si Spencer’s work injustice.
“At first I thought no one's gonna commission this, it's too wild, it’s just too mental to do it,” the showrunner says, admitting he refused to make the show at first because he thought it was impossible.
Read more: Bodies review: Netflix's mind-bending sci-fi drama will keep you guessing
The time travel crime drama follows four detectives in different timelines who find the same dead body and begin to investigate what happened and why, it is full of mind-bending twists which is why it seemed so difficult to adapt for the screen.
Tomalin was eventually convinced to "have a go" at adapting the series by Netflix, and he adds: "There's no other answer to how to solve being daunted other than just to jump... and it was like being in a trance for two years.
"But I wasn't alone in doing it, I had this amazing team [and] support I had Danusia Samal, the other screenwriter, helping me carry episodes and she was wonderful so it was very much a team effort.
"We were all scared s***less, but together we got through it."Paul Tomalin
The show creator shared that while the creative team were keen to honour "the spirit of the graphic novel" some things had to be changed because it wouldn't work on screen.
"We kept to every moment that was cool that we could possibly include, but if we had to throw something out we did," Tomalin says.
"There are big differences to the graphic novel, but the characters are the same, the themes are the same, and there's enough psychedelic madness from the graphic novels.
"I'm pretty sure we did our best to nail it. It was just a wild ride and [I'm] basically still recovering."
Tackling important social issues in Bodies
Bodies, Tomalin says, is about the isolation and loneliness of its four characters, and each struggles with stigma in the periods they are in: 1890, 1941, 2023 and 2053.
In 1890, detective Hillinghead (Kyle Soller) has a romance with a man during a time when homosexuality is illegal, in 1941 Jewish cop Whiteman (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd) struggles with antisemitism at the height of World War II, and in 2023 detective Hasan (Amaka Okafor) faces microaggressions as a muslim woman in the police force.
"I think it's it's a privilege to be able to tell these stories about these outsiders in their time zones," Tomalin reflects.
"The show moves along at a hell of a pace, so there isn't necessarily the time to explore the kind of inner reality of the thing, it's not Mike Leigh."Paul Tomalin
"But it was really important that the theme of the outsiderness was brought out in each of their individual issues that make them feel alone, and there's commonality in all of them, and I think that's gonna be really beautiful to bring out."
He adds, "So often when you're suffering with whatever it is that you're suffering from, you feel alone. And I think the theme of the show is 'know you are loved' and the strangeness of that sentiment, because none of them feel it.
Read more: Bodies star Amaka Okafor 'rarely felt represented' on screen before the Netflix show
"Often when you're suffering it's so much about just being told that you're not suffering alone, and that your loved that is such a quick balm for so many things."
Jacob Fortune-Lloyd examined 'his own experiences' for role as DS Whiteman
Jacob Fortune-Lloyd also spoke to Yahoo UK about being part of the Netflix show, in accordance with union rules, and shared how he used "his own experiences" to inform his portrayal of Whiteman.
"The show has a good look at antisemitism and prejudice, it's a massive ingredient in his life, it's scarred him, it's hardened him," Fortune-Lloyd reflects.
"He has a very cynical view of his countrymen, he says 'if the Nazis invade here what do you think will happen?' And I'm sure it was a opinion among other Jews in the country at the time, that you don't know how your country [is] going to react if put to the war.
"And actually, that period of history is a very complicated one for all kinds of people, but for Jews in that period there was the Kindertransport for 10,000 Jewish children to this country, it was something to be very proud of... but also there was a lot of antisemitism at the time.
"Actually there was a rise in antisemitism at the time and the government were aware of that and weren't really sure what to do about it."Jacob Fortune-Lloyd
"[Whiteman has] grown up in that atmosphere and he has great cynicism, and it's founded on something, it's made him even harder and more individualistic, and less trusting."
Fortune-Lloyd goes on: "I think the show is about love... and [how] we try and fill the holes that the absence of love is left, and that's what shows about for me.
"But it does look about prejudice in all four storylines, but Charlie's getting a sense of that and reading up on that and thinking about my own experience was what [I added to the] story."
Despite the difficulties that his character is faced with, Fortune-Lloyd says he "absolutely loved" being part of the show's 1940s timeline because of the influences it drew from like the 1939 Orson Welles movie The Third Man.
"We started on silhouette shadow and shape because it was so important," Fortune-Lloyd says of the way his timeline was depicted on the show.
"It was such an important ingredient, there at moments like in the first episode when Charlie walks out of the doorway and he's about to get a car, and it's just such a gorgeous shot.
"Between Marco [Kreuzpaintner, the director of the first four episodes] and Joel [Devlin, one of the show's cinematographers], it's just class, it's so classic, the light coming across his face, the hats pulled down and you only see the mouth, and obviously the trench coat.
"It's just such a gorgeous image. so to be able to be that Guinea pig, to be that person doing that it's just such a joy."
Bodies is out now on Netflix.
Watch the trailer for Bodies:
