The Peripheral, a brand new sci-fi series from the minds of Westworld creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, arrives this Friday on Prime Video, and ahead of its premiere, we were able to sit down with the stars and creators to learn more about what's to come in season one.
We first sat down with stars JJ Feild (Ford v Ferrari; Lost in Space) and T'Nia Miller (The Haunting of Bly Manor; Sex Education) to talk about their villainous roles as Lev and Cherise, respectively. While they didn't want to tip their hands too much, they did share their thoughts on their character's motivations and teased the show's central mystery.
The fan-favorite Chloë Grace Moretz (Kick-Ass; Tom & Jerry) headlines the exciting new sci-fi series, with Gary Carr (21 Bridges; The Deuce) and Jack Reynor (Transformers: Age of Extinction; Cherry) featuring in key leading roles. Stay tuned for our interviews with all three later this week!
The Peripheral starts streaming, exclusively on Prime Video, on October 21!
Check out the full video interview below and please remember to SUBSCRIBE to our channel!
ROHAN: Both of your characters are very stylized and futuristic, and I think it's safe to say that they each have very different agendas, that are likely to put them on a collision course with one another. What would you say their motivations are throughout the season?
JJ: Global domination. *laughs* There’d be both power, this is a power struggle.
T'NIA: Yeah, although I would say she Cherise’'s objective is for the greater good. I am not sure that you have the same objective.
JJ: But I'm convinced my greater good is good.
T'NIA: Yeah, there we are.
JJ: Yeah, control, power, whatever, the motivation may come from different places, but we both believe that ourselves and who we represent, should be in control, and obviously, we have different ideals of…
T'NIA: …how that should work or that pans out.
ROHAN: T'Nia, you have a really great fight scene in episode five or six with Chloë, this huge hand-to-hand combat sequence - can you tell me more about prepping and shooting that pivotal scene?
T'NIA: I'm a middle aged woman, darling, I had a stunt double. *laughs*
I did some of it, and actually, it has inspired me to go and do some martial arts, and get into more fight training, take up stage combat again. Yeah, it was fun. It was fun, kicking ass. But I didn't do any of the backflip stuff, no that was a gorgeous, young girl, and I can't remember her name. I'm sorry. I'm not great with names, but yeah, I'm looking forward to do more of that, for sure.
ROHAN: Like any Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy project, The Peripheral raises a lot of questions about our world today and where it may be heading over the course of the next few decades. In the show, many are using virtual reality to escape their actual reality, including Chloë's Flynne - during your research, did you learn anything about why VR or video games are becoming such an increasingly popular form of escapism for new generations?
JJ: That's a giant William Gibson question, isn’t it? We set this in the future, where we can control the environment to how we want to perceive the world, and what's extreme about Gibson is, as he was writing a while back, and predicting stuff that is so precise, Nostradamus would be jealous, and I think we're always looking for escapism. The question is, what tools we use to escape and some of them are wonderful and healthy, and some of them are destructive, and nihilistic, and Gibson takes that to this very technological level, obviously with all the writers and Jonah, and Lisa and everyone who have taken that into today's environment brilliantly.
ROHAN: Overpopulation is a serious concern for our planet today, but your show turns that threat on its head and reveals a future that is vastly underpopulated. Since both of your characters are from the future, what are you allowed to say about the show's central mystery and what happened to the world between 2032 and 2099?
JJ: What can we say?
T'NIA: I don't think we can. *laughs* I think you just have to stay tuned.
JJ: There's that extraordinary scene where Chloe and Gary are on the on the banks of the River Thames, and Chloe is asking, you know why are all the people doing what they're doing? When I first saw that scene, I remember looking at it going, “Now, that’s a bit set up, there’s people doing juggling and what if this is a bit like a theme park?,” and then Gary teaches Chloe, how to change her environment through her sort of haptics and stuff and that was an amazing - although you read it in the script, when you actually see it, it's an extraordinary reveal, because it's one thing reading a script, oh, London is empty, and then seeing it was extraordinary.
Plus, check out our additional The Peripheral interview below:
Flynne Fisher (Chloe Grace Moretz), her Marine veteran brother, Burton (Jack Reynor), and their dying mother live in a small town in the Blue Ridge Mountains in 2032. As their mother’s health deteriorates and the medical bills add up, Flynne and Burton make extra money playing simulations (Sims). The two siblings share Burton’s avatar, “jockeying” for high-paying customers to beat challenging game levels. When Burton is offered a chance to beta test a new Sim, it’s Flynne who ends up playing, pretending to be her brother. The Sim takes place in London and it tasks Flynne with breaking into a corporation known as the Research Institute—to steal a valuable secret.
When the assignment goes badly wrong, Flynne begins to realize the Sim is more real than she ever could have imagined. The London she’s exploring exists in the future…year 2099. And what Flynne has uncovered in the Research Institute has put her and her family in grave peril. There are people from the future who want to use Flynne for the information she’s stolen…and there are others who want Flynne dead. Flynne encounters Wilf (Gary Carr) in Future London, a man who may be the key to unlocking the mystery at hand. But first, in her present, Flynne and Burton, along with his former elite military unit, must rally to save themselves from forces intent on killing them—forces sent from the future to reclaim the vital secret Flynne stole.
The Peripheral starts streaming on October 21!