In 2005, awkward high school student Miles Halter leaves his Florida home to attend Culver Creek Academy, a boarding school in Alabama. Miles is the kind of teenager who is obsessed with the last words of famous people. He only ever reads biographies, generally skipping straight to the end when he does so. He is particularly obsessed with the last words of 15th century French writer Francois Rabelais: "I go to seek the Great Perhaps.", and hopes to find his own "Great Perhaps" at his new school.
The main thing Miles finds, though, is a group of friends: his room-mate Chip "The Colonel' Martin (who nicknames the very lanky Miles "Pudge"), Chip's good friend Takumi, and their mutual acquaintance Alaska Young. Surprise surprise, Alaska - pictured front and centre above - is smart and beautiful and Miles is instantly smitten. Alaska has a boyfriend, though, so Miles is mostly confined to staring wistfully at her and hoping she will notice him.
Which is frankly not terribly healthy behaviour, and for me, one of the weaknesses of this adaptation of John Green's novel is that it fails to communicate that as clearly as the book did. When I read the novel, it was clear that it was a deliberate deconstruction and challenge to the 'magic Pixie dream girl' trope - the idea that a beautiful woman comes into a man's life, teaches him to really live, and then conveniently dies or disappears so that the story can stay centred on him - that is so common in fiction. The pacing in this eight part serial, to my mind, skews too heavily toward indulging Miles's obsession, and too little toward examining it.
I was also irritated by how often and how much the series dwelt on the cruelty and cliquishness of high school kids. It definitely contributed to my overall feeling that at eight episodes in length, this is at least two episodes too long.
The young cast here are great, and they deserved a better-paced, better constructed script.
If you want to look for Alaska, I recommend you do it via the book.
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