Summary17-year-old Josh (Colin Ford) searches for his girlfriend Sam (Sophie Simnett) in post-zombie apocalyptic Glendale in this dark comedy based on the graphic novel by Brian Ralph.
Summary17-year-old Josh (Colin Ford) searches for his girlfriend Sam (Sophie Simnett) in post-zombie apocalyptic Glendale in this dark comedy based on the graphic novel by Brian Ralph.
“Daybreak” wears its influences while marrying them to something distinct and of the present moment. ... “Daybreak” may telegraph a few of its biggest surprises, but the path getting to those revelations includes some wild left-field swings that its cast pulls off with glee.
Daybreak glosses over the realities of such a catastrophic event with a thick coat of knowing humor, breakneck shifts from flashbacks to the present, and POV shifts. Often, that approach works pretty well. But at times, the series cops an attitude so aggressively that it becomes exhausting. ... Just when Daybreak stretches your patience, it has a way of rebounding with a clever touch or a strong performance that makes you give it more chances.
Throughout the series, Josh often breaks the fourth wall by introducing flashbacks, cuing montages, and contextualizing the apocalypse for the audience. These meta moments are less charming than lazy, rejecting subtle world-building in favor of information dumps. Much of the Daybreak’s comedy is similarly uninspired. ... Insipid comedy aside, Daybreak offers evocative reflections on the premature death of a generation’s childhood.
It’s the show’s action and social commentary that falls short. The latter is represented in part by Angelica, too forcefully written by half, and in part by a burned-out-hellscape-as-social-scene metaphor that feels overdetermined. The show’s rules don’t really make sense: Most adults were vaporized, but some became zombies, and some were actually fine-ish. It was in flashbacks and in moments where Josh and Wesley were figuring out how to carry on that I saw the show “Daybreak” wants to be, one of fine and granular understanding of the roiling emotions of teen life filtered through the lens of popular art.
“Daybreak” is a show I wanted to like—I would accept the “Ferris” meets Romero pitch in a heartbeat—but I found myself alternately frustrated and bored way too often. It hits so many of the same beats over and over again, and often has the pretentious air of something that thinks it’s much smarter than it actually is.