Extreme wealth is becoming the narrative preoccupation of our times. The obscenely rich entrepreneur, or sometimes the heir to an immoral fortune, has been all over television in 2023, from Beef to Dead Ringers, Succession to The Fall of the House of Usher to The Morning Show. In A Murder at the End of the World, Clive Owen joins their ranks as “king of tech” Andy Ronson, a billionaire who invites a group of creatives and high-achievers to a retreat in the wilds of Iceland, where they ostensibly talk about the great issues of our time, particularly the climate crisis, and bear witness to what the future might look like. “The facts are hysterical, but they are facts,” says Ronson, at the end of a rousing speech about climate refugees and the mass disappearance of wilderness.
Such unapologetic sincerity is the hallmark of Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij, who are best known for creating The OA, the imaginative sci-fi series that was cruelly axed by Netflix after two seasons before it could wrap up the plot. Here, they narrow their vision – this is a lot less interpretative-dance based than that earlier show – and broaden it, darting between timelines to investigate different murders, while also meditating on AI, robotics, violence against women and abuses of power.
