Popular Reviews of Power Out

I’m sorry to say but by the third episode I wanted the protagonist to die, I truly wanted the armed police to find them and shoot them all dead.I know that’s a hateful thing to say, however a radio play based on the premise of complete extremism of this level it’s not something I would ever expect from the BBC.although maybe we need to have a conversation about things like this, and things do need to change, but presenting it in such a cavalier fashion as though it’s right to justify the potential suffering and harm of millions of people for the belief of a group of people who don’t even understand how the world works. Perhaps if the protagonist had been slightly more mentally mature and not written with such an infantile and jaundiced view of the world and had the protagonist not had an total inability to listen to another point of view then maybe it would’ve been worth listening to.I truly wish I hadn’t wasted the time.

To take a page from Roger Ebert’s review for North, I hated this podcast. Hated hated hated hated hated this podcast. Hated it for everything it represents, which is a ludicrously shallow vision of how activism achieves anything. The protagonist is a non-binary teenage hacker who takes down the national power grid and yells platitudes about animals who have gone extinct. I have never identified so hard with a police officer who asks during negotiations what their demands are, and only receives hand waving demands to fix EVERYTHING. Nothing concrete is suggested, nothing educational, just vague demands devoid of understanding and history. The power outage that they cause leads to food shortages, accidents, and deaths, which they try to put a bandaid on by directing the same people that they doomed to food distribution centres. As has been seen in this pandemic, shutting down access to public utilities only hurts the most vulnerable amongst us. It doesn’t cause a redistribution of power and it is absurd magical thinking to pretend that it will happen just like that, as is the case in this godawful drama. Someone smarter than me will have to tackle the suicide ideation at the end. All I can say, is the teenage hacker says something to the effect of I love all life more than my life, jumps off a cliff, and no joke, becomes a Disney Princess because they are saved by a flock of birds. One can only laugh at how much this narrative cheats. Anyway, if you have spare time, ignore this audio drama and spend your time on something actually meaningful, like campaigning for solutions to climate change. If you’re looking to be inspired, listen to Forest 404 instead, which brought me to tears with its soundscapes of rapidly disappearing ecosystems.

Cool idea that falls a bit short of my expectations. Enjoyed listening but missed something; the production is mediocre and the story/subject too big for its writing.

I normally like this type of series, but you know when you attend performance art and you can see that everyone evolved is deeply sincere and committed to their craft, but it's all you can do to stop yourself from openly guffawing into your free wine? Well listening to this podcast series felt a bit like that. The subject matter is serious and the issues important, but the execution felt like it was written for a university dramatic society by students not in their final year. The protagonists are insufferable, the plot poorly executed, and the ending unsatisfying.

I am giving this the 3 star neutral rating. I listened as far as part way through the final episode, and then gave up (again). It was quite trying. There is a lot of good here, I liked some of the characters, liked the voice actors, there was threads of a great story. However at the point that I (again) decided I could not go on, it just was not coming together as a whole, and maybe those last minutes would have redeemed it, but I was no longer prepared to find out. Bearing in mind this is BBC . . . . wtf!? Could the BBC not have reviewed and helped bring together a decent story from it.

Not BBC radio 4 best offering. Story line has potential but podcast never lived upto it

Without a doubt the worst audio fiction I have heard. Power Out is a mess in every possible way - the script is poor, the story is fumbled, characters are either bland or unbearable, the voice acting is subpar and the messages it tries to convey are awkward and preachy. Avoid completely.