Russell T Davies has once again been credited with predicting the future in his 2019 TV series Years and Years – this time by former Newsnight host Emily Maitlis.
The Bafta-winner, 59, whose career now spans an impressive 36 years, had already caused an eerie moment after Years and Years after featured a ‘monkey flu’ pandemic storyline.
And now former Newsnight host Emily Maitlis has taken to Twitter to reveal that she has spotted another example of Davies’ work for the BBC series having an all-too-real reflection in the real world.
Posting on the social media website, she said: ‘Just realised that, once again, Russel T Davies has beaten us to it [sic]’. Her words captioned a picture of Emma Thompson’s character, Vivienne Rook.
Alongside that picture of Rook – Thompson’s character who rises to political power across the course of the six-episode miniseries – is an eerily similar photo of Conservative party leadership candidate Liz Truss.
Both Rook and Truss opt for a red blazer and short blonde hair to complete their respective looks in the photos, and both of them are looking out beyond the camera that’s focused on them, off into the middle-distance.
Fans and followers were quick to react to Maitlis’ observation, with one Twitter user claiming that Davies is ‘five steps ahead of us all’ and another saying ‘my childhood hero has predicted the future’.
The picture of Truss, which was taken as she launched her campaign in July, also features several Conservative MPs behind her, mirroring the crowd that stand behind Emma Thompson in the still image from the alternate-reality BBC show.
Years and Years follows the experiences of the Manchester-based Lyons family over the course of fifteen years, from 2019 to 2034, as they witness a worsening political environment and various examples of societal collapse.
A global recession and a flu pandemic both affect the family, and viewers have been noticing parallels between the world depicted in the series and the one we’re currently living through in 2022.
However, several events depicted in the series – such as the Queen’s death in early 2022, and a nuclear strike ordered by US President Donald Trump – didn’t come to pass.
