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May 31, 2021 · Amazon Prime's Panic is based on the 2014 novel by Lauren Oliver, but the author made several major changes when adapting her story for a TV series.
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Panic: Created by Lauren Oliver. With Olivia Scott Welch, Mike Faist, Jessica Sula, Ray Nicholson. No one knows who invented Panic or when it first began. But in the forgotten rural town of Carp, Texas, the game is the only way out.
- (10K)
- 2021-05-28
- Adventure, Crime, Drama
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By Tom Power
published 27 May 2021
Panic on Amazon Prime leaves the post apocalyptic vibes behind
(Image credit: Amazon Studios)
Panic on Amazon Prime is a surprisingly deceptive TV show. On the surface, the streamer’s latest young adult (YA) series, based on Lauren Oliver’s novel of the same name, appears to be nothing more than standard fare for its adolescent-targeted genre. However, dig deeper and there’s more to it than meets the eye.
Panic operates in an unusual space compared to other recent book to TV adaptations. Shows usually employ authors, such as Leigh Bardugo on Netflix’s Shadow and Bone adaptation, in creative consultant or executive producer roles to ensure such TV adaptations are as authentic as possible.
Amazon Studios, though, chose a different approach for Panic, and set author Lauren Oliver as the show’s creator. Oliver, then, had the flexibility to revise the novel’s plot and characters without having to surrender her creative freedoms. It’s a dual role that enabled Oliver to collaborate more closely with the show’s cast and allow them to offer their own fresh takes on characters that she created.
“When you have the creator who made this story and world, you feel pretty safe when she says ‘It’s gonna veer off and do this thing’,” Sula explains. “Lauren was like ‘Don’t worry about this’ or ‘You can throw this out as I’m gonna go in this direction’. It was done in a very secretive way, too, so even though I read the book midway through filming, I didn’t know what to expect from the show’s plot.”
One element of the show that doesn’t deviate from the source material is the set of challenges that Panic’s contestants must face. Participants have to successfully navigate six increasingly treacherous rounds, including a personalized challenge where they're required to face up to their greatest fear in order to progress to the final round.
With tasks ranging from jumping off a vertigo-inducing cliff into icy waters to stealthily breaking into the home of an angry shotgun-toting farmer, Panic’s contestants are put through the wringer in their quest for monetary success. It’s these challenges that provide the show’s most thrilling moments, and there are occasions where you’ll realize that you’re holding your breath or gripping your seat tightly.
By contrast, and largely for health and safety reasons, the show’s cast didn’t have to perform many – if any – of their fictional counterparts’ death-defying stunts.
Panic’s positioning as a YA series, centered around an oft-used ‘winner takes all’ plot device (most famously seen in The Hunger Games), may not be to everyone’s tastes, but it’s a far deeper show than it first appears.
The series shines a light on real world subjects, including suicide, that teenagers and young adults can find difficult to talk about or, in keeping with the series’ exploration of fear, are even afraid to raise in the first place.
Poverty, misogyny, sexual assault, and a lack of employment opportunities are also explored in-depth throughout the series. As a YA-oriented show, Panic is ideally placed to prompt these kinds of discussions among its target audience.
In reckoning with this topical content, Panic’s cast hopes that the series will enable viewers to recognize the importance of opening up to family, friends or medical professionals if any of these subjects hit close to home.
“[It’s important] to see a show that addresses things that are happening in the real world, such as people having a finite amount to live on,” Sula says. “These kids are gonna be pushed into doing this game because of their individual situations. I didn’t grow up in a wealthy environment, but Natalie’s family is very well off and has a stable home, so any real-life person in the same situation may think ‘Wow, I can never emulate that’. It represents our wider society with kids trying to financially plan [for their future], and it sucks with all of the other issues they have to deal with.”
“These are extreme circumstances that people are going through,” Welch adds. “I think the grounded elements of the show balance out the stakes of why these kids are doing this in such a blown up way [through Panic’s competition]. In the end, it’s the result of having a community and friendship around you, and I hope viewers realize that they don’t have to suffer in silence and they can talk to their own support groups.”
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