This is a curious, messy little story about grief & individuality wrapped up in an alien utopia.

Earth has been invaded by aliens - but don’t worry, they’re a benevolent entity called The Seep who simply want what’s best for humanity. With no more war, poverty, or environmental destruction, protagonist Trina is hesitantly ready to live out her days in peace with her wife Deeba. But when Deeba chooses to be reborn as a baby to experience a better life, Trina is devastated by her loss and sinks deeply into her grief.

The collective experience of The Seep is fascinating – everyone suddenly achieves grand oversight (war is unnecessary, actually), but all individuality is wiped away in favor of worldwide peace. The Seep is uniformity; past lived experiences and pain no longer matter, and all are discouraged from reflecting on the past.

Trina is trans, and feels discomfort and imbalance in the current world where anyone can change appearances at the snap of a finger. There are some fascinating sparks of discussion around this (including a white character who takes the face of a person of color) and I would have been interested in seeing this explored in a deeper way.

This is a story about grief, about ethics within utopia, about suffering, about consent & control & the consequences of being able to make your own choices.

Really though, it is a story about grief. Mourning is labor; it is a very gradual shift in perspective. While loss & suffering can be communal (those around you can certainly help you survive grief), it is important to go through the process as an individual and therefore come to conclusions and slowly recover on your own.

The Seep wipes away individuality and forces universality - but acceptance of individuals is really what encourages an understanding of community. And humanity comes through individuality, through choices that have consequences, through past pains and triumphs.

It’s interesting to me that we view the losses of a collective through an individual who did not seem to be suffering pre-The Seep. I don’t mean to diminish the challenges she of course faced as a trans indigenous Jewish woman, but instead her basic survival needs. She had financial stability, a house, friends, and so on. What impact did The Seep have on someone who was barely surviving? 

The ending to me felt a bit unearned - honestly, I did not see Trina working through her grief as effectively as we were meant to believe. I would have preferred a more open ending where we see the beginnings of her revelation & then have faith that she is starting to heal.

CW: grief, death, alcoholism, drug use, addiction, suicidal thoughts & suicide, abandonment, transphobia, racism, cultural appropriation, gun violence, animal death (fish eaten live), sexual content

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