If you’re foaming at the mouth to get back to Westeros before the return of Game of Thrones on April 12, you’ll be able to do so on Jan. 30 exclusively in select IMAX theaters.
HBO has remastered the last two episodes from season 4 (the extremely action-heavy “The Watchers on the Wall,” and the epic “The Children”), for the format, airing each episode back-to-back on a screen that will make your laptop with a stolen HBO GO password look downright microscopic. Game of Thrones‘ majestic fantasy landscapes and cinema-quality special effects make it a natural pairing for the big screen, but it does have us asking: What other TV shows should be seeing this treatment?
Hannibal – No program on network television, cable, premium cable nor Netflix looks better than NBC’s Hannibal. Every episode has new set pieces that defy imagination, often for a good reason. It’s a show that deals in the psychotically morbid and has a fascination for gorgeous set pieces, often made out of human corpses. The palette is centered at blood red, and on a theater screen, escaping the madness would be impossible. A pairing of the season 2 premiere “Kaiseki” and finale “Mizumono” would serve as a wondrous single presentation.
Black Mirror – The British sci-fi anthology series has recently found a passionate audience in the United States through Netflix, thanks to its uniquely dark foresight of technology – both present and future. It’s also simply a marvel to look at its perpetual experimentation with color and design. The visuals are sharp, sleek, futuristic and cold. It’s easy to get lost in the show’s world – but on an IMAX screen? You’ll be glued. Season 1 episode “Fifteen Million Merits” boasts the show’s most unique visual setting, a TV-obsessed society with omnipresent screens that cover its citizens’ field of vision, while season 2’s “White Bear” is a thrilling standalone story with its horror imagery and downright brutal ending.
Twin Peaks – The David Lynch fan-favorite is making a return to Showtime in 2016, so why not mark the occasion with some big-screen airings of the show’s original feature-length pilot? The Blu-Ray version of the show contains a remastered version of this episode, taken straight from the original 35mm negatives. Lynch’s surreal eye for color, and twisted take on Americana have resonated with audiences for generations. An IMAX re-release is just what it’d take to kick off the 25th anniversary of the mystery of Laura Palmer.
True Detective – Even in the film enthusiast scene, it would be hard to find anybody familiar with the name Cary Fukanaga before the debut of True Detective last spring. But the director quickly became an arthouse-hold name, praised for the program’s mesmerizing shots of Louisiana and masterful action sequences. Episodes 3 and 4 (“The Locked Room” and “Who Goes There,” respectfully), presented a pair of unbelievably tense sequences: a sneak attack on a desert compound, followed by a stunning one-shot escape from both cops and bikers.
Sherlock – With episodes that already have a feature-length runtime of 90 minutes and some of the biggest stars working in film today – Sherlock already feels like a cinema series. The show seamlessly updates classic Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s mysteries into the 21st century, with clever visualizations and a sense of undeniable style. The epic scale of the show is best emphasized by the season finales, which often deal in apocalyptic consequences.
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