Tradecraft: Carlton Cuse Espionage Thriller Colony Coming to USA

On the TCA Summer Press Tour, producer Carlton Cuse (The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.) told critics (including Deadline's Lisa de Moraes) that he approached his upcoming USA alien invasion drama Colony not as science fiction, but as "an espionage thriller." Written and executive produced by Cuse and Ryan Condal (Hercules), the drama (with a 10-episode order at the cable network) stars Josh Holloway (Intelligence, Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol) and Sarah Wayne Callies (The Secret Service, The Walking Dead). According to the trade, "Colony takes place in Los Angeles in the near future, in a state of occupation by a force of outside intruders. Some locals choose to collaborate with the authorities and benefit from the new order; others do not, and suffer the consequences." Even though the setting is modern Los Angeles, Cuse told reporters that in crafting the series, he and Condal had in mind Nazi-occupied Paris during WWII. I wasn't interested in another sci-fi alien invasion show, but Cuse's "espionage thriller" description suddenly has me very interested indeed! We learned last year that Len Deighton's similarly themed SS-GB, a spy novel about life in Nazi-occupied Britain in an alternate timeline where Germany won WWII, will also soon be a 5-episode series on BBC from James Bond screenwriters Neal Purvis and Robert Wade.