Warning: This article contains some spoilers.
AUSTIN, Texas — Neither a war nor a missing child deters Alma Ortega from finding hope in HBO Max's new dystopian series "DMZ."
The fictional character's strength and determination amid chaos is exactly what gravitated actor Rosario Dawson toward the role.
"I liked finding her [Alma's] strength, in contrast to what was happening around her," Dawson said during an interview at the South by Southwest festival, where the series held its premiere Sunday.
"She has to figure out what is her way of claiming her space and making her mark in a way that can be respected in a world that seems to only respect violence and power," she said.
The series, from filmmaker Ava DuVernay, is based on the DC Comics graphic novel of the same name. It takes place several years after a civil war between the United States (Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island in New York) and the Free States (New Jersey and inland) has turned the borough of Manhattan into a demilitarized war zone.
In it, Alma, a U.S.-based medic, sneaks into Manhattan and searches for her son Christian "Skel" (Freddy Miyares), who got lost on the day the city was evacuated before it turned into neutral territory. But when Ortega finds her son years later, she learns that he has become second in command to his biological father, Parco Delgado (Benjamin Bratt) — a man who has since become a powerful gang leader who frequently uses violence to exert his power over the city.
At the series’ premiere Sunday, Dawson teared up in the Q&A with the audience.
“I’m so emotional right now,” she said. “This is so real for so many people in the world around us. … Some of this is going to be triggering with a lot of the footage we’re seeing in the news [of the war in Ukraine]. But there’s a real heart and a lesson that is there that might be surprising for people to encounter in a fictional work.”
“DMZ” joins a growing list of dystopian fiction series, which many consumers turn to as a means of escape.
It's not lost on executive producer Roberto Patino that the dystopian series debuted at a time when an overwhelming majority of Americans believe the nation is going in the wrong direction, that political polarization will only continue and that there's a real threat to democracy.
"The explicit intention of this show was to cut through all of [the politicization], and almost ultimately neutralize that," Patino said.
Patino added that he hopes the series "showcase[s] a narrative that will have the viewer really examining who we are as people, and who and where we want to be and who we want to be moving forward."
Dawson agreed, saying the show makes everyone take "a really hard look at ourselves and exposing the possibility of a different way forward ... recognizing that a different way forward doesn't happen unless we start to celebrate our differences."
The series debuts on HBO Max on Thursday.
