Terms of Entanglement

TV Pilot, One Hour Sci-Fi Drama: “Terms of Entanglement”

A grounded sci-fi drama, “Terms of Entanglement” combines the “search for a lost family member” dynamic of 2016’s “Lion” with the eerie, detached vibe of “Severance.”

Elle is the chief data archivist for a large city in 2054. Beset by regret and the pervasive sense that something is missing in her life, Elle risks her job -- maybe even her freedom -- to find out what happened to the daughter she gave up for adoption two decades prior. The complication -- shortly after Elle gave birth to her daughter, the expanded use of quantum computers disrupted the fabric of reality, resulting in a “data catastrophe” -- the scrambling of most digital records. Two decades later, save for one photograph, Elle has no information that might answer her questions.

Three of Elle’s fellow data archivists join her quest. They must locate a pre-catastrophe quantum computer to help reconstruct the lost data while finding clues concerning Elle’s daughter. Standing in their way is Averill Merkin, the head of a secretive agency dedicated to finding all quantum computers and disposing of them.

When Elle and company find a quantum computer, they discover that the events underlying the data catastrophe split reality into two planes of existence: Blue World and Pink World. Although free will exists in both, everyone is connected -- at a fundamental level -- to their counterpart by quantum entanglement. Although an initial foray with the quantum computer proves devastatingly disappointing to the Elle of Blue World, two subsequent discoveries renew her hopes and open the story to interaction between the two worlds.

In subsequent episodes, Blue World’s Elle slowly zeroes in on her daughter’s location. In Pink World, the daughter searches for Elle, while a more deranged version of Merkin attempts to outwit his Blue World counterpart in a play to recover the missing data.