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Entered into: Best Multi-platform Format 2022

Produced by: VERTOV
For: YouTube NPO3
Distributed by: VERTOV

In a nerve-racking - scientifically based - climate change thriller, we follow various characters in a residential neighborhood of a city plagued by an all-consuming heat wave. Faster than they deemed possible, they are fighting for their lives against the brutal heat, while at the same time rediscovering the value of humanity in times of hopelessness.

6 days, 6 double episodes
(HEAT was shot during the COVID-19 lockdown in the summer of 2020 in Amsterdam, under the strictest protocols.)

Released online, on a special web platform featuring "the week of the heat wave", Tuesday-Sunday, with the 12 episodes laid out over the 6 days, the audience could decide the order to watch the stories of each day themselves, making it as much a discovery process as a binge watch. The online showcase featured a lot of extra factual, scientific content, based on aspects of the drama series, so people could find out more about the issue. On YouTube each double episode was released every week, running 6 weeks in total, for a more linear experience.

Together with the cultural climate campaign Warming Up, this series aims to clarify what impact climate change can have on us in the short term, in our everyday lives. No collapsing icebergs or stray polar bears, but sudden heat waves in an unprepared city, with power outages, no running water, and coagulating proteins in the human body. The effects of climate change are closer than you might think.

At the same time, HEAT is a loving, exciting and compelling drama series, and tries to reach further than just hopeless horror. The joy of freedom of the adolescent summer, as it begins in the first episode, rapidly transforms into essential questions about love and connection.