Netflix has dropped the first (and likely only) trailer for its upcoming sci-fi thriller Tau, highlighting the voice talents of recent Best Actor Academy Award winner, Gary Oldman. Of all the things you thought you might see and hear today, Maika Monroe (It Follows) attempting to escape from a futuristic smart home run by an AI program that sounds suspiciously like Oldman probably wasn’t one of them. Thankfully, as a technology company and purveyor of algorithm-based streaming entertainment, Netflix reckons it knows what you want long before you do. Apparently, what subscribers want is Tau.

Written by Noga Landau (The Magicians) and directed by Federico D’Alessandro, Tau stars Monroe as Julia, a young woman kidnapped and imprisoned in a smart home by a bespectacled Ed Skrein (Deadpool), in need of test subjects to complete his mysterious AI project. The result is a high-tech thriller that proudly displays its low-budget, B-movie bona fides, as Julia attempts to escape a smart home that’s hell bent on keeping her where she is. 

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From the trailer alone it's clear Tau pulls inspiration from a number of films. The artificial intelligence itself will likely draw superficial comparisons to 2001’s HAL 9000, with Oldman standing in for Douglas Rain’s unnerving monotone, and a vaguely occult-like symbol being used in lieu of the unblinking red eye that made Stanley Kubrick’s rogue AI famous. In fact, Tau appears to be borrowing from a wide gamut of films, as there are hints of everything from Don’t Breathe to Cube, and even Blumhouse's incredibly fun summertime techno-thriller, Upgrade

Tau Netflix

For its part, Netflix has been releasing genre movies at a fairly steady clip in 2018, almost all of which have arrived with little in the way of advance marketing. So far, nothing has surpassed the streaming service’s post-Super Bowl flex by delivering The Cloverfield Paradox the same day the trailer dropped, but films like The Ritual, The Titan, Anon, and Cargo were all available to viewers weeks and sometimes days after the trailer hit the internet. 

As far as Tau is concerned, it’ll bow on the service on June 29, less than two weeks after this first look. You have to wonder whether or not that’s enough of a window to generate proper interest among potential viewers, but if Netflix’s current dominance of the media landscape has taught us anything, it’s best not to question the algorithm. The only question will be if Tau is any good. 

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Tau will be available to stream on Friday, June 29 only on Netflix. 

Source: Netflix