Cold Lazarus

Created by Dennis Potter

On Channel 4

A final, deeply introspective science-fiction meditation on consciousness, mortality, and the commodification of the self, written by a dying author confronting his own end.

Cold Lazarus is a four-part British television drama written by Dennis Potter with the knowledge that he was dying of pancreatic cancer. Forming the second half of a pair with the television serial Karaoke, it is Potter's sole science fiction work. In a bleak, synthetic 24th-century dystopian Britain, scientists work on reviving the mind of 20th-century writer Daniel Feeld, whose head was frozen after Feeld's death shortly after the events of 'Karaoke'. Progress has not been made, so discontinuation is considered, but media mogul David Siltz, who has been spying on the project, envisages a fortune from broadcasting Feeld's memories on TV.