Sense8 (season 1)
The first season of "Sense8", an American science fiction drama streaming television series created by Lana and Lilly Wachowski and J. Michael Straczynski, follows eight strangers from different parts of the world who suddenly discover that they are "sensates"; human beings who are mentally and emotionally linked. The season was produced for Netflix by the Wachowskis' Anarchos Productions and Straczynski's Studio JMS, along with Javelin Productions and Georgeville Television. Unpronounceable Productions was set up to oversee production for the show. A multinational ensemble cast starring Aml Ameen, Doona Bae, Jamie Clayton, Tina Desai, Tuppence Middleton, Max  Riemelt, Miguel Ángel Silvestre, and Brian J. Smith portrays the suddenly connected strangers. Freema Agyeman, Terrence Mann, Anupam Kher, Naveen Andrews, and Daryl Hannah also star. The season acts as the origin story for the eight sensates. All episodes were written by the Wachowskis and Straczynski and the majority of them were directed by the Wachowskis, with the remainder being divided between their frequent collaborators James McTeigue, Tom Tykwer, and Dan Glass. Filming took place almost entirely on location in nine cities around the world: Berlin, Chicago, London, Mexico City, Mumbai, Nairobi, Reykjavík, San Francisco, and Seoul. All 12 episodes  of the season became available for streaming on Netflix on June 5, 2015 and were met with generally favorable critical reception. The season was noted for its representation of LGBTQ characters and themes, winning the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Drama Series. It was also recognized with a Location Managers Guild award for its use of locations as an integral part of the story, and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music. Cast. Recurring. The recurring actors are listed by the region in which they first appear. Episodes. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude> Production. Filming and locations . To properly tell the international aspects of the story, filming for "Sense8" took place almost entirely on location around the globe. In the first season they filmed in nine cities located in eight countries: Berlin, Chicago, London, Mexico City, Mumbai, Nairobi, Reykjavík, San Francisco, and Seoul. Production on the first season began on June 18, 2014 in San Francisco. The filmmakers successfully negotiated with the organizers of the Clarion Alley Mural Project and select artists to feature their artwork in the show. Shooting in Chicago began on July 9 and wrapped up on August 8, with filming taking place both  on location and at the Cinespace Film Studios. They shot some scenes in the Superdawg drive-through restaurant, while customers were being asked not to stare at the filming. Lana and Lilly Wachowski are frequent customers of the place. During location scouting, the producers found the City Methodist Church in Gary, Indiana which is nearby Chicago, and changed one site's description in the scripts to a church accordingly in order to fit that particular site into the filming. They filmed in the church from July 25 to 28. Filming proceeded to London for a short shoot and then to  Iceland, where between August 26 and September 6 they shot in Reykjavik and nearby places such as Akranes. Filming then started in Nairobi, where a sequence required a crowd of 700 extras, 200 cars and a helicopter. In Seoul they filmed from September 18 to 30. Next they moved to Mexico City and later to Germany, where they filmed in Berlin and inside Babelsberg Studio. Last place they visited was Mumbai where they also shot a Bollywood dance number that was choreographed by "Slumdog Millionaire"s Longinus Fernandes. The writers wanted to feature an event in each city. They were able  to schedule the Pride scenes with its Dykes on Bikes on the Dyke March in San Francisco, the Fourth of July fireworks celebration in Chicago, and the Ganesha Chaturthi Hindu festival in Mumbai. Additionally they recorded footage from the Fresh Meat Festival of transgender and queer performance in San Francisco, a club event taking place at the KOKO in London, and a real lucha libre (Mexican professional wrestling) event with the fighters wearing wrestling masks in Arena Naucalpan, in Mexico City. Lastly the scenes where characters are flying on an airplane were recorded during the real flights the cast and  crew had to do to get from London to Iceland. On November 17, 2014 Straczynski wrote that the main unit shooting had wrapped, with only a few winter shots in Iceland remaining to be captured the next month. These scenes were further delayed to mid-January 2015, until Iceland had the necessary amount of snow, with the wrap party taking place in Reykjavík's Harpa Music and Concert hall on January 21. By the end of the shooting, the filmmakers had completed 100,000 miles of flight time, or four times around the globe. Music. Johnny Klimek and Tom Tykwer, who  co-composed the score for "Cloud Atlas" and had a minor contribution in the soundtrack of "The Matrix Revolutions" as part of Pale 3, composed the season's music which was orchestrated by their fellow "Cloud Atlas" collaborator Gene Pritsker. The music was written before filming began and it was recorded by the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra. Ethan Stoller and Gabriel Isaac Mounsey, past collaborators of the Wachowskis and Tykwer, are credited for composing additional music and score. Stoller also acted as the season's music editor. The theme music was picked by the Wachowskis from the two hours  of original music Tykwer and Klimek had written. It was shortened from its original seven or eight minutes and a choir and electronic elements were added to it at the wish of the Wachowskis. The show received a nomination for Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music during the 68th Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards. The title of Episode 4, "What's Going On?", refers to lyrics in the song "What's Up?" by the 4 Non Blondes, which is featured in a scene where the main cast collectively sings it as their first shared experience together. After Nomi escaped from  the hospital she said the lyrics were in her head all day and Amanita recognized the song saying it was the perfect soundtrack for a lobotomy. A soundtrack album for the first season was released digitally by WaterTower Music on May 5, 2017. It includes 10 tracks by Klimek and Tykwer, and four licensed songs including "What's Up?". Klimek and Tykwer's compositions alone, are also available on WaterTower's YouTube channel. Reception. Critical reception and popularity. Critical reception of the first season of "Sense8" has been generally favorable. Rotten Tomatoes, a review aggregator website, reported a 71% critical  approval rating with an average rating of 6.25/10 based on 62 reviews. The website's critical consensus reads, "Some of the scenarios border on illogical, but the diverse characters and the creative intersections between their stories keep the Wachowskis' "Sense8" compelling." On Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, the season is assigned a score of 64 out of 100, based on 24 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". In a report released by Netflix it was discovered that at least 70% of the viewers that watched up to the third episode ended up watching the entire first season, and Straczynski was  told there are people that watch it "straight through – three, four, six times." In another report released by Netflix, "Sense8" was listed among the shows whose viewers tend to heavily binge-watch their first seasons, rather than savoring their episodes by watching them at a slower pace. Netflix's Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos praised the success of "Sense8" in the up-and-coming French and German markets but also globally. Vice president of international series for Netflix Erik Barmack has named "Sense8" one of the most popular Netflix series in the Brazilian market. Less than three days after the  premiere of the first season, "Variety" reported that it had been pirated more than half a million times, regardless of the series' digital distribution. Marketing. The red carpet premiere of "Sense8"<nowiki>'</nowiki>s first season took place on May 27, 2015, in San Francisco's AMC Metreon, where the first three episodes were previewed. Starting in the middle of July 2015, Netflix Brazil released a series of documentary shorts called "Sense8: Decoded". Inspired by "Sense8" and directed by João Wainer, the shorts briefly touch upon subjects such as psychiatry, feminism, being transgender and buddhism. Later in the month, Netflix released  a music track titled "Brainwave Symphony" on Spotify. To produce it they subjected eight strangers to a series of various stimuli and they recorded their individual brainwaves using EEG sensors. After extracting a melody from each of them they arranged them in a way to produce a track which mirrors the escalating action of the season. In early August 2015, Netflix made available "Sense8: Creating the World", a half-hour web television documentary, shot around the world, about the making of the first season of the series.