Humboldt

Humboldt’s central theme focuses on the way our actual needs and quiet desires consistently tempt even the best of us into greed.

The show is set in 1970s Humboldt County. Many people who emigrated there were refugees from technocracy and fleeing from something. Some were fugitives escaping real or imagined persecution. Others were Vietnam veterans unable to cope with post-War America; some were wives fleeing the oppression of traditional marriages; others were former urban residents escaping what they believe to be the death of America’s cities. Many drug abusers fled there to escape social networks that prevented their “drying out,” ex-convicts, homosexuals, and spiritual seekers fleeing the moral and aesthetic bankruptcy of mainstream America. These folks had their eyes on brighter horizons and saw Humboldt as a compelling solution. 

Humboldt is The Wire with weed, in the way that the county itself is a character with an arc of its own, and a storytelling lens that pulls back further and further with every season.  

THE CONCEPT

Humboldt: A pacifist culture clashing with greed. 

A group of refugees flee to Humboldt, hoping to drop out of life as they know it, but instead find themselves repeatedly brushing up against and being transformed by the seeds of greed that threaten us all.

Season Arc: Each season will revolve around the grow/harvest season and see a different character in this world (in the first season this is our Jenny) encounter an escalation of threats and greater temptation, while pulling back the camera to show us that there is more to Humboldt than we realize. Years may be skipped between seasons. Flashbacks are a definite regular, and flash-forwards are a strong possibility.