This is an odd adaptation of the book - and perhaps I'm showing both my age and my unhip nature by having read the book and being able to compare it.
Some of the adaptations make a lot of sense to me. Triffids are now genetically engineered from their native form and a massive source of biofuels as well as a carbon sink. Global warming and running out of oil fixed in one neat, green solution. What could possibly go wrong?!
Most of the core elements are there and not hugely changed - there's a guy who has an idea that the sighted should help the blind, even they don't want to. They end up in the Isle of Wight (probably to Brian Aldiss' eternal vim and chagrin), there's the "Voice of Britain" broadcasts and so on. Masen, Susan and to a lesser extent Masen's SO, Jo, are there.
One change that turns (entirely predictably) into a major plot token is an African mask - Bill Paxton and his mum were investigating the Triffids in Ghana it appears in the new version. No complaints although the token is not cashed in as I expected. The other big change is Eddie Izzard (show-stealer extra-ordinaire). Eddie plays Torrence, who is there in the book but in an essentially background role. In this version he has a large role and he's a massively psychotic fantasist (probably with narcissistic personality disorder). My only real complaint about all this is that it makes the Triffids less of a problem than the people.
But overall it is a well-worth watching adaptation, certainly better than the 1980's one in my opinion. There is a darkly funny moment when the general says "They're big and slow, easy to avoid" and a little later there is a Triffid that looms massively over a 3-ton truck. They're REALLY big in this version.
