I give it one more episode, either we get some hard science and actual plot development (or at least just Radioactive Zombies) in this show or i’m gone…
Hey, someone give me a very quick recap of what is known, through all epi to date? Please? I haven’t watched the show, just want to see if it’s as bad as I thought it was going to be.
Really nuclear war? Why no contact with the outside- the entire world dead?
We don’t know what’s going on in the outside world. There was a fuzzy news broadcast on TV from an Asian country which showed a US map and presumably a graphic of cities that were hit.
A large plane crashed outside of town but there were no bodies. They listened to the cockpit voice recorder, which told us nothing except that Skeet’s ex-girlfriend’s fiance’s plane was diverting to Des Moines.
Some people drove out of town in four directions to see what’s going on. One of them presumably ran afoul of some refugees from Denver but he hasn’t been found.
There’s a guy in town (Hawkins) who appears to have known something was going to happen and he moved his family to Jericho. We’ve seen him brick up a barrel of something. He also has internet access but we don’t know who he’s communicating with.
A guy with radiation sickness was found in the drugstore. Hawkins knew him but he didn’t tell anyone he knew him. Before he died, he told Hawkins that there was a “traitor”. Hawkins was angry with him because instead of leaving Denver with just his family, he tried to save others. They all died outside of town.
It’s a big mess.
I will watch for a little bit longer but I really fear the show is gonna tank.
The Morse code at the beginning titles actually has little clues–at least this one did. The code said “He knows Rob.”
I think it already has, as far as quality, but according to someone who works on the show, it’s been picked up for a full season. (I read this on another board.)
This show is so bad that it fascinates me.
-Lil
Don’t know which show you’re watching, but this one is pretty okay, actually. Not great, but better than 90% of the dreck they pass off as primetime TV nowadays.
I’ve watched every episode. I’d be really upset if it got cancelled, but plausibility is not one of Jericho’s strong suits.
-Lil
Well, it’s been picked up for a full season: From Cynopsis, a trade e-mail publication:
That’s less than Studio 60, so I think we can breathe easy about that show.
This show is just awful. I had a strong feeling of that after I watched the first ep on-line before the premiere. I DVR’d it and got caught up.
Awful. But I’m going to keep tabs on it anyway until I find out more about the Hawkins “family.” Sometimes it sounds like “dad” isn’t even the real dad. Other times it seems none of them are actually related. So what’s this “family only” policy?
Who are these people who put together fake families and spread out to different areas? Or are all the fake families supposed to rendezvous in Jericho. What was it dad said, “the rally point is not secure?”
What did dad go out and get during the radioactive rain storm? Why did he stash it behind a cinder-block wall?
Maybe it’s like 3rd Rock from the Sun. The Hawkins “family” is really just a group of aliens inhabiting human bodies. “Dang! Why did I have to be the little kid?”
I don’t think the families are fake. Hawkins was mad at Victor because he returned to Denver, presumably to rescue people outside his immediate family.
Over at TWOP pretty much everyone is watching only to see what’s up with Hawkins, and they’re also hoping for zombies. 
I’m trying to hang in but the eyerolling is giving me a migraine!
So, in this semi-rural town where there are many farms, it takes them FOUR FUCKING DAYS to think that maybe a hand pump might be useful in draining the big damned tanks at the gas station? No shit, really? Then zoom a million miles over dirt roads (what, there’s no gas station closer to the clinic? My ass.) with an unbaffled tank full of liquid precariously truck strapped to a flat bed pickup–I’ve driven stuff like that, and you’ll be going like ten miles an hour max, gods forbid you have to take a corner… Sorry, driving geek rant!
WHY would anyone A) restock a store that’s already been looted, then B) take money for the goods? Stash and barter, people, what are you thinking?
Radiation poisoning does NOT cause “third degree burns,” which Victor didn’t have anyway.
Aforementioned inspirational homilies are approximately 468 light years removed from the caliber of the St. Crispin’s Day speech–sorry, I draw the line at about 450, which allows me to enjoy dubbed kung fu movies.
On the other hand, now that there is no more MST3K available a girl’s gotta get her jollies wherever she can…
And there could be RADIOACTIVE ZOMBIES! hope, hope, hope…
I’m just getting caught up with the show and watched them all.
I really, really wanted to like this show - post-apocalyptic settings are one of the best and most underused settings for stories.
But… blah.
The nuclear stuff is almost incidental - you could fill in a generic reason for isolation and it wouldn’t change the story any. No one is taking it seriously - no serious efforts towards preventing contamination and decotaminating. The popular conception of nuclear war is overblown and unrealistic - however, this show swings off the other end - that you go inside for a day, and then you can shrug it off.
So, we’ve got ash coating everything, yet none of it is carrying fallout? Seems exceedingly unlikely - weather is a huge part in determining the travel of fallout, and the ash can be generated by firestorms away from the bomb - but it’s unlikely that you can be coated in ash and yet have none of it be a radioactive hazard. Hawkins, the knowledgable character, when asked what made hydrogen bombs different (as compared to Hiroshima and Nagasaki) said “Hydrogen bombs… they literally explode the air.” Great - our writers sure did their research on this one. What the hell does that even mean? There’s a big explosion, and there’s a blast wave that propogates through air - but that’s true of fission bombs too.
And when that guy got caught in the pharmacy, clearly suffering from radiation poisoning - those cops that didn’t want to touch him were totally right. If someone looks like that, they’re gone. They’ve received a way more than fatal dose. No reason to contaminate other people in a futile effort. But I forgot - in this world, there’s no actual contamination of any sort.
Other stupid stuff:
The worst of it was the discussion about the tanks seen travelling to Denver. First, someone suggests maybe it’s an aid operation - how the hell do you provide aid with tanks? It’s possible that it was the character’s mistake, because people tend to identify any sort of military vehicle as a “tank” - but why write it that way? Tanks tend not to travel long distances over roads anyway - it’s gas inefficient and mechanically troublesome. They’re carried by rail or specialty trucks. That’s a fairly minor nit, though.
Now, another guy - one of the cops, I think - asks - what if they weren’t US tanks? What if they were China, or Russia, or Al Qaeda, or North Korea? Yeah, I’m not even kidding. You could say it’s just the character being dumb - but when the writers throw out a statement like that, without it being ridiculed or contradicted, they’re generally floating it out there as a suggestion to make us wonder.
Do I even have to explain why such a suggestion is completely ridiculous on the face of it? Firstly, Al Qaeda didn’t smuggle in tanks into the country in their luggage. The odds of them exploding nuclear weapons everywhere isn’t so ridiculously implausible - but they idea that they’ve got a platoon of tanks, in the middle of kansas or wherever it is, and they’re gonna go take over Denver or whatever their sinister plan is is some of the dumbest shit ever.
The other countries listed are almost as absurd. People seem to have the impression that other militaries could somehow invade the US. Even if the US completely sat by and let them, taking no defensive effort, Russia, China, or North Korea could not possibly land any substantial military force on US soil. They simply lack the force projection and logistical capability. It isn’t even remotely close - the very idea is absurd. China couldn’t even invade Taiwan even without US intervention - but somehow we’re supposed to believe it’s possible that they landed army units, and they’re in the middle of Kansas? Is the secret of this show magic teleporter technology?
The whole second episode was spent convincing people that dying was bad, and that they shouldn’t do it. “You should take shelter” “Nah, it’s cool” “No, really, you’ll die. Come on. Do it. Take shelter” “eh…” “I’m gonna follow you around and nag you until you take shelter!” What a stupid bore… sure, tell people what’s happening, but if they choose to be retarded about it, let them die.
Everyone has forgotten the ham radio, apparently. Sure, the guy said it wasn’t working - but hell, what else do they have to do but double check 500 times? It’s an important communication tool, but apparently only existed as a plot device to give the second episode an ominous ending.
Bar with a generator?
That kid apparently carried a few thousand pounds of food from the train himself. Didn’t ask anyone else to help or anything - apparently undertook this superhuman feat alone - and why? To have a nice surprise moment for his boss. Well, it’d be a nice enough surprise to say “hey, I found a train of food! We might not all starve to death!” and, you know, ask for help retrieving it.
Why is that satellite image repeating? If there’s an active broadcasting station, you’d think they’d have new stuff. And if there’s not - they should be getting static. I don’t see what train of events could lead to that repeating signal.
They’re turning the geek kid/hot bitch thing into one of those stories where she learns a valuable lesson and then we find out she’s actually a good person and we see her inner beauty and all that. Bullshit. If a girl is going to treat other people that way, there’s no inner beauty to be had there. But since everything in this show is just one big cliche, that’s how it’s going to go down.
And this is a flaw shared by almost every disaster movie - an obsession to go wander around to find loved ones. Yeah, I understand that your kid/girlfriend/wife/parent is really important to you. But all these disaster movies have constant plots revolving around "My husband was somewhere in Colorado when the disaster happened! I have to find him! You better not stop me! I’m gonna go to ground zero, cause I know maybe he’s somewhere around there, then I’m gonna walk around yelling his name while radiation poisoning eats me from the inside out and zombies come after my brains. And when I find him - well, I can’t actually do anything about it or improve our situation or anything. BUT I HAVE TO GO FIND HIM!!!
Yeah, I get it - loved ones, important and all that. And if you knew specifically where someone was, and it was practical, if dangerous to get to them, it wouldn’t strike me as implausible at all. But all these “He’s somewhere within 400 miles of this area! Let’s go drive there and honk the horn and yell his name!” character motivations just bug me. Some people would be that stupid - but every damn character?
And I’m not sure whether or not having people obsessed with unimportant things is weak or clever writing. The teen bitch worried about her social status, the old woman about her business, the gas station guy about being fired… on the surface, it seems absurd. It seems like weak writing. But… people are weak minded and cling desperately to irrational things. Maybe that’s actually a realistic projection of how people would behave - simply unwilling to give up what they knew, what they held as important, even when it’s clear that it doesn’t matter anymore.
I have a feeling this show is really about why America should fall victim to a nuclear attack. And judging from Hawkins and Victor, the people who set off the bombs feel the same way.
What do you mean? In a Hollywood “OMG AMERICA IS THE WORST EVER” sort of way?
“Look at these people, they are so stupid they deserve to die!”
Well, yes, but who would wash my car, and paint my house?