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JERICHO |
Series Overview 
Jake Green - Skeet Ulrich Eric Green - Kenneth Mitchell Rob Hawkins - Lennie James Major Beck - Esai Morales Emily Sullivan - Ashley Scott 
OTHER JERICHO SEASONS Season 1 OTHER POST APOCALYPSE SHOWS Survivors (2008) Dark Angel Cleopatra 2525 Day of the Triffids The Last Train Logan's Run Planet of the Apes 
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SEASON OVERVIEWHaving been cancelled at the end of Season 1 and brought back from the dead by a campaign of peanuts from the fans (no really), JERICHO was given a chance to prove itself again by bringing in a big enough audience for the network. It failed and was cancelled again. So what did this second chance at life bring to the show? Well mainly it brought pace. Where Series 1 was a slow burn of ethics and morality with strong stories and strong characters, good action and a great feel for tension. In the new season the slow burn is jettisoned for storylines that can be encompassed in a single episode and involve conflict and shooting or the threats of shooting. The concentration on character takes second place to plotting and half of the town's more minor characters conveniently disappear from view. Survival gives way to rebuilding and with it comes all of the ills of the world - corruption, cheating, powerbroking and murder. It's certainly not as good as the first time around, but enought of the quality survives to keep us coming back week after week and most of the flaws can be put down to a sense of desperation and fear of failure that the network's ultimatum placed on the makers. Our time in JERICHO is over, but we're glad we visited. TopRECONSTRUCTIONThe battle with New Bern is over, stopped by the army of the new government in Cheyenne, and the human cost is being counted on both sides. Jericho lost a lot of folks, including Johnston Green, one time mayor and leader. His sons Jake and Eric plan on taking revenge for that, but the new military commander has other ideas, and a surprising offer for Jake. Rob Hawkins, on the other hand, learns that the Cheyenne government might be directly responsible for the nuclear attack in the first place. This opening leaps past the expected full on battle that was promised at the end of the last season and gets on with the job of moving the story along. There's a new power in town in the shape of Esai Morales' Major Beck and he's a great character, competent, tough and no-nonsense. Loose ends are tackled or put aside for the Green boys by preventing their revenge attack and making Jake the town sherriff. The side story of Stanley and Mimi's relationship is a bit soap opera in comparison. This, though, is the set up episode, putting all the pieces into their new places on the board and hinting at what the series plotline might bring. The series proper starts next week and we can't, quite frankly, wait. TopCONDORThe President of what is now being called the Allied States of America decides to pay a visit to Jericho, using the stop off to address the 'nation'. This means that the Secret Service take over the whole town. It also gives Rob Hawkins the opportunity he needs to get information about the new government and the lies that it has been propogating. Jake locates a journalist who just might be willing to tell the truth if it were shared with him, but the forces that are arrayed against them are not without their own teeth either. Wow there's a lot of plot in this episode of JERICHO. In Series 1 these stories probably would have slow burned across three weeks or more. The makers are clearly trying to speed things up a little in order to ensure their second lease of life doesn't run out too soon. The main part of the episode in which Hawkins sets his plan in motion is textbook countdown drama. The tension comes from there being a clock running down (in this case the length of time it takes the computer files to download) as the enemy forces close in on all sides. It's fast, slick and exciting. More intriguing, though, are the intimations that all is not well in the state of ASA. The history book has been rewritten, the flag changed and the rhetoric become more hawklike. For the citizens of Jericho, these are not good signs and do not go unrecognised. TopJENNINGS AND RALLJennings and Rall is the company that seems to be instrumental in getting the country back on its feet. It is also the company that employs Ravenwood, the contractor responsible for the destruction of Rogue River and many deaths. Both of these groups seem determined that Jericho should not have two cases of the vaccine to a virus that is devastating the countryside nearby. Jake decides that it should be otherwise, but he is going to need help from more friends than he knew he had if he is to survive. Tension is something that JERICHO has always been good at and once again the writers come up with a situation that takes the heroes to the very edge of disaster as the clock ticks down. TWo, in fact, as Rob Hawkins finds that he has to go to Major Beck and risk all on the soldier's intelligence and heart overcoming his training and the faith in the chain of command. It's also a chance to stir up the shades of grey that the new situation in the town has created morally, ethically and emotionally. None of this would mean a thing without the continued strong playing of the cast. With Esai Morales proving to be as strong a newcomer as the cast of established characters, the nuanced performances are taken a bit too much for granted by this point. All in all, JERICHO is the most compelling genre action drama outside of LOST. TopOVERSIGHTWhen it emerges that new currency has been going missing in Jericho, the Ravenwood administrator is not too pleased about it. He takes Dale, the teenage business magnate, into custody and then goes after the woman who can prove the money was stolen, with tragic results. In the meantime, Hawkins comes up with a plan to bring Major Beck closer to the truth. The art of the slow burn has disappeared completely from JERICHO. In this episode alone there is the freeing of Dale, the stealing of secret papers from Beck's office, the setting up of scam to teach Beck the truth and the stolen money routine. That's a lot of disparate stories to cram into a single episode and none of them are as effective as a result to the others. Following the stay of execution, the makers are either trying to tell all of the stories that they had planned before they can get cancelled again or are trying to make their show so exciting that it gets renewed. Whatever the reason, it's working against the show with plot taking on a greater importance than character. As a result, the tension is reduced and the climactic shootout and its tragic events are less impactful. TopTERMINATION FOR CAUSEBonnie is dead and Mimi is critically injured. Jake takes over the med centre and locks it down so that the man from Ravenwood can't kill the surviving witness. As the siege continues, the Ravenwood team call on friends external and internal, but Jake and his team also have a few tricks up their sleeve. This week the show manages to restrict itself to telling one single story and improves greatly as a result. True, the siege storyline isn't exactly original, but racking up suspense is what this show has been good at from the start and this episode is not different. There is also time for Stanley and Mimi to show how the tumultuous events of last week's episode have affected them. It's lean, taut and tense and a fine return to form for the show. TopPATRIOTS AND TYRANTSJake and Rob arrive in Cheyenne to try and recapture the bomb before it goes off. Once recovered, they need to get it to Texas, something that isn't going to be easy when the enemy has fighter planes at the their disposal. It's the last episode and the makers have too much story to get into one tie-it-all-up-episode. As a result the whole plot is rushed through with unseemly haste that makes it all completely unbelievable. With the whole of Cheyenne to search through, Jake and Rob find the bomb in about ten minutes flat. There's only a couple of guys guarding it so it's easy to get away with and the escape from the Texas embassy to the airport is completely glossed over altogether. Far more interesting are the events back in Jericho itself when Beck gets orers to pretty much raze the town and must put his orders up against his morality. This is the kind of story that the show has done so very well from the start. So it ends for JERICHO and we will miss it. How it never found the audience it needed when so many lesser shows go on to multiple seasons is one of life's great mysteries. Top |
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