Written Reality: The Rec Room: Jericho

The Apocalypse Will Not Have Zombies — or Ice

by Andrea M. Newton
June 15, 2007

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I don't like post-apocalyptic fiction. It's dark, it's dreary, and everyone dies.

So when my husband told me that he wanted to watch Jericho, a TV show about a small town in Kansas after nuclear bombs destroy half the US, I wasn't exactly counting the days until the series premiere. I figured I'd suffer through a little of it, then wander off to work on the computer.

I was wrong.

For a full hour, I sat transfixed, watching the story unfold. There were no foreboding, sunless skies. No rubble-strewn streets. No desolate buildings coated with fallout ash where zombie-like survivors died miserable deaths from starvation or radiation sickness.

There was just Jericho, a small town much like one I lived in as a kid, too far from the blast to be directly affected, but close enough to see the mushroom cloud. And with no way to know what had happened or when help would come -- if it came at all. A small town struggling to survive even as the world outside it fought to break in and take what few resources it had left.

A small town struggling to keep people in its own community from doing the same.

And realizing, day by day, that all the things everyone thought were so important before didn't matter at all.

Sweating the Small Stuff

What would life be like outside the blast zone? You'd expect to lose electricity. You might even expect to run short of clean water, food, and gas. But antibiotics? Antiseptic? Ice? Would you think about those?

One of the things that Jericho does so well is showing all the little, everyday things that we take for granted that become luxuries after a disaster. It's no surprise when they ration gas and food, and brainstorm ways to generate electricity. But it's the little things, the everyday things that suddenly aren't there, that make the story so real.

Because after a major disaster like that, you wouldn't have a way to restock food or medical supplies. You wouldn't have any idea what was going on in the outside world. You wouldn't even be able to make ice without a freezer.

But you'd have to find a way to try.

A Community is its People

Just as the everyday problems lend Jericho its sense of realism, the stories of the people in the town give the show its heart. No character was the same in the season finale as he or she was in the pilot. Everyone changed -- and not always for the best.

Like Jake Green, the prodigal son who left years before under a dark cloud. He returns the day of the disaster to claim the inheritance his grandfather left him, barely able to stay in the same room with his father and brother without getting into an argument. When the bombs hit, he stays, using everything he has learned in his time away to keep everyone safe and alive, even traveling outside the safety of the town's borders to save his father and his brother.

And where exactly has Jake been the past five years? In an homage to Grosse Pointe Blank, Jake gives a different answer each time someone asks.

Robert Hawkins is another enigma, a man who arrived in Jericho shortly before the disaster with his wife, son, and daughter -- and a nuclear bomb. He also has a government-issue laptop designed to continue working even after the EMP. Is he working for the people who dropped the bombs, or against them? Every time you think you know, Hawkins does something that leaves you unsure all over again.

Gray Anderson is your typical politician, angling to unseat the incumbent mayor, Johnston Green -- Jake's dad. With typical political ambition, he uses the chaos after the explosion to sow discontent in an attempt to wrest power from Johnston. But Gray soon learns that the experienced Johnston made running the town look easy. Gray had no idea what he was getting himself into, and by the end of the season finds himself doubting if he can handle it.

I didn't like Stanley Richmond at first -- apologies to Brad Beyer, and the show's writers. When I saw the first scene with Stanley, I thought, "Typical boneheaded jock." I figured he'd be a throw-away character, someone the writers could get us to know just long enough to kill him so it'd be more real. Once again, Jericho proved me wrong. On the outside, Stanley might have seemed like a dumb hick, but as Jericho's story unfolds, you learn that he's a sweet, caring guy who raised his sister after their parents were killed. A man who fights to keep his farm safe so the town has food. A man devastated when his fellow Rangers -- friends and neighbors -- are slaughtered after an ambush. A man who keeps fighting anyway, because he has to.

By the season finale, Stanley was one of my favorite characters. I was on the edge of my seat every episode, praying he'd be alright.

And watching him with Mimi -- well, that's just fun.

Mimi herself starts as your typical IRS auditor, bent on snatching Stanley's farm away for unpaid taxes. She longs for lattes and big city shopping. She's a fish out of water in rural Kansas, but she rises to every challenge thrown at her, whether it's trudging alone through the cold night to get help or coping with a surly teenage girl. And the scene with the chicken, and at the cemetary with Stanley, is hilarious -- not something you'll find in most post-apocalyptic dramas. Of course, when it looks like the government is getting things under control again, Mimi has one foot out the door to return to the big city -- if she can bring herself to leave behind everything she's grown to love in Jericho.

Every character in Jericho has his or her own story, and each grows in different ways. I could fill pages telling you about each one. And not all of them are good. For example, your heart breaks for Dale when he listens to his mother's death on the answering machine in the first episode. By the season finale, he's jealously hoarding supplies, amassing his own militia, and making backroom deals to gain control over more and more of the town. If Jericho fends off the invasion launched against them at the end of the season, Dale could well be the next big threat the town has to face -- one more dangerous because it comes from inside.

It's a Dangerous World Out There

When Jake and others from Jericho venture outside the town's borders, you realize how well they're doing. Nearby towns look like scenes from typical post-apocalyptic fare. Dead bodies, ruined buildings, mercenaries and looters, even a man trading in human slaves. Jericho's fight for survival is as much to keep that chaos out as it is to get supplies in.

But Jericho's very existence makes it a target for desperate refugees and ruthless people. Even neighboring towns that were just high school football rivals with Jericho before the bombs eye the town's resources and plot to take them away.

And, of course, there's still the question of who dropped the bombs in the first place. When China airlifts crates of food and supplies to them, is it because they feel compassion for the people of the United States, or because they're the ones who attacked and want to pacify the populace? Or was it North Korea, or homegrown terrorists? Who is the military group coming to Jericho's aid in the season finale? Are they really there to help, or to find Hawkins? And what's up with that flag?

Only one thing is for sure -- with a season finale that literally ended with bullets flying after the screen went black, Jericho fans will be biting their nails until the series returns sometime next season.

Even when it will return is a mystery. CBS canceled the show after its ratings failed following a three-month hiatus that the network admits was a mistake. Fans immediately rallied, bombarding CBS with phone calls, emails, letters, and over 20 tons of nuts. After just three weeks, CBS relented, promising to bring Jericho back for seven episodes midseason next year -- more if it gets good ratings.

If you haven't watched Jericho yet, you can catch all the episodes on CBS InnerTube. CBS will also be re-airing the pilot, the fall recap, and the last eleven episodes of season one on Friday nights at 9PM ET starting July 6, 2007.