Let's start at the beginning with season one. The power goes out across the world, nobody knows why, chaos ensues, fast forward fifteen years, just long enough for a new generation to grow up and know the world in a completely different way. The story focuses on the citizens of the Monroe Republic, a new nation formed in what used to be the Northeast US that stretches as far west as at lest Chicago. In particular the story focuses on Charlie Matheson who lost both of her parents and her brother was kidnapped by Monroe who wanted their father and uncle Miles, but since their father was killed, Charlie's brother is being held in ransom for Miles. Charlie sets off with the help of her stepmom and Aaron, a former computer nerd who went from millionaire to nobody instantly and seems to be lacking in survival skills, but he has been entrusted with a pendant that allows electricity to work again. Aaron does not seem to be important at first and really seems to be dead weight, but we'll get back to him later..like next season, until then he's an albatross. Any way, Charlie finds Miles and hey prepare to rescue Charlie's brother. Note that I didn't bother to check the names of her stepmom or her brother, because like Charlie's dad, they die just to prove how fragile life is in this post-apocalyptic world. Miles does end up being very important because it turns out Sebastian Monroe was his best friend and they built the Republic together after anarchy broke out after the blackout, but after Monroe turned out to be a megalomaniacal tyrant, Miles went into hiding and only some primal urge to protect his family brings him out to fight again, and of course he is the only one who can do it. In season one, the story was standard post-apocalyptic fare, which was good enough because no network television series had touched this in years, and I personally feel that certai genres need at least one representative on the air at any given time, and if nobody else is doing it, whatever does get on the air is better than nothing. Revlution followed the formula of destorying civilization and making our heroes fight among the rubble, and it's goodif you like that sort of thing, and I do.
Season two is where things went wrong by explaining the blackout. Now, understand writers, it does make perfect sense to explain your apocalypse, in fact it is strongly encouraged, especially making it relevant. However, Revolution decided to do something wierd that I have never seen before and hope never to see again, they followed the origin of the apocalypse and created an entirely spearate story, making the orginal plot largely irrelevant, and yet still tried to follow the original plot as if it still mattered anyway. It turns out Aaron was actually one of three computer programmers who wrote the code used to operate nanotechnology that is/are currently draining electricity from everything on Earth and shutting down all electronics. Charlie's parents actually developed the nanotechnology, which explains the relevance of the Matheson family, as they were the ones who started the blackout and presumably they are the only ones who can stop it. However, the nanites recognize the coders as their parents and begin communicating with Aaron. Aaron is consequently separated from the rest of the cast as he goes on his own journey to figure out what the nanites want. Meanwhile, after a brief break from the blackout allowed two nuclear warheads to destory the capitals of the warring nations of the Monroe Republic and Georgia, POTUS and the former US govenrnment come out of self-imposed exile to try to reclaim the country. Monroe was chasing after Miles and was consequently nowhere near home when Philadelphia got nuked, so he survived but now he has nothing and wants to rebuild, but first he has to stop the US government. Why would we root for the US government to be undermined? Because they hired the Mathesons to make the blackout happen and set all of these events in motion. In fact, that the nanotechnology could cause a blackout was an accident, they were actually trying to create medical tech that could save their son from asthma and possibly create an energy supply, but there was a glitch and when the government found out they forced them to weaponize technology that was otherwise beneficial, because that's what governments do. But as awesome as the whole revolution is and all of the many people who are dragged into the web of political deciet and war and other post-apocalyptic action I usually love, it's all rendered moot by Aaron discovering that the nanotechnology is now basically God. The nanites are capable of anything and for some reason, presumably the recoding in the season one finale, they have become sentient and now have free will. I'm sorry, but if Aaron is now in a battle with an artificial god, why do I care about the petty squabbles of people that could be crushed in an instnat by omnipotent tech? I don't have an answer, but for some reson the showrunners decided to focus on the plot of Charlie, Miles, and Monroe fighting the president old school. Now, in my rather vast experience with post-apocalyptic fiction with god-like antagonists(Final Fantasy, etc.) once you realize who the biggest threat is, the main cast unites against that threat. Never does one guy go off on his own, fight god single-handedly, and then come back to gather his allies after failing miserabl while they fight a futile and comparably irrelevant war that takes center stage, and yet that's exactly what happened here.
In conclusion, if you are going to make a post-apocalyptic series, well any story I guess, decide on one threat and put everyone on the same team to fight it. If you have people going in too many directions, it's too complicated and never works. Unless you're George R. R. Martin, but that's another story.
No comments:
Post a Comment