I never really watched the show, but I caught this synopsis from Instapundit:
http://instapundit.com/archives2/016811.phpI NOTED EARLIER that Jericho has been canceled, and some people aren't at all surprised:
Many of you have lamented the disastrous left-turn the television series Jericho took last season. Well, it was awarded with spectacularly low ratings and now cancellation.
A military reader emails with similar sentiments:
Just saw your post on Jericho's cancellation and think the producers have no one to blame but themselves. I liked the first season, but the 2nd season has gone off the rails. Let me count the way:
1. The bombs were an old white guy conspiracy set in motion by facist conservatives and a big, bad corporation. God forbid that they say it was a foreign power or terrorists, nooooooo.
2. As a soldier, I found it very offensive that the military is now the oppressing enforcer. How many times I have seen what was happening in the show and saying, "There's no way we'd do that." Jake's interrogation, not punishing Getz, shooting at civilians for violating "curfew." The list goes on and on.
3. So many holes in the military aspect that it was pathetic. Here's the most obvious - MAJ Beck says he's from the 10th Mountain Division, but they're stationed at Ft. Drum, NY. In order to join with the ASA military, wouldn't he have had to have sought them out by finding a way across the "blue line?"
This was possibly the most offensive aspect, as if we would just throw allegiance to some new government outside of the constitutional line of succession in Cheyenne, under a new flag and new name. Pray tell why we wouldn't have fallen in line with whoever actually had succession, since the entire line is never together in the same city because of just such a possibility. It's not like we would have said, "ASA, USA, no big difference."
In short, who wants to watch a show that denigrates their country, denigrates their military, and seems to blame the possible evils of the world on corporations? Wouldn't a show about how we pulled together and united against an external threat been a little more palatable?
Not to Hollywood in an election year, I guess.
UPDATE: Reader Ed Stephens emails:
I echo your other reader's comments about the reason for Jericho's demise. Perhaps only blue staters could imagine that scattered nukes would cause the dissolution of the United States. That American's would suddenly decide they need a "new" constitution? Personally, I would have liked to see more emphasis on the recovery efforts, setting up windmills, solar power, etc (now that the bureaucracies hindering it were gone). Think Gilligan's island/McGuyver on steroids highlighting "yankee ingenuity" and Heinlein's quote about specialization.
A more probable scenario would involve an invasion by Mexico into CA, AZ, NM and Texas (if not UT and CO) to capitalize on a weakened US; but I'm sure that would be too un-PC.
CBS's "THE UNIT" also similarly went off the rails the same way, but maybe Mamet's turn from liberal orthodoxy will cause it to change.
Have not these people learned anything from "24"?
Indeed. Related thoughts here.
