Small town, big bang.
It's a great series that deserved more of a fighting chance. It's easy to understand the many ardent fans of the show, but hard to understand Jericho's failure to attract more viewers than it did. The show is engaging, to the point of being dangerously addicting and whatever it lacks (see below), that's more than made up for by a consistently inventive story expansion. The show moves seamlessly from the original premise of 'USA - post nuke' into much unexpected territory. There's some filler episodes, but barely a bum one. What hampers the series is that odd but inevitable 'dated' feeling that almost all network dramas fail to shake, even the minute they arrive on our screens. Dramas like this just can't live up to the HBO/AMC cannon because of the demands on them to, eg: appeal to a large audience and produce 22-ish episodes per series - it can be simply backbreaking. One can't help but imagine how much better this show could have been with a studio like HBO behind it. It certainly deserves more care, with which it might have not been cancelled. Nevertheless, the fact one can imagine Jericho's greater potential is a credit to the strength of both the inventive writing, the smart political commentary and the many well-drawn characters which shine through occasional soft-focus, feel-good, pre-watershed moments of schmaltz and sentimentality. Those moments are thankfully few, but there's enough to make you wish there were less. The cast are all very capable, particularly Skeet Ulrich, Lennie James and Gerald McRaney who lend the show its gravitas. Bring it back! 4/5score 8/10
BlackTaterTotallyBlue 23 December 2010
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2357528/14711
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