iTunes has released series 2 out... where is series 1?

stormy_daze

Yet another Vancouver series set in Norad, Colorado Air Force Base. I've always wondered why Kurdy and Jeremiah never managed to find the Stargate out of there – there are so many tok'ra and jaffa everywhere. :P You'll recognise a lot of the same actors from both series if you're a fan of both.

I love post-apocalyptic stuff, Luke Perry in leather trousers, "wanderer" type characters, and Colorado, so this show was right up my alley.

Anyway, I loved this series, I thought it was great. I cannot, for the life of me, conceive why they would release the series 2 before (or in place of) series 1. The only thing I can come up with is that someone thought Sean Astin might improve the sales.

Well, I have a few things to say about this show, really just to warn you about 2 things: 1) This is not necessarily a bad thing, but there are two kinds of shows out there: shows you can pretty much walk in the middle of, having not seen the previous episodes (shows like Seinfeld, for example, rarely build on top of each episode) or even Stargate, (with the exception of a few episodes here and there that link back) and you can still enjoy and pretty much understand everything that is going on. There are other shows, like Battlestar Galactica, where if you come in having not seen all the episodes before it, you sit there scratching your head thinking "what—wait, what? Why is he… what? Who is this woman? When did this guy get—WHAT?" So Jeremiah series 1 is much more along the lines of the first kind of show – you can, for the majority, watch an episode out of series 1 and figure out what's going on because there aren't a lot of plot lines that connect. There are the major plot lines and characters, but they are easy enough to figure out if you didn't see the last episode.

Jeremiah series 2, however, is much more along the lines of the second kind of series – you really do have to watch each episode before seeing the next or there will be too many pieces missing and too much catching up. A lot of people hate this kind of a show, but I love it – I think it makes the show more interesting if you have longer story archs, but it makes it harder for you to see a random episode.

So my first suggestion for watching Jeremiah is really to watch series 1 if at all possible. Then, when you're ready to watch series 2, you will get much more out of it if you watch it in order.

2) There is a distinct "tinkering" visible from the studio and/or network for the second series. The dialog and plots take a direct dive in intelligence. There also seems to be a ridiculous attempt to make the show "happy." It's like some idiot who didn't understand the first series at all, and how the show is about finding hope in the worst of times came along and said, "This show is depressing. Make it happy." So there is an obvious attempt to prozac the show and try to make it more "happy" and "hopeful." Even the opening credits see a change. Instrumental music and "Dear Dad, it's been 15 years since the Big Death wiped out everyone over the age of innocence. The end of your world, the beginning of mine." Intelligent, succinct, simple. But series 2 went to "uplifting and happy" music and a dumbed-down version of "it's been 15 years since a strange disease killed off all the adults and left us kids to fend for ourselves. Now I'm moving ahead through the past." I know creator J. Michael Straczynski swore never to work with MGM under the current administration because of this show. The dumbing down and the prozac dose to the show confirms to me that someone must have been tampering with the show.

Now, all of this aside, this is a great series, one of my all time favourites. Luke Perry and Malcolm-Jamal Warner have especially good chemistry – I love that they fight, that they scream and yell, but in the end, they're still as close as kin. Sean Astin makes a great addition to the cast. His character, Mr Smith, is always just a little outside the circle – which I love! Most of the time on a show when they bring in a new main character there is this attempt to prove to the audience that the new character fits in perfectly with everyone. I absolutely LOVE that Mr Smith is intentionally set just a little out of the circle – because the truth is he does NOT fit in perfectly with Kurdy and Jeremiah. And by making it part of the story that he doesn't fit in perfectly, they made him fit perfectly! I love this series; I've kept watching it all this time. I'm just hoping someone will make the 1st series available on iTunes as well.

Hope you enjoy the series! It really is a brilliant series.

score 10/10

stormy_daze 17 October 2008

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1963066/