Maybe it was too expensive to make the planes fall out of the sky in the daytime.

Yes, that was obviously done for purely visual purposes. Those lights should not have worked. It looked cool, though.

this. but if it's drawn out, a la lost, i will stop watching early. if obvious questions aren't answered early then this show needs to go.

Nun, Lost was pretty freaking good for a long time on a major network. So I see no problem holding a show to a better standard. Same with 24, The West Wing, etc. Your Argument doesn't hold water. Revolution obviously will not be any of those shows.

I enjoyed it and will be watching this season. The only thing in the pilot that tilted me was how Monroe had ice. In the scene where he's in the tent he's getting ice. Are we to assume he has one of the usb power thingies and uses it to make ice?

All of those shows would be considered to be in a totally different era compared to today, and all were groundbreaking shows (something has to break the ground). The networks are having to deal with extremely good shows poaching their viewers. There are tons and tons of choices for the consumer out there, and the networks' seemingly solitary goal is to get people to sit in front of their TVs and watch them as opposed to something else. The audience won't stick around if it doesn't appeal to them, because there are just too many choices.

The plain and simple fact is that neither Breaking Bad nor Justified would have ever seen a second season on network TV. That isn't a knock on either of those shows, it's just apples and oranges from network to cable, as they have different desires than each other.

The key for me is getting a network TV show to both appeal to the masses, and to people who like well done TV. The show that did that for me, last season, was Person of Interest. You basically brought up 3 very good examples of well done network TV shows, but there have literally been hundreds of network TV shows since those have been made. Every single network is trying to produce the next LOST (a high concept show that appeals to mass audiences). If you looked at most networks' slates from the past few seasons you would see that truth. I don't think anyone is trying to do a The West Wing type show anymore, and the 24 format absolutely does not work on network TV these days. As I said, it's a different era, and it's really difficult to catch lightning in a bottle. The networks are absolutely trying to find shows that will be at a super high quality that viewers will watch, but they won't put that above getting viewers to watch. It's also worth noting that several shows that a lot of people love these days are on FX or USA. Both of those are subsidiaries of FOX and NBC. The shows you see on there are the shows they think won't appeal highly enough to network audiences, and they don't want them canceled. That's another huge way network TV has changed over the years. I seriously doubt a show like Fringe would have been on FOX in today's era, they likely would have put it on FX, and it would have been around forever.

There's no chance Revolution will ever be considered a great show, but it is clearly better, or at least as good, at the Pilot stage than almost every similar show that has failed over the last several seasons. I can easily see myself watching all of the the episodes of this show more enjoyably than The Event or Terra Nova, but that's not saying much. If it ends up being about aliens, I'm out.

No one has mentioned the end when the black lady starts up a computer?

He likely has control of all of the things necessary to make ice, that the other groups don't have. Technology, no matter how rudimentary, is likely what gives one group power over another. The more of that technology you control, the more area you control. Would you prefer to go to a battle with guns or swords? One group has the equivalent of swords, and the other has modern weaponry. That's generally a pretty big deterrent to rising up against the powers that be, unless everyone is a terrible shot like they were against Miles in the Pilot.

That was meant to show us that there is more than one of the devices that Ben or whatever his name had. Is there a problem with this?

I also think the show was badly cast. Seems to be going for the Twilight "everyone is beautiful" demo. Again, this is obviously a soap opera with sci-fi elements. Not that there is anything wrong with that, of course.

I completely agree with you both about the casting and the soap opera issues, but the cast doesn't play out nearly as badly as I thought it would, based on looks alone. The show would probably have been received better if it had an overall better cast.

One thing to note is that the name of this show is Revolution. I never really thought about that name until now, but it seems pretty obvious that the alien people are planning a revolution over the people like Monroe.

lol...you really think they're aliens?

No. I don't know. Please don't let it be f***ing aliens!

Ice thing actually makes perfect sense for someone in his position. It just means that he has the power to have people go up to some cold climate with frozen lakes, cut blocks out of them, pack them in sawdust and then bring them back to him, like people did in pre-electricity days. I don't think it means he has power in so far as a USB device, but does show he possesses the other meaning of power.

You can make ice without electricity and without carting big blocks of it down from Alaska.

Not cheaply of course, but its entirely possible. I think the ice was meant to convey the difference in quality of life between those in the villages who are taxed in grain and merely dream of the days they could ice cream and those at the top of the militia power pyramid who get to have the basic luxuries we take for granted right now.

I also would be shocked if a future episode doesnt try and bridge the gap of knowledge on how a wholly mechanical internal combustion engine isnt being used (maybe it is but its so expensive only the mega powerful have them) and how steam isnt being used widespread (maybe it is, but only the mega powerful have them and use them for specific tasks we havent seen, transferring goods across the continent by steam train for example).

The show has a lot of minor questions it needs to answer somewhat quickly. I expect it will. But if you want to know why some electrical impulses in the body work you will likely be disappointed. Honestly I dont think the reasons why the blackout happened and how is even important to the story, it will drive the plot as Monroe tries to chase down the scoobies to get technology to work again but society reforming without technology is the more interesting part of the show for me.

Natural gas powered refrigerator. Like the old days.

scoobies?

Definitely gave me the Flash Forward, Event, Terra Nova vibe. This is a very bad omen Mostly though it was Flash Forwardish which was just ridiculously bad and I have a feeling this is gonna turn out similarly. I'll keep watching though until it totally pisses me off. I hope they pull it off but I am very skeptical.

I was intrigued by the premise, partly because I'm attracted to post-apocalyptic stories. But a world, even as shaky as the one perported in this pilot, still needs characters and a story. This is where the show fails. Perhaps the network's focus groups show that what viewers really want is a future where one clearly not badass guy can whup up on a dozen or two heavily armed men. Well, they didn't invite me to that focus group.

Pick up Peter Heller's new post-apoc book The Dog Stars -- it will give you more pleasure in a few pages than watching this tripe for the entire 12-episode life of the series, upon which it will fade into deserved obscurity.

This show isn't going to disappear in 12 episodes. It had very high ratings, and it's unlikely to fall incredibly far by the 12th episode, unless it ends up being about something stupid like aliens. If that's the ultimate plan, then it would be a very good idea for them to not reveal something like that until the season finale. This show likely has a The Walking Dead type connection with its audience. This is a very simple story, that no one will have to think about. That kind of story appeals to the average network TV watcher. I highly doubt it will retain anywhere near the ratings it had for the premiere, but I would be pretty shocked if it drops below a 2.5 in the 18-49 demo without an incredibly dumb twist.

In a one hour Pilot, you can't expect a huge amount of character development, and they've barely cracked the surface of the story. If anything, the lack of this development is a positive for the show, because they have had months to decide where they want the show to go, as opposed to boxing us into a very sh**y idea. The tablet is practically blank. They gave us some names, and showed us some faces, but there is literally nothing more than that in the Pilot. That will allow for a tremendous amount of story and character growth. I'm not saying it will happen, but it has a better chance than a lot of shows that give us unappealing characters, with unappealing stories, that we can't change, because of how the people were boxed in in the Pilot.

nunnehi,

You seem to like a crappy show. That's OK.

Not sure how "simple" it is. I mean, it's pretty ludicrous. No electricity? This defies the laws of nature. Lots of holes here. But even without electricity mankind got by for 1000's of years. It is relatively new in the big picture. How does lack of electricity cause buildings to crumble in 15 years? I loled at the fallen columns in the hotel

The more I think about what I watched the stupider and more ridculous it becomes. A far more interesting story would start and concentrate on the immediate time that the lights went out and not 15 years in the future. Of course we will get a dose of flashback but that isn't necessarily good either.

This show is not gonna work. Every other Lost clone has failed miserably and this will be no different. Lost was a freak accident and will never be replicated even though they keep trying.

The only good post apocaliptic show I can think of was Jericho and that had to beg for a second season and this show won't be as good as Jericho was.

This show takes the Discovery Channel series, Aftermath, and adds a dramascope syfy spin. Is it real, ffs of course not. Does it have to follow scientific canon, FFS OF COURSE NOT.

If the characters can get a toe hold it has a chance.

Building crumbled and stuff was broken because they were blown up and looted by people and militias in the subsequent resources war that would have wiped out 90% of the world's population in the following three months of the blackout.

And yeah, they are definitely going to show the events after the blackout in the show as a B story but for obvious reasons there is only so much they can show in the pilot.

this thread is maddening. why is everyone just assuming that they have all the answers already? i mean, ya, the pilot was just ok and theres a lot to explain, but you guys are just assuming you know what they're going to say and reacting to it.

like wtf? what if something else caused this? they (presumably) have an entire season to explain a ton of stuff that happened between the blackout and where they're at now 15 years later. if you hated the pilot and dont wanna watch thats fine. if you thought it was meh and think it has no chance of being good, thats fine too. but to assume you know everything in a show like this is kind of dumb and naive imo.

Actually, I've stated on numerous occasions that I think this show is mediocre. That means it's neither good, nor bad. I think there's a lot of room for improvement, but I don't know if that will happen. The ratings, on the other hand, are very very high. Will they stay as high as they currently are? Probably not. Was there anything in the Pilot that would turn off mainstream viewers? Absolutely not. Unless there's a dramatic dumb plot twist, like lolaliens, this show is very likely to get renewed, as long as it stays above a 2.5 in the 18-49 demo, and is still likely to get renewed at a 2.2. Next week's ratings are the most important in the series, and will be a lot more educational than this week's were. If the ratings had been low, this week, I wouldn't have thought anything about them, because of how long it's been available via other avenues. Seeing the massive ratings it had was absolutely noteworthy, for the same reason lower ratings would not have been.

I think it's absolutely ridiculous the level of nittery that is going on in this thread, first because it's a fantasy, and second, because they have shown us almost NOTHING about what has happened, or how the societies were built. It's insane to think that is not part of any writing canon on this show. People need to settle down and give it another week or two before all of the nitting comes out, as this wasn't the typical 2 hour Pilot you tend to see for shows like this. The believability of the show is atrocious, so far, but there are lots of ways they can begin to make some of the less believable stuff more convincing with probably just a little bit of research. There were months between the making of the Pilot and the second episode, so it's ridiculous to assume they haven't been fixing things that people find problematic, even though this is NBC.

The show is called Revolution, which I believe means the show is going to be a power struggle (no pun intended, but it was fun to write anyway). The people who have the power are probably living pretty large, while the people like in the colony our protagonists were from are not. The have nots are going to try to overthrow the haves is my guess. I think the jury is largely out on how good this show can be, but I certainly think it will be better than The Event, Terra Nova, and Falling Skies. That's a low bar.

mrbaseball, what I mean by simple is this. It's basically going to be a story of survival, coping, good vs. evil, and family. Any convolution is going to come from what the USB device is doing, and what caused the blackout. For the vast majority of viewers, the characters and their development will be what's important. This isn't a complicated whodunit, with millions of tiny mysteries that won't be answered. There are basically two big mysteries, and one small mystery at this point. The two big mysteries are what or who caused the blackout and what the USB device is, and the smaller mystery is who is Monroe and how did he get power? If they answer all of those questions, the show will be fine, as long as they don't answer them ridiculously (lolaliens). The show is on at 10pm, which means people have already turned their thinking caps off.