The Revolution pilot is online now...
- Thread starter Gotham Central
- Start date
I've been watching Revolution and somewhat enjoying it and I'm finally caught up. I think a problem I have with this show, amongst other things is the brutality of the Militia to prove a point that they are evil. It's citizens are bad and must be wiped out, and then you have Militia being the good guys with good families and all that stuff. I think it stems from a big problem in that I want to see this society after this blackout. I'm interested in the concept of human nature having to live without electricity and how they manage. To make the Militia the one dimensional villains seems counter productive to that goal.
I know it's early and I'm liking what I see but I really hope we get more fleshing out of the societal relationships and "what gives". How did this great divide happen, and it seems there are very few good people left. Also, the 15 year gap is still bothering me in that they could easily be telling this story with a shorter (Like a 2 or 3 year) gap. What the heck happened in 15 years to get society to be this way.
As for Charlie, I like her but I wonder what if they got a better actress. I think then she would have been a much better character than what we've seen so far. I'm optimistic she improves and hopefully as the season goes on, we will see that.
I know it's early and I'm liking what I see but I really hope we get more fleshing out of the societal relationships and "what gives". How did this great divide happen, and it seems there are very few good people left. Also, the 15 year gap is still bothering me in that they could easily be telling this story with a shorter (Like a 2 or 3 year) gap. What the heck happened in 15 years to get society to be this way.
As for Charlie, I like her but I wonder what if they got a better actress. I think then she would have been a much better character than what we've seen so far. I'm optimistic she improves and hopefully as the season goes on, we will see that.
Billy Burke is a bore. It's not the actor, I've seen him do other stuff. His Philip Stroh on The Closer was truly badass, as well as evil, and Burke earned complete conviction in the character. Antihero is a tired old cliche and about the only TV series to successfully spawn one is Breaking Bad.
David Lyons isn't bad either, but neither his Bass nor Monroe personas seem real. The main villain and the antihero being so dreary really hurts the show. Maybe they should retcon Bass and Miles as lovers and Bass turns into Evil Monroe when Miles leaves him? Desperate, but desperate measures are called for.
Incidentally, so far as nanotech handwaving for the black out goes? There isn't even a suggestion of what precisely nanotech is supposed to actually do to stop electric currents from flowing. Swarm in to make insulation? Discharge all currents? But where to? And wouldn't any of these make visible changes?
Also overlooked in nanotech marvels is the question of where the little buggers get their energy, deposit their wastes and obtain materials for the new ones they make. It would be very much as though there was a massive bacterial overgrowth. Or possibly it would be more like galloping mold? And they are supposed to have been able to break into every sealed battery on the planet! How? Tiny diamond drills? Sulfuric acid that somehow doesn't cause any visible damage? It's not like the nannites would know one already got into this battery, so that a single practically invisible hole is all the evidence left behind. They'll all bore in, however they do it, and damage the casings.
Lastly of course, the probability is that anyone using an oil lens microscope, which does not operate on electricity, would be able to see them, even if there wouldn't be enough magnification/resolution to reveal much about the structure.
Also, what wavelengths would the amulets us to send off signals to the nannites? The nannites are so small that that for each to receive a signal the wavelength would have to be at least in the UV range. Hey, look, Ben's necklace makes my jeans glow! That's a pretty high energy signal. But if the nannites clump to make a longer wavelenght signal receiver, again they are easily visible.
In a movie, you can ask these questions on the way home. But in a TV series, when you just ask yourself these questions during a commercial break, it makes a difference. The passage of a week can really make willing suspension of disbelief even tougher. I suppose the first resort of the scientifically illiterate, quantum woo, will eventually come to mouth.
Lastly, mileage may vary, but the insistence that only the most ruthless brutality could restore "order" and survival seems to me to be more an ideological assumption demanded by a reactionary world view, than a legitimate dramatic possibility.
David Lyons isn't bad either, but neither his Bass nor Monroe personas seem real. The main villain and the antihero being so dreary really hurts the show. Maybe they should retcon Bass and Miles as lovers and Bass turns into Evil Monroe when Miles leaves him? Desperate, but desperate measures are called for.
Incidentally, so far as nanotech handwaving for the black out goes? There isn't even a suggestion of what precisely nanotech is supposed to actually do to stop electric currents from flowing. Swarm in to make insulation? Discharge all currents? But where to? And wouldn't any of these make visible changes?
Also overlooked in nanotech marvels is the question of where the little buggers get their energy, deposit their wastes and obtain materials for the new ones they make. It would be very much as though there was a massive bacterial overgrowth. Or possibly it would be more like galloping mold? And they are supposed to have been able to break into every sealed battery on the planet! How? Tiny diamond drills? Sulfuric acid that somehow doesn't cause any visible damage? It's not like the nannites would know one already got into this battery, so that a single practically invisible hole is all the evidence left behind. They'll all bore in, however they do it, and damage the casings.
Lastly of course, the probability is that anyone using an oil lens microscope, which does not operate on electricity, would be able to see them, even if there wouldn't be enough magnification/resolution to reveal much about the structure.
Also, what wavelengths would the amulets us to send off signals to the nannites? The nannites are so small that that for each to receive a signal the wavelength would have to be at least in the UV range. Hey, look, Ben's necklace makes my jeans glow! That's a pretty high energy signal. But if the nannites clump to make a longer wavelenght signal receiver, again they are easily visible.
In a movie, you can ask these questions on the way home. But in a TV series, when you just ask yourself these questions during a commercial break, it makes a difference. The passage of a week can really make willing suspension of disbelief even tougher. I suppose the first resort of the scientifically illiterate, quantum woo, will eventually come to mouth.
Lastly, mileage may vary, but the insistence that only the most ruthless brutality could restore "order" and survival seems to me to be more an ideological assumption demanded by a reactionary world view, than a legitimate dramatic possibility.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
I just want to know what kind of bad ass batteries all these devices have. An iPhone and portable CD player that've held their charges for 15 years? Tiny little amulets that can produce a massive effect after (assumingly regular usage) during the same amount of time? A makeshift PC with no visible power supply?
i think thats why its called a science fiction show, lol. when i watch star trek, i don't wonder how they can scramble peoples' molecules from one place to another.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
Star Trek isn't set in the modern world using modern technology and extrapolating what happens when a single sci-fi element is introduced.
It's not handwaving. I don't believe for a second that any of this is scientifically plausible, which you'd know if you read my early posts in the thread. I'm simply seeking a possible mechanism that the producers and writers might use to explain the scenario on the show. Something which explains some of the conditions (while I agree raising numerous more questions and difficulties).
I'd have a more appropriate place to tell you to go were this another forum, but alas you limit your unpleasant behavior to these forums, so I can't. I think it's great that you manage to make assumptions and insults about people over TV shows and movies with such regularity. It really makes the threads so much more welcoming and enjoyable once you've arrived.
Are you completely incapable of watching a movie or TV show without imposing your social and political views on it or assuming that others are equally incapable? Just because I or anyone else here describe what THE CHARACTERS likely motives were for establishing the militia (as shown onscreen) doesn't mean we support those motives or think they are the right way to achieve those goals.
^^^Guilty conscience? The show's storyline is very much about the in-universe politics. The writers have clearly established that absolute murderous chaos instantly broke out and only the baddest asses like Miles and his Sith apprentice Bass were able to cope. This strikes me as nasty minded nonsense. I didn't know you were a writer on the show but since you are taking personal offense, you must be. Since this is your responsibility, shame on you. Also, you don't get to foist Lord of the Flies scenarios on people without them having the right to criticize it. Trying to pretend it's just some sort of character drama with meaningless premises more or less chosen randomly at an idle moment is absurd.
On the other hand, the impossibility of the nanotech explanations doesn't strike me as a reflection on the fans who thought the show might have thought of it, regardless of how rapidly they wither in the light of the commercial breaks. I also don't expect they will be responsible for the (sadly) probably inevitable chatter about quantum physics at some point.
Really, the only insulting thing was calling Billy Burke a bore, but that's only insulting the sense that any disagreement with another person's taste is "insulting." I suppose I should have been more tactful and said something like " Billy Burke doesn't inspire enthusiasm or even conviction, so it's kind of hard to care very much about what his character chooses to do.
On the other hand, the impossibility of the nanotech explanations doesn't strike me as a reflection on the fans who thought the show might have thought of it, regardless of how rapidly they wither in the light of the commercial breaks. I also don't expect they will be responsible for the (sadly) probably inevitable chatter about quantum physics at some point.
Really, the only insulting thing was calling Billy Burke a bore, but that's only insulting the sense that any disagreement with another person's taste is "insulting." I suppose I should have been more tactful and said something like " Billy Burke doesn't inspire enthusiasm or even conviction, so it's kind of hard to care very much about what his character chooses to do.
Funny, my PC has no visible power supply.
The show's storyline is, absolutely. I was talking about the speculation put forth by the people in this thread, however.
All of the issues you raised (nanotechnology, creating the militia to reestablish order) were things I mentioned in my previous posts. The showrunners have been deliberately vague and haven't mentioned anything about nanotechnology or any other "handwaving" mechanism behind the blackout as far as I am aware, so the criticism seemed directed at me specifically. If it was not, then I apologize for misreading your meaning.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
What, like the cord leading to the outlet? I wish I had a desktop PC that didn't need power.
The nanotech criticisms were not directed at you. For what it's worth, I've more or less assumed you are right in your guesses about what tack the writers will take. Perhaps I shouldn't criticize them ahead of time? I'm sort of thinking out loud about the show.
I am also aware that no one yet has actually endorsed the villains on the show. But I don't think that it makes much difference since the supposed moral issues are consequential to the premises. But since the premises are false (my thinking, any who differ will have to post their own views,) then all the choices faced by the characters are false. This makes them irrelevant, along with all criticism of them, both positive and negative.
Good news: It's very likely I will not watch Revolution after Monday's episode, so it is unlikely that there will be much more to post on. I can't resist one more unpleasantness before I go, which is that the grass is remarkably well trimmed in lots and lots of scenes. Given how rapidly the ivy has covered the walls, my guess is that this is merely good gardening, not the Postapocalyptic Ecology.
^^^Given the costs of set decoration, this one is kind of petty I suppose. But I'm so irritated by the notion that an army base commander would simply sit on his base and do nothing for two weeks I'm not feeling generous.
I just got caught up on this show. I disagree that six months is a long time for a society to disintegrate. You only need to look at hurricane season or something like hurricane Katrina to see that it would happen much more quickly. I have been much more surprised with how mild the scenes of the immediate post-tech world have been.
As for the batteries still working after fifteen years--I have an old Rio mp3 player from 2002 that still holds a charges enough to play for twenty to thirty minutes, and when plugged in still plays fine. I have no problem with all the electronics working for the brief amount of time they were on.
As for the batteries still working after fifteen years--I have an old Rio mp3 player from 2002 that still holds a charges enough to play for twenty to thirty minutes, and when plugged in still plays fine. I have no problem with all the electronics working for the brief amount of time they were on.
My point exactly. Did you get to view the PC on the show from every angle? Because the version of the show I saw never made that evident. Did we get to see every corner of that attic? no? hmmm, guess there could easily have been batteries powering the pc that we didn't see.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
We had a good enough view of it. We also had a really good view of the inexplicably archaic, CRT, monochrome monitor (where do you even find one of those anymore?!) she was using, too. We also saw an iPhone that managed to hold a full charge for over 15 years with apparently no data loss whatsoever. So I guess with that type of magic around, an also inexplicably hand made PC with an archaic CRT monochrome monitor powered by cookies and sparkly wishes isn't that absurd.
Not really. we only saw it from the front/top. We never saw the back nor did we even get a good look under the desk it was on.
Either way. how the PC was powered is one of the least problems with the magical blackout.
Mister Fandango
Fleet Captain
Maybe for you. But this and the magical effect the blackout had on every aircraft seen on the show (all of them losing all forward momentum and simultaneously entering a flat spin, which is incredibly rare in and of itself) are two of the bigger problems I've had with the show's premise.
Might I suggest that on the contrary Katrina is an excellent case that shows how notions of the mob instantly destroying everything is ideology, not fact, nor even reasonable speculation? Katrina was widely reported as a massive breakdown in law and order, with widespread looting and really gruesome horror stories, centered largely on the Superdome.
These dramatic anecdotes make a powerful impression. But that's exactly why you have to consciously articulate the bias of the mass media. The ideology in the Katrina case was of course racism, but there was also the government interest in distracting attention from its failure to take action even to properly evacuate the neighborhoods threatened.
Given these imperatives, the news media which have internalized the official ideology and have been deliberately structured to be "responsible" (i.e., confirm, not contest) embarked on a carnival of racist slander. Shots fired to attract the help of rescuers were instantly promoted into deliberate mad dog assaults.
Looting was the story when the public interest meant the important story was the indifference of the government to the people's welfare, as opposed to the oil refineries' welfare. Not even the networks could completely ignore this, especially when the loathesome president went out of his way to praise the obviously inadequate efforts. But how many national news reports investigated why school buses were not used in evacuations instead of what particular kind of merchandise people took from a doomed Wal-Mart?
Outright fabrications about the Superdome were lovingly detailed with lascivious delight. Those stories were so appallingly vivid that the movie Sarah's Key compared the Superdome to one phase of a Nazi roundup of Jews in Paris in 1942! Nonetheless the absence of lurid trials for the alleged rapesand other violence should powerfully suggest to all but the most die hard racists that there was something horribly wrong with the reporting. In particular, the discovery that the worst atrocity in Katrina was in fact a relatively well to do white neighborhood spawning a vigilante group that murdered African Americans trying to escape through "their" neighborhood.
No, I think Katrina is instead a powerful lesson that racism and other ideologies slandering the mass of the people on behalf of the rulers, who prize the order protecting their property above all else are alive and well. The belief that humans will devolve into an instant mob when or if the powers that be lose their grip is reactionary, even if the lovable capitalists on DS9 thought so.
When the news media reported on Haiti, where they were foreigners unable to dominate all reportage, they were so consumed with their vulgar racism and backwardness they were baffled at their inability to find real instances of the anarchy their bigoted ideas predicted. It was much easier when they had an effective monopoly on the news, and their government was providing all the official information! In the end, they resorted to claiming the US invasion was a humanitarian mission instead.
Again, the sequel is never as vivid as an anecdote. The US has arranged to prevent the largest political party from running a candidate in the presidential election, making the current president a puppet responsible to his foreign masters instead of a democratic leader chosen by a free and fair election.
The terrain Revolution is plowing is well manured, but I think it just stinks.
So, "all" in this context is based on a known set of one crash seen on screen?
stj, the key phrase in your post is "I think". It is all well and good that you have your personal opinions about the human condition, but it is conjecture. Revolution is speculative fiction, and as such its premise is just as valid as any other story in the genre.
The writers could just as easily have written the same plot and then set the characters in a Little Town on the Prairie or Gunsmoke setting, but then it would have been a different story.
You cannot just say a fantasy/sf story or novel is no good because you don't agree with a premise that can neither be proven or dis-proven.
The writers could just as easily have written the same plot and then set the characters in a Little Town on the Prairie or Gunsmoke setting, but then it would have been a different story.
You cannot just say a fantasy/sf story or novel is no good because you don't agree with a premise that can neither be proven or dis-proven.
