Revolution

New series from JJ Abrams.

This gives me physics-rage. There's no explanation for such an event without just invoking Clarke's Third Law. If the blackout melted long conductors like an EMP blast (unshielded), scientists would start over using advance knowledge to construct computers from simple components, and then work up. However, this is not the case, as we see a man using a pre-blackout computer at the end of the trailer. The data chip from the first scene apparently holds a magical power source... that it downloaded from the internet.

The narration says that batteries, turbines, and motors no longer work. There is, energetically, no difference between shooting a musket shooting a rifle, and running a gas motor, so we can't say the blackout stopped all highly energetic reactions like in the Emberverse.

Basically, there is no consistent, reasonable explanation for all of these things to happen. Either gunpowder works AND gasoline along with it, or neither do. Either all old technology was fried by the blast, or it's all fine and the current just can't flow (in which case all life would die). The trailer contradicts itself three times over already, at least.

Did I mention that the acting is kind of embarrassing? No? Well it is. On the other hand, it is JJ Abrams, so maybe it'll be great.

edited 14th May '12 3:46:55 PM by Jergling

Isn't Eric Kripke of Supernatural involved in this?

Also I'll watch some of it just to see where it goes. It actually looks good.

edited 14th May '12 4:41:00 PM by zam

I saw a trailer for this while looking up a trailer for Prometheus. It looks.....

AWESOME!

edited 14th May '12 6:55:53 PM by TheStarshipMaxima

MST3K Mantra, my friend. That and Rule of Cool.

I think it's an interesting setting, and I've liked the other Abrams work I've seen (those being Star Trek and Super 8). The involvement of Jon Favreau is also a plus for me.

edited 14th May '12 7:03:59 PM by Mort08

Jon Favreau is part of this? Guess I'll have to check it out.

I hope this doesn't go the way of Awake and just become another NBC drama that only lasts a season before being cancelled.

I'm definitely watching this when it comes out. It looks SO good and gets the imagination juices flowing. I do echo Shadow Scythe in hoping it doesn't just last one season and then die, though and to the top poster, don't overanalyze or you'll ruin it for yourself. Willing Suspension of Disbelief.

How have the characters been able to get that dental work done in the post-apocalypse? Seriously.

I'm loving the setting. It's got character. These guys? Mostly not.

Personally I'm trying to figure out that backwards crossbow. (Take a good look at it: The limbs are inverted on it.) I honestly can't figure out how it's supposed to work unless she's supposed to intentionally shoot herself through the shoulder every time she fires it.)

Yeah the seventh episode was somewhat painful to watch. I just can't take the whole cast celebrating killing a man, how ever bad.

I don't mind people being happy about the world being Osamaless, it's just that the whole legality of the event is questionable and it seems like a breach of basic human rights (even if the target has himself breached them, that doesn't mean we can throw them out the window when dealing with him in return) that throwing a big party on top of all it seems offensive and no one in the cast questions this.

Anyway, I suppose now I know how people who don't agree with Sorkin on most issues feel like when they watch his shows.

I believe you're in the wrong thread.

I like Abrams, but I think the premise of this show is too unscientific for me to deal with. You can't just say "machinery doesn't work anymore, just because". It makes no sense.

This is the man who said that you can destroy a planet with red.

Maybe the answer will come forth over time. That's what story arcs are for after all.

No, it's just that science doesn't work that way. A gun, for example, is just a bunch of mechanical parts. The machines that produce electricity (e.g., a hydroelectric dam) are also just a bunch of interacting parts. They follow the same basic physical laws as everything else. You can't just arbitrarily say "all these unrelated things stopped working at the same time".

Well, you can, but people who find a minimum level of scientific plausibility necessary for enjoying speculative fiction won't watch it.

Wait, so JJ Abrams is making another TV show that doesn't make sense? Sometimes I get the feeling that he has a psychological block that prevents him from making a straightforward TV show.

I almost thought Magic Time when I heard the basic premise.

Were there any guns in the trailer? For all we know, they might not be working either.

(When I described the show to a friend of mine, he referred to what it sounded like as a "Dies the Fire" event, apparently named after a SF novel.)

I thought the dad gets shot in the trailer? Or was that an arrow?

On that note: that trailer is a spoiler for the entire pilot. The end is the cliffhanger.

edited 12th Aug '12 9:20:47 PM by occono

You do see an old fashioned hunting rifle griefly and tyeah the father gets shot with it. Looks like mostly bows as distance weapons though.

And yes, highly reccomend the Emberverse books, the first of which is titled Dies The Fire in which an even more extreme version of this happens. Gunpowder doesn't work, nor does steam power.

When I first heard about this show months ago, I saw it presented in at least one place/article/whatever (can't remember where) as a direct Emberverse adaptation. I bought Dies the Fire and I'm about halfway through it. But anyway, now whenever I look at any material having to do with this show, there is absolutely no mention of Stirling or the Emberverse anywhere.

I guess Kripke (who, by the way, is the actual creator for this, not Abrams, I describe it to people as a Kripke creation rather than "the next J.J. Abrams show" or whatever) decided to mess with the Change a bit. Perhaps the whole idea of not even having gunpowder didn't go over well with someone making the decisions. But I'm telling you, I'm pretty sure what I saw back earlier in the summer is accurate: This is an Emberverse adaptation with changes, not some sort of rip-off or copy. I mean, don't you think Stirling would take legal action against NBC and Kripke if they were copying his basic premise without asking him first? Having gunpowder work is not enough of a change to make something lawsuit-proof, IMO.

So that said, I have no idea why they're not crediting him. But now the Wikipedia article is namedropping other series/books, including one called Ariel that predates the Emberverse by about 20 years, went out of print, and his since been reprinted several times. It too involves a "Change" (yes, exact same name) basically identical to Stirling's, except it also creates supernatural creatures and is set in the southeast instead of the northwest. I'd never heard of it, and now I'm wondering how Stirling could have written something so similar without anyone seeming to notice, or without getting himself sued!

Needless to say this is all very confusing...but I'm still very excited for this show.

AFAIK There's no connection netween this show and the Emberverse except what fans of the latter are creating in their heads. The only similarity is that civilaztion collapses after the power goes out worldwide. However in the Emberverse even steam power and gonpowder don't work. Don't know about steam in Revolution and the trailer has a gun being fired although apparently most people use bows.

I'm wondering if Technology Goes Away has enough examples to form a counter trope to the magical equivalent.

This sounds more like something supernatural at work rather than technological, or some form of super-science that would make the whole thing sound ridiculous if they're trying to go for the realistic explanation.

edited 23rd Aug '12 6:23:51 PM by VicGeorge2011

From the trailer I'm going to go with a combination of Weird Science and Hollywood Science.

edited 24th Aug '12 5:11:15 AM by tricksterson

It's mentioned above and I'm wondering about as I watch the first episode, so here comes the question: How do batteries stop working just because the power went out? Don't they have an internal power source?