kansas

(S01E05) You know how NBC's Heroes does endings really well? Actually, they do everything really well, but their episode endings are particularly cool and intriguing.

Jericho is like that with their openings.

The power comes back on, and not only does an "Emergency Alert" sign come up on all televisions, but every home and business in Jericho gets a phone call from the Department of Homeland Security. It's a recording, telling them to stay where they are, help is on the way. This is an amazingly creepy, effective scene. You wonder if that's how it will be if anything like this really happens.

(S01E04) Is the bar in Jericho asking patrons to pay money for the food and drink they're consuming during this crisis? I ask that because in the opening scene of tonight's episode, the power goes out and the woman behind the bar tells everyone to go home. And I'm thinking, wait a second...the world might be coming to the end and the only comfort these small town citizens can find is with each other, and the bar is making them go home at 9:30? Shouldn't this bar be sort of a meeting place, since it has food and drink and a television?

(S01E03) "18 Hours After The Bombs."

That's sort of an odd phrase to use as an opening, "after the bombs." But I guess we know they were definitely bombs, and there were more than one. Sometimes I think we might be overthinking this show. Maybe we're supposed to understand that these were nuclear bombs directed at our cities, a war, and not (take your choice) an accident, aliens, a conspiracy, or something similar. I guess the mystery is in who did it, why, and how this small town will survive.

(S01E02) Can I first say that, even before I saw the title of tonight's episode, that I totally guessed it just from looking at the previews CBS has been showing? It was either very predictable or I had a Dionne Warwick Psychic Friends Network moment.

This second episode was good. This isn't groundbreaking television. It's really more like just an old-fashioned suspense drama, but so far it's working.

(S01E01) I think I can say without much hesitation that CBS is going for the Lost crowd here. An ongoing mystery involving a nuclear (?) explosion that happens outside of a small town, cutting off all communication between the small town and the outside world. What happened? Was it an accident, another country attacking the country, aliens? Something else completely? But a show like Lost, one that grabs the imagination and fan fervor at an incredible level, is a rare thing. Can Jericho do it too?

CBS has been heavily promoting this new drama (if you watched The U.S. Open, it was teased approximately 2000 times), and we gave our quick first impressions several weeks ago, but here's a little more about the show.

Basically, it's The Day After: The TV Show. A loner (Skeet Ulrich) goes back to his small hometown in Kansas, just to stay for the day, to finish some business, when some sort of nuclear (?) explosion happens in the distance, perhaps Denver. The town is completely cut off from the outside world. They can't communicate with anyone. But what worries is that one of the kids in the town was talking to his parents on the phone when the blast occurred. They were in Atlanta, and a blast happened there too. Or did it?