Monday, April 13, 2020

Survivors closing remarks

At the end of series 1 I was in two minds about whether to carry on watching because I didn't think the show would be much good without Abby. But Charles stepped into the gap - he was equally interesting because he had more flaws and inner conflicts. I actually began fancying him in series 3, up till then only Greg had held my attention in that way.

Jenny develops quite well. I do like the ways she's become hardened without ceasing to be herself. In 1.3 she can't bring herself to use the gun outside the supermarket, during series 2 John reports that 'Jenny fell over' when she fired a gun, but by series 3 she's unhesitatingly opening fire at Col Clifford's men and telling Charles 'shoot it in the eyes' when they find the trapped pig.

Put it this way, if I'd wandered up to one of the settlements and joined them, I'd take care not to let Jenny see that I found Greg attractive. I don't want to get shot in the eyes.

Series 2 was good, I liked the Whitecross ensemble but they didn't make enough of Ruth, and it trailed off a bit towards the end before reviving with Over The Hills and then the astonishing appearance of the balloon.

Series 3 I found very disappointing and badly connected. There were one or two good episodes in there, and the conclusion was - adequate. I have been much worse pleased with the final episodes of things.

What did impress me was that they managed to keep me with them even though the theme had changed. In series 1 it was mainly about the breakdown, the aftermath, scavenging and foraging. And when I got to the end of series 1 I said that that was what interested me and I'd been less engaged by the self-sufficiency theme which is beginning to emerge.

But I did get engaged by that theme in series 2. By the time we got to the end I wanted to stay with Whitecross and see them make it succeed. And I didn't really want to buy into the emerging theme about reconnecting communities and restarting technological civilisation and preventing malign forces from seizing control of it.

Yet again though they managed to engage me - though with less success this time, series 3 was much less cohesive than the other two, some of the episodes had very little connection to the main arc at all.

I only started watching this because I was trying to deal with the start of the coronavirus crisis. I'm glad I did, it's been a transformative experience which has helped me to face up to my fears. Thank you, survivors.

Survivors - 3.12 Power

The survivors reach Scotland, and we learn some startling things about what's been happening north of the border. The death ratio is only 90% (500 times lower than in England) so the Scots now outnumber the English 15:1.

Basically Charles and Macallister, the 'laird', argue back and forth about who owns the hydroelectric power, and about whether this is really the time for nationalism, while evil Sam from ep 3.9 tries to sabotage the whole project. Alec is disheartened by the nationalist quarrelling, but Jenny argues that, while bare survival was endurable when it was the only option, it won't be if they know they needn't be living that way. 'Let there be light,' says Alec as he pulls the big switch.

The closing scene shows Macallister and his chatelaine turning off their dining room lights and sitting down to dine by candlelight. I suppose the moral is that their experiences have taught them that, while they've got electricity again, they needn't be dependent on it. But of course it's all right for them. They live in a stately home with people bringing them, as Macallister says, salmon and whisky and oatcakes. I bet they haven't spent the last 3 years living in cars and looting supermarkets and struggling to raise crops and making soap out of mutton fat and dying from flu. If that's how I'd spent the last 3 years, I think I'd keep the lights on while I ate.

The writer has a lot of fun with the Scotland/England scenario. Charles accuses Macallister of planning to hold the English to ransom, and he replies 'How could you afford a ransom?'. Later Macallister says he'll consider Charles as his Secretary of State for England.

Jenny gets to dress up nicely again, and wash her hair, disconcerting Hubert with her new appearance.

Macallister exposits that the Scottish islands weren't affected by the plague at all. Though of course the idea of plague-free pockets of civilisation was raised and dismissed in ep 1.5 - the premise then was that if any of the survivors visited such a pocket, they'd give everyone there the plague. But we're a long way from Terry Nation's ideas now.

Jenny inexplicably chooses not to come and live in Scotland. What's the matter with her? After my remarks about the previous episode, it's oddly fitting that Survivors ends by holding up Scotland as the promised land.

Sunday, April 12, 2020

Survivors - 3.11 Long Live The King

A lot has been happening since the previous episode. After some initial manoeuvring we discover Agnes in paramilitary uniform hoping to set up a currency and national council in Greg's name. As Agnes points out, it doesn't matter whether the currency is really backed by a million gallons of petrol any more than whether it mattered the Bank of England could have really paid out everyone who held its notes. For a fiat currency to work, people just need to believe in it.

And bringing forward the currency first is a clever writing move, because it prepares for the larger step that, because people met Greg in the past and trusted him, it doesn't matter whether he's still alive or not, which is good because he is revealed to be dead, though that wasn't difficult to guess from the beginning.

The bombastic GP posters and badges, and the flag with GP on it, are quite clever too, they seem very ridiculous, but they're meant to be over the top, they're deliberate propaganda to create a self-fulfilling prophecy of stability.

The world was ravaged by the plague and since then the survivors have coped with typhoid and flu and smallpox. But they also appear to be extraordinary susceptible to fascism, this must be the 5th or 6th time we've had people calling for order and strong leadership (from them). I think it's a bit cheap to push all this onto Agnes just because she's blonde and Nordic.

The Captain (namechecked in the previous ep) is in this to show us that one danger of order and strong leadership is that they can be hijacked by gangsters. But in person he doesn't present the threat that he should. Why is he up and walking around if he's had smallpox for weeks anyway? Remember how ill Dr Adams was at that stage. And no-one reacts with alarm to his pustules.

Jenny has some metatextual lines. 'I'm sick and tired of these everlasting changes of plan. It's always the same' and 'Greg isn't here. Again.' She's as fed up with series 3 as we are.

There's a freeze frame when the episode title caption comes up shortly after the start. That hasn't been done before - though the delay between the start of the episodes and the caption has been very variable, it takes over a minute in some cases.

Some of these themes are to be found in David Brin's 1985 novel The Postman, in which a post-apocalyptic wanderer puts on a discarded US Postal Service uniform and finds he's accidentally created a self-fulfilling prophecy of restored order. Don't watch the film of it though, it's shit.

'We're supposed to be going to Scotland, aren't we.' It's interesting that - the coronavirus having delayed my own plans to head north - I should have found myself having second thoughts about going after seeing the English countryside so much on display in Survivors. And even more interesting that as series 3 comes to an end, my resolve should return when I find one of the subplots is about a quest to reach Scotland.

Dating: Charles says that Agnes last reported seeing Greg 'weeks ago'. Possibly referring to the events of the previous ep.

Survivors - 3.10 The Last Laugh

Really harrowing episode in three acts. Firstly a series of misdirections regarding the true nature of Mason and his friends, and what was going on with Dr Adams. Then the conversation Greg has with Adams about death, which succeeded in making me cry real tears. Then Greg's plan to lure Mason into being infected, which requires him to shower abuse on his friends. My notes here just say 'Fucking hell Greg.'

Greg does give his friends two clues to what's happening, though; the Norwegian phrase he says to Agnes, which she explains, and the one about following in the footsteps of Paul, which Jack misinterprets. Greg means Paul Pitman not St Paul.

I'd spoilered myself on Greg catching smallpox, but I didn't see it coming in this episode. I'm really sorry he's dying, I've come to feel a great affection for him over the last 34 episodes. McCulloch really succeeds in selling me him. I wasn't sure what to make of him at first, wisecracking to his dead wife about how he thought she'd stay alive just to spite him, but he doesn't put a foot wrong after that, everything he does I find believable and admirable.

Resisting Anne's blandishments, accepting Abby as titular 'boss' provided he can get on with the tech stuff, being there for Abby and Jenny during that first winter, drawing his execution straw in Law and Order, dealing with the guilt afterwards without complaining, being the family man with Jenny and Lizzie and John and baby Paul. Rest in power Greg.

That's a good line Dr Adams has about if you're afraid of death, think of how you'd like to die, then pray for it to happen that way. I'm a hoper, not a pray-er, but I'll try that. Goodness knows I need it at the moment.

At least Greg gets to drink coffee again one more time. I think I'd miss coffee more than alcohol after the apocalypse. Carrot tea indeed.

Dating: Adams speaks of winter coming, but I suppose he might mean the previous year.

Survivors - 3.9 The Enemy

For the first time on their travels our friends come to the equivalent of an inn. It's kind of nice to see Charles standing by the coal fire in the bar, doubtless remembering pre-collapse pub visits. 'Iechyd da,' he says authentically when served a fresh pint.

But he goes on to try to manipulate Jenny into sleeping with Alec so that he'll stay and fix the locals' generator. The argument they have about Greg while playing bar billiards was surreal, I thought maybe Charles was hallucinating, or perhaps I was. Jenny ends up shockingly calling him a Welsh bastard in front of everyone. I wonder, would he have had her thrown out of Whitecross if she'd said that while they were there.

Mind you, they're all at it - Charles refers to Alec as MacSporran and we learn that Jenny has been making Tartan Army references.

Sam the ex-junkie, saved by the plague is an interesting character. First he's just painted as very right-wing, then he turns out to be resentful and mad, intent on sabotaging the hydroelectric mission. The first time we've had a sort of anti-survivor plot.

It's a splendid moment when the generator starts and the light-bulb comes on. At the end the pithead wheels are turning again. But that made me think of the last line of the last of the Changes books - 'And the air would soon be reeking of petrol.'

Sam uses the same expression 'US' (unserviceable?) that Winser does in Claws of Axos.

Jenny comes in to nurse Frank and asks him how he's feeling. 'Is that a proposition?' he asks. As Adrian Mole said of Bert Baxter once, 'sometimes he is just a dirty old man who doesn't deserve visitors.'

Dating: Charles says it was last month that Jenny was back at Challenor. Does he mean in 3.6? Did they go back there after the half-way meeting, or is he referring to an off-screen visit between episodes?

He also says it's been 3 years [since the plague]. He probably means this is the third calendar year since it happened.

Survivors - 3.8 Sparks

I didn't like this episode very much. It's the first one that I've decided I won't bother to re-watch. The dear old fascist lady is a bit of a hard sell for me I'm afraid.

Jenny is the best thing in it, having to deal with Frank manipulating her into impersonating Alec's wife to get him through drug-induced emotional catharsis. Alec being the guilt-ridden electrical engineer who they set off to find at the end of the last ep. I wish they'd done more 'angry Jenny' scenes in the earlier series. Mind you, she had her stroppy moments in series 1, arguing with Dr Tyler in ep 1 and kicking the boxes around in ep 2.

I love it when any of the survivors eat out in the open with a knife in one hand, I think it must be some kind of latent class resentment of my own coming to the surface, seeing people like them forced into such uncouth behaviour.

First cat in Survivors I think. Charles opined in 1.4 that they were all dead.

Alec is the 4th Scottish survivor. 'What's wrong with Scotland?' What indeed.

Dating: they met Brod 'a couple of months ago' so it can't be March any more, thank god, it must be May. But then it's already been May in 3.5.

Survivors - 3.7 The Peacemaker

Jenny said that she wouldn't leave Paul again. Yet here she is roaming round the countryside again with Charles and Hubert. I thought for a moment I'd got the episodes in the wrong order.

It's a good episode this though, lots of cunning misdirection before we find out what's really going on at the mill. Who's the evil one? Is it surly Henry, saintly-seeming Frank, or Rutna with her sitar cue? The twist is that it's none of them and nothing sinister is happening, rather like in ep 3.1. Henry's display of peacemaking with the gunmen is quite impressive.

There's another good reveal too, that Frank has a pacemaker which might give out at any time. It's a good post-apocalyptic plot idea, but it's a terrible pun with 'peacemaker'. Do you think it was deliberate?

Hubert's back on comic relief as he gets to literally roll in the hay with Blossom.

'Contains strong language reflecting attitudes of the time' - Hubert drops 'wog' and 'darkie' twice each. On the other hand, Blossom exposits about Asian women being targeted during the initial plague panic, for supposedly bringing the plague here. Surely such a thing would never happen...

The sitar cue. On one occasion we see her actually playing a sitar, but on two others it's definitely non-diegetic. Which is the first use of incidental music so far, unless you count the times when they bring up the closing theme early.

Charles has trouble recognising the aroma of curry because he's forgotten about it. Nice.

A third Scottish person has survived the apocalypse.

Dating: it's 9 months since Greg left, so in theory it's still March. Pet does have a woolly hat and gloves on when she's using the phone. But it's been a busy March for the survivors if that's still the month.

Survivors - 3.6 Reunion

Interesting bit at the beginning of this ep where, just for a moment, it looks like Charles doesn't want them to bother rescuing Hubert's friend. Which is possibly why Hubert is later talking about how people are still 'behaving as if they had money.' He does get further elevated out of the comic relief category in this ep, which is good, it was a bit uncomfortable having him grousing but being useful in the background all the time.

Good to see Jack and Pet again, I was beginning to wonder if we ever would. The plan for them to drive out and meet the others had me clutching my head though, don't these people ever learn?

To make up for the continued Greg teasing, we're given the reunion between John and his mother. I did like the scene where they arrive back at his old home, and all our friends who've been looking after him for the last couple of years are watching anxiously to see how he reacts. 'Where's my pony?'

Janet has beautifully manicured nails for a post-apocalyptic vet.

Jenny finally mentions her baby Paul again. And indeed is reunited with him.

Dating: there are daffodils on the table at Challenor, so the suggestion is that it's still March or April. But really more time must have passed than that, to accommodate the action since ep 3.3. Btw I'm not and haven't been drawing any clues from the weather and foliage seen on location, because obviously they can't choose those, whereas of course the table flowers are a different matter.

John was due home from his granny's the day after the foot and mouth disease broke out at home, and the foot and mouth was a month before the plague. He was at prep school so that day must have been during the holidays, and at least a few days before term started, perhaps longer. Private schools have slightly later term starts than normal ones, but the autumn term would probably still have started in the first half of September, so the plague would have been in the first half of October. Unless he was away for half term, which would put it at the end of November. But I think that's less likely. You wouldn't send a kid miles away to his grandmother's, and also plan time at home for him afterwards, with just a week to play with. So on that basis the date when ep 1.1 starts might be Mon Oct 6 or 13. That's 2-3 weeks earlier than the earliest possibility suggested by almost the other clues so far.

Furthermore. Janet talks about her horse show activities in 1973. So obviously the plague must have been no earlier than 1973. I get the idea that the production team thought the plague was in 1974, but I'm sticking to 1975 because the autumn outbreak of the plague would then have been in the future when series 1 was broadcast in April.

Saturday, April 11, 2020

Survivors - 3.5 Bridgehead

There are three main kinds of Survivors ep:
  1. Aberrant settlement of the week/extrication
  2. Trouble at their own settlement
  3. World-building
and this is a world-building one. Not much happens but people have conversations in picturesque places that tell you more about the survivors' world.

Basically Charles has a rare success in successfully managing to hold a market day where people trade their surpluses. And we get teased yet again with the prospect of Greg returning.

I haven't encountered so many railway references in SF since I read Colin Kapp's The Railways Up On Cannis as a kid.

I've realised what's bothering me about Edith and her sons - up to now I don't think any of the survivors have been related to one another. Charles said in 1.4 that it hadn't happened in his experience. But here we have 4 members of the same family still alive. That was kind of the point of the show for me, that it was about disparate people randomly thrown together and forming bonds, not just a post-apocalyptic The Waltons.

Jenny has displayed a remarkable absence of concern about baby Paul in this series, it's almost as if she and the writers have forgotten he ever existed. I suppose we are to assume that he and John and Lizzie 2 are still being looked after by Pet.

Dating: Brother Tom left the farm 3 months ago, and ISTR in 3.3 he'd left a month ago, so it must now be round about May 1978.

Survivors - 3.4 Mad Dog

Excellent episode. Richard Fenton PhD saves Charles from a pack of dogs, one of which may or may not have given Charles rabies. He and Fenton have an interesting discussion over the next two days, some of it on horseback in a snowstorm - continuing the Game of Thrones theme. Charles' drive to rebuild versus Fenton's nihilism. This is really good, because you can see Fenton is getting to him. Charles must have had many moments of secret doubt that his dreams were achievable.

Then there's a sudden key change where Fenton develops rabies and has to be shot by his neighbours, who then turn on Charles and hunt him across country in order to kill him before he becomes contagious. Gripping stuff. And then in possibly the most unexpected twist so far, Charles escapes by steam train, morale restored. 'Steam for survival!'

I've seen this criticised online, and I bet it wouldn't have happened if Terry Nation had stayed in charge, but it's not beyond the realm of possibility for people to be able to get a steam engine working on a preserved railway.

Lovely shot of the sunset through the window of the empty 'halfway house' as Charles and Fenton arrive.

Another voiceover when Charles is reading Fenton's notes.

Fenton has the last Times ever printed - 'inflation reaches 28%'.

'Since when do people shake hands?' - not in the last 3 weeks...

Survivors - 3.3 Law of the Jungle

One of the two classic patterns for Survivors episodes is for our friends to get into a sticky situation with the aberrant settlement of the week, and then to extricate themselves, with varying degrees of difficulty. This is one of the stickiest, as villain of the week Brod is more determined than usual for them not to escape.

Charles describes him as 'like a robber baron from a fairy tale' and there's something weirdly Game of Thrones about him and the way he's corrupted Edith's two sons. Luckily for the survivors, he's also got a massive class-based chip on his shoulder which impairs his judgement, and if that wasn't bad enough, he's also impotent. Jenny goes about to seduce him. 'I have to pretend to fancy him,' she explains earnestly to Charles.

Hubert - who isn't one of the targets of Brod's class issues - elevates himself out of the comic relief category by cutting the Gordian knot: he shoots him and pretends it was an accident.

Jenny's experiences seem to have hardened her: she shot that man in 3.1, and in this one she peremptorily tells Charles to kill the trapped pig. 'With a shotgun?' he asks. 'Shoot it through the eyes!' she says impatiently. I don't like seeing Brod hit her though.

Brian Blessed is great as Brod - there are some odd shifts of tone in the episode, but Blessed makes them seem plausible. Like when Brod suddenly starts ranting about his wife running away with a tax inspector. They're literally on a train to nowhere after the apocalypse, and what's bothering him is her fancy man's job.

Road signs being used as archery targets. Very Threads.

The feral dogs in series 3 are a much more convincing threat than the ones in series 1.

Copy of Middlemarch treasured by Edith. Poignant.

Geography: Charles repeats the thing from series 2 about their settlement being in the West Country. A search shows that that term is sometimes meant to include Herefordshire.

Dating: it's 8 months since Jenny last saw Greg, so it's now approximately March 1978. (As previously, we don't know what the year is, but for brevity's sake I'm continuing to assume the plague struck in late 1975).

Survivors - 3.2 A Little Learning

Another bubble episode that doesn't progress the main story, apart from the teases about whether Jenny and Greg will actually meet up. When she kept missing Abby in 1.1 and 1.2 I cared, but I don't care about this, because it's being played for laughs.

The self-sufficient group of kids is a familiar trope but their leader Eagle's powerful Glaswegian manner makes it work. With Nessie the nurse in Lights of London, that's two Scottish people who've survived the plague. Greg's initial scene with the kids is good, both funny and sinister.

The two traders are played half the time as vicious, hardened rogues and the other half as mere cheeky chappies, the inconsistent tone makes it hard to believe in them. One of them's doing a really odd posh 40s accent. Also the plan to get Jenny to stay by telling her that Greg is having it off with Agnes is beyond tedious. You're writing about people after the collapse of civilisation and that's the story you want to tell?

The last 5 minutes are really strange, first the sudden raising and dismissal of the minefields, and then the surreal appearance of a wandering elephant.

One good moment though, where Greg has just euthanased Libbie and he tells Eagle that she died in her sleep - and then discovers that she was Eagle's sister.

Couple of unusual references to pre-plague culture - the kids sing Yellow Submarine, and also Greg pointedly remarks that they should have watched fewer violent films and more BBC2.

Survivors - 3.1 Manhunt

Very confusing episode as the survivors and we are led to be very suspicious of Miedel and his drug manufacturing operation, only to have Colonel Clifford explain everything at the end. The skeleton is plastic and Miedel is a kindly man who fled from the Nazis in 1936.

The moral seems to be that Charles was wrong to be suspicious, but one can hardly blame him given his experiences at the hands of all the various people who've tried to exploit him and his friends.

The bit where Jenny, not being party to the explanation, shoots one of Clifford's men was shocking, I thought the episode was about to take a very dark turn, but the dead (?) man's colleagues are kind enough to overlook the matter.

Good to see Greg's phone idea in operation, even if we don't see Greg.

The settlement is said to have moved (as proposed in the previous series) but then later it appears that some of them are still at Whitecross. Lizzie has regenerated.

Dating: 6 months have passed, so it's January 1978 approximately.

Friday, April 10, 2020

Survivors - 2.13 New World

The survivors' amazed reaction to the appearance of the hot-air balloon is beautifully done. Imagine having resigned yourself to a lifetime of making soap, and then suddenly seeing something that might mean you were wrong after all. You would indeed just stare at it with a wild surmise.

Not everyone reacts positively to the idea though. Pet has learnt the lesson of self-sufficiency all too well, she's afraid of being let down by civilisation again. And she doesn't welcome the prospect of civilisation being restored in a disciplined Nordic way. I must say part of me agrees with her, if I'd got used to living without government and money I probably wouldn't want them back. Then again, what happens when they run out of needles and repairable tools and wellingtons?

Charles and Jack have a conversation that also makes these two opposing points. 'I've never considered myself a drop-out,' says Charles. I suppose people would retain some of their basic political outlook after society collapsed, even when there was no politics to attach it to. (Though he has previously been shown to have been very into self-sufficiency well before the plague. I suppose drop-out is one of those irregular verbs: I am going my own way, you are eccentric, they are a drop-out.)

This is though, if you'll excuse the expression, quite an uplifting episode. For once they're sufficiently well-supplied from their own hard work to have the leisure to sit and debate the future direction society should take.

Charles is getting a lot more Welsh as the episodes go by. Especially in that bit where he's talking about the South Wales coalfield.

I haven't just been interested in chronology btw, but also geography. Greg says in Lights of London that Whitecross is in the West Country, but perhaps that was deliberate obfuscation, because I'd already twigged it was near the Welsh borders somewhere. Now, in this episode it's said to be 4-5 hours by balloon from Hereford. Balloon flight is feasible in winds of between 4-10mph, so it must be 16-50 miles from Hereford. And on the day the balloon arrived Greg said the wind was westerly, so it must be east of Hereford. But, Alan and Melanie expect to cross the Wye on their way to Chipping Campden, and there is nowhere that far east of Hereford and west of the Wye. The best match is the big loop of the Wye near Foy, and even that is barely 9 miles from Hereford.

Dating: haymaking is still in progress, I think it can't be very long since the previous ep, late June or July.

Updated to say: I gather that some people consider the 'West Country' to include Herefordshire, so maybe Greg was speaking truthfully. To me though the West Country doesn't extend north of the Severn.

Survivors - 2.12 Over The Hills

Having barely referred to gender up to now, Survivors tackles it full-on with this fascinating episode centring around newcomer Sally's getting pregnant. On hearing the news Charles immediately reverts to his old self as seen in ep 1.4. I say reverts, but it becomes clear during the story that he hadn't changed as much as we thought; the reason he and Greg haven't married their partners is because he doesn't want to give moral endorsement to the idea that the women should have children with only one man.

But we're shown that the women have other ideas. Charles - having innocently remarked earlier that it's surprising that more of them haven't got pregnant - is aghast to find out that they've been asking Ruth to come up with a reliable method of contraception. When he objects, she defies him and says she isn't going to assist in putting women back into their historical box.

We also learn that Jenny has stopped having sex with Greg because she doesn't want to have another child. And that Pet's periods are still regular. We learn more about the inner lives of the women survivors, as women, in this ep than we have in all the previous ones put together.

Charles still can't be dissuaded from holding a conception party for Sally. Greg plays the 'Keep on going' song from ep 1.4 again. But the occasion ends just as badly as the last party they had. Sally miscarries, and Charles and Pet have a long sad conversation about their relationship. Charles gets thoroughly schooled in this episode.

The episode ends on a hopeful note though with Greg finally getting the methane-powered engine going.

The 'pockets of civilisation' idea from ep 1.5 and Lights of London is raised again, and dismissed again. I suspect we're being prepared for new developments here.

Greg seen using a slide rule. Handy thing to have post-apocalypse, no batteries.

Christmas mentioned for the first time. I expect they had a Christmas celebration at the series 1 house. Imagine that. Survivors Christmas special.

At the start of the ep Charles is surprised by the idea of a methane-powered tractor. And yet he was talking to Greg about it in the previous ep.

Dating: the party is on Midsummer Day, which might mean June 24 or the summer solstice, which if this is 1977 was June 21. The episode opens a week previously, on a Sunday - either the 12th or the 19th. The haymaking in the previous ep suggested that that must have been in the second half of June, so it can't have been very long ago at all if they were haymaking then.

Survivors - 2.11 New Arrivals

Abrasive agronomist Mark Carter BSc Ag shakes up the settlement with his plans for factory-style farming. The flu subplot eliminates Arthur and provides the moral: there's more to leadership than knowing what to do, and if people's morale is low they're likelier to die of illness. I was sorry to see Arthur go, I'd got quite fond of him.

Jack also has the flu - having not seen the next ep yet, I'm not clear whether he survived - and starts rambling about the threat Emlyn Hughes poses to West Ham. Then we see his hallucination of West Ham playing - against who a search leads me to believe are Liverpool in their 1972-73 away kit. The things I do for cult TV. That's the biggest deviation from series 1 realism so far: not only is it the first time we've seen anyone's thoughts, but also those thoughts are in the form of pre-plague footage.

I think btw Emlyn Hughes is the only contemporary public figure to be namechecked so far. The Home Secretary was mentioned in ep 1.1, but not named. (It would have been Roy Jenkins). I wonder if Emlyn, and Roy Jenkins, survived the plague?

Dating: the spring wheat was sown 'early last month', after the last frost (some time in April if they're over towards the Welsh borders). That makes it May at least, and in fact haymaking is in progress, so it can't really be earlier than mid-June. At the outdoor meeting Greg has his anorak on, but a lot of the others aren't wearing coats.

Charles says the plague was '18 months ago'. Once again that fits with the Nov-Dec period we've kept coming up with so far.

Thursday, April 09, 2020

Survivors - 2.10 Parasites

Rather an odd entry this. Mina's down on the canal bank collecting leaves, and who should come along in a boat full of merchandise than Patrick Troughton. She arranges a meeting next day between him and the survivors for trade, and between him and her for a meal a deux.

But it's not he who arrives, but evil criminal Jeff Kane, played by notable Hancock impersonator Kevin McNally. If this had been made 5 years later I think Daniel Peacock would have been cast. He has a great speech where he expresses his contempt for norms before the plague, 'and now they're all here pretending it's some jolly Outward Bound camp.' Not every show has the courage to include meta-criticism of itself. Mina soon discovers that he's murdered Trout and left him floating in the canal with a knife in his back.

Despite the extreme naivete of the survivors, Kane doesn't actually succeed in stealing anything from them other than the very-much-foregrounded methyl alcohol with which he and his companion end up poisoning themselves with. He does however shockingly murder Lewis. I was half expecting Lewis to be removed from the story at some point but that still took me aback. Anyway, Kane and his sidekick accidentally blow themselves up, the end.

Not much world-building here other than to establish that as well as fascists of at least three different shades, designing women, rapacious traders, petrol bandits and rapists - as well as all these, good honest criminals are still active after the apocalypse.

Mina goes leaf-collecting in rather delicate knitted tights. It's her choice. But if I had nice tights after the apocalypse I think I'd save them for a special occasion.

When Trout mentions the A40 she says '..the A40...' in rather the same nostalgic way that Jack reminisces about his Sunday morning chores in ep 2.8.

Trout says he was an aircraft marshaller 'two years ago'. Just possibly suggesting that it might be closer to 2 years than 18 months since the plague. If Lewis is planting cabbage seed in the field scene, then it can't be, it must be still April/May. Also Mina has a vase of daffodils on her table.

Odd outburst of hooting or creaking at the end of Trout and Mina's opening scene. It bleeds over into the next scene with Lewis in the cabbage field.

Greg refers to the apocalypse as the 'holocaust', we haven't had that before.

The salt expeditions continue as a convenient device to ensure that they only have to pay half the cast half the time. But salt would be an important commodity to people in their situation. The source is 120 miles north of the settlement - an 8 day round trip by horse, assuming they make an easy walk of the journey as we saw Charles and Pet doing in the previous ep.

Another voiceover in the final scene. I don't like this tendency to more sophisticated forms, I want to stick with the strictly literal style that perfectly suited the first series. This is a very serious story about people in a very serious situation, I want it told in a very serious way.

Survivors - 2.9 The Chosen

Essentially a diversion with Charles and Pet getting mixed up with fascists led by Philip Madoc. Some good twists and turns though regarding whether it's him or sub-leader Joy who's trying to have our friends killed. Also the way he's set up fake escapees from his settlement to return with terrifying tales of the outside and beg for readmission. The sort of thing the Operation Golden Age people might have done.

Another tricksy shot in the first act, fading Charles out on one side of the picture and the window in on the other.

Joy refers to gang rapes as part of the post-plague disruption. The first time that's been addressed since the hints in 1.1 during Jenny's escape from London. Pet makes a face when she hears that. She might be shocked at the news or she might be remembering old trauma.

One fascist says that the plague wiped out 98% of the population. 99.98% has been the figure we've had up to now.

Pet playfully threatens Charles with the gun in the first act. Would they really joke around like that? Maybe they would, perhaps humour is as harsh as everything else in this world.

Suspicious moving reflection in the medical cabinet when Charles and Pet are first talking in the quarantine hut.

No dating data at all in this ep - it's a diversion which could fit in anywhere.

Survivors - 2.8 By Bread Alone

Despite the title I didn't twig, until the reveal, that Lewis' secret shame was that he was a priest. When he was soulfully examining the pansy under the rubble heap I wondered if we were going to get an advanced 70s plot about post-apocalypse sexuality. Now that would have been an interesting story to tell.

The story we actually get isn't so bad, there's a wider range of reactions to him coming out as a priest than I expected. Some of the survivors display class-based hostility, others oppose him on philosophical and political grounds, some just want the trappings of organised religion restored, others draw an unintended moral conclusion and leave the settlement on YOLO grounds.

I liked the way that reassuming his priestly role made him a better trench digger.

It was tidy to have him and Jenny solving each other's problems. Her petulant demands to have the amenities of civilisation back don't fit with her conduct in series 1, but it makes sense that the stress of trying to care for her baby would have made her feel like that.

I'm not sure about the church service at the end. I think the table flowers send the same message much more efficiently.

Paul is referred to (as he is in the credits) as Paul Pitman, I think for the first time. In series 1 he always said 'Just Paul' when asked his surname.

Dating: it's lambing time so could be as late as April by now. At least 10 days have passed since the previous ep, as that's how long Prince Harry and Judy have been in the quarantine house.

Wednesday, April 08, 2020

Survivors - 2.7 A Friend In Need

Right up until the last 30 seconds of this I was preparing to write it down as one of the series 1 'tactical sequence' eps on a grand scale. There's a bit of world-building at the beginning, with the conference of community representatives, and the arrival of Daniella, but most of it is comprised of the hunt for the mysterious sniper who's been gunning down young women in the area.

However, the final twist did completely confound my expectations.Frustratingly though we weren't allowed to verify the shocking characteristic of the sniper for ourselves. I'm not going to give it away, you can look it up on imdb if you like.

Another reference back to 1.9 Law and Order. Greg's position in this ep though is counter to the one he takes in 2.5 The Face of the Tiger. Good exchange that he and Charles have - 'Values have changed whether you like it or not.' 'But do you like it?'

I also half expected Daniella to be immediately sacrificed as a decoy, perhaps before Jenny stepped into the role. I did like the bit about the handful of cigarettes though; Jenny explaining that everyone was forced to stop smoking 6 months ago and that, by implication, it would be dangerous to distribute them because it would set off people's addiction again without assuring their supply.

Arthur's reported remark that all the survivors, male and female, are starting to look like each other, is amusing, and good characterisation.

How does Jenny know that Vic tried to kill Anne in ep 1.11? She and Vic retired to bed together immediately afterwards, and she left first thing the next morning without seeing anyone. It was good btw to have it acknowledged that Vic's fate had an element of ambiguity about it: he was the only one of the series 1 characters we saw trying to escape the fire who wasn't seen to succeed. Charmian, Emma and Donny perished without being seen.

Dating: there are daffodils in the vase on the conference table, so it's probably still March. They do like their table flowers, the survivors, they always had them back in the series 1 house. It's well observed, you probably would do that to cheer yourself up and feel like there was still a bit of civilisation left.

Survivors - 2.6 The Witch

Once again Hubert is doing a Tom Price tribute act. This ep takes as its moral what Ruth said in the previous one, about how the survivors may be primitive by circumstance, but they are civilised by choice. Here most of them are choosing not to be civilised by deciding that Mina (referred to but not seen in the last ep) is the eponymous witch.

I like the idea that their circumstances are degrading them, but the execution is a bit crude. It seems implausible that they'd progress quite so quickly to waving crucifixes at her and trying to take her baby away. This isn't The Changes. If they wanted to make the delusion seem so infectious, it would have been good to show that even Charles was tempted to believe it - perhaps by having him see the defaced bust that may or may not be of him.

As it is it's just resolved by Charles, Ruth and Greg telling the others to pull themselves together. There's a sort of 'filler ep' feel about all this. Perhaps that's why it contains no dating clues, except that Jenny and Arthur are still away on the salt quest mentioned in the previous ep.

Survivors - 2.5 The Face of the Tiger

'A year ago we were just happy to be alive,' says Ruth as they all bicker about who's working the hardest. It's clever that this quarrelling and division has already made Alastair think of leaving, even without the whole 'them finding out that he killed a child while insane' thing.

This is basically a remix of 1.9 Law and Order, with Hubert in the Tom Price role. Good to see that Greg is - by implication - haunted by the way that 'murder trial' turned out, and is determined not to make the same mistake, or even a similar one, again.

Ruth has another good line, 'We may be primitive by circumstance, but we are civilised by choice'. If I was one of the survivors I'd say that whenever opportunity offered, until they all got fed up with me and made me make soap.

Alastair met someone on his travels who may or may not have been Jimmy 'action hero' Garland. So long as he isn't in this episode, I don't care.

Very strange closing scene. Firstly there's a voiceover, which hasn't been done at all in the show before; up to now we haven't seen or heard anything which wasn't literally happening. Then there's a very odd shot which has Charles standing on the left of the scene, pans off him to the right, across the landscape, and onto Charles again standing on the right of the scene. It's the most confusing thing I've ever seen in 70s television, I thought for a moment they were trying to suggest he had an evil twin.

Dating: it's now March. The plague was 'over a year ago'. The quarantine hut had 3 of the survivors staying in it a fortnight ago, the implication being that that was when Ruth, Greg and Charles returned from London. That suggests that 2.3 and 2.4 took place in late Jan, or Feb, and that would put the plague in November 1975 rather than late October based on the evidence in 2.4.

Tuesday, April 07, 2020

Survivors - 2.4 Lights of London pt 2

The interest here is in seeing how they laboriously turn the plot round so that Ruth can leave London with a clear conscience. But before we got to that point, Greg and Charles threaten to take her back to the settlement by force - I wonder if she'll be able to forget that?

It's an interesting position that Ruth's in in this world. She's a very valuable resource, so she's important and people usually defer to her, but equally they're also liable to fight over her and allocate her services without considering her wishes. It's a little bit like the setup in one of the early Day of the Triffids chapters where the sighted people are being exploited in a similar way.

Like some of the series 1 episodes, there's a sequence with people shooting at each other which goes on too long, but it's not quite so tedious as those earlier ones because our friends are directly threatened.

Greg speaks of their settlement as being in the West Country. I had the idea it was out Gloucester/Worcester way.

Dating: it's 5 days since Ruth came to London, the night when Mac the radio engineer died. He had been sending messages for 14 months. That's a pleasingly precise bit of data: if it's still January (1977) then the plague could indeed have been in October or November 1975. If more time has passed between ep 2.2 and ep 2.3, then December is back in the picture. It is reassuring that we keep coming back to this Oct-Dec band of possibility.

Survivors - 2.3 Lights of London pt 1

Some really unexpected and shocking images to start this ep - the masked doctor echoing the scientist in the opening credits, the surgery with its electric lights, the police car. The Denning Farm guy is as shocked as I am to see it.

The series 1 house was called The Grange, I don't think that name has been used before.

Ruth points out ironically that Penny has access to makeup. It has obviously grown rarer since series 1.

I was a bit disappointed by the journey to London being composed mainly of dark hints. I wanted to see an empty stretch of motorway with the odd wrecked car.

The unwholesomeness of the London settlement is really nicely built up - the initial deception practiced on Ruth, Trigger lurking outside, Manny's sinister bonhomie, the doctor's concern with breeding, Vira letting slip the secret of the Move. All the same, such comforts as it offers are clearly tempting Ruth, in her little pre-apocalypse bubble bedroom.

The Oval all dug up for crops. Very HG Wells.

Ruth tells the doctor she's had 4½ years' training, but in 1.13 she said she'd been in her third year when the plague struck.

I feel the stuff about the radio messages from Cairo shows the show is moving in a direction I won't like. I liked the 'blank slate' feeling of series 1. I'm not sure I actually want civilisation to be rebuilt in this way.

Dating: it's still winter, it can't be all that long since the previous ep. Abby left London a month ago (if anything the Londoners say can be trusted). They've been listening for radio broadcasts for a year, which suggests the London settlement formed while the plague was still raging. The doctor says the plague struck 'about a year ago', which fits with Charles' equally vague reference in the previous ep. I am moving towards placing the plague in November 1975 rather than at the end of October - although that makes episodes 1.10-1.13 even harder to fit in to the following June. For that part of the series 1 dating to work, the plague has to be as early as possible.

Monday, April 06, 2020

Survivors - 2.2 Greater Love

Effective scene with Arthur going through the old census data and dividing by 5000 to work out how many nurses there are left.

Charles and Greg drink a toast to civilisation, then later on Charles is getting out the brandy that he was saving 'for a special occasion, for a bigger world, better days' in much grimmer circumstances.

Some retconning/backstory about the original plague - not everyone who had that had lumps under their arms (Jenny's friend Pat did, and so did Abby). Ruth says that that was assumed to be a mutant form of bubonic plague - though Dr Tyler in ep 1 said it was a mutant virus, and bubonic plague is caused by a bacillus not a virus. What Paul's got doesn't respond to antibiotics, so, as Ruth explains, it must be another mutant strain. I suppose we are to assume that the original plague has got into the rat/flea population and carried on mutating.

Ruth's PPE made out of tomato compost bags is very disturbing. It's partly Threads, it's partly much too close to the bone coronavirus-wise.

Good bit of characterisation with Ruth challenging and defeating Charles' 'towns are out' edict in favour of a quarantine protocol. I like Ruth but I wish she hadn't regenerated. I wanted to see series 1 Ruth doing this stuff.

Greg talks explicitly about how conditions have changed for the better since series 1. It's clearly going to be less Day of the Triffids and more The Good Life from now on.

Dating: it can't be long since ep 1, only a day or so probably. Charles says civilisation was 'just a year ago', he's probably speaking loosely as previous evidence has shown it must have been 13 months ago at least.

Paul says that he was in London - as described in series 1 - 3 months after the plague. In series 1 he also describes doing other things before he joined the survivors in March. If the plague was at its latest possible date (early Dec 1975) he would have had to do them very quickly in order to fit in the visit to London as well. That suggests it was earlier in the possible range, back towards the end of Oct 1975.

Survivors - 2.1 Birth of a Hope

Charles again! Interesting to see him talking explicitly about leadership when I noticed in 1.4 that he and Abby were being grouped together as leader types. I love the 'amused by its presumption' bit with the wine, that is exactly the kind of grim joke I'd expect people like them to crack after civilisation has collapsed.

Notice how Charles is not shown to be jealous after Greg kisses Pet. We're to understand that he's not as unstable as he was when we last met him.

Jenny's wearing a dress, I think it's the first time she's not worn trousers. She's still wearing the furry coat though.

I'd been partly spoilered about the fire but I didn't expect it to eliminate the rest of the cast so ruthlessly. Arthur is much more interesting when he shows a bit of vulnerability, he was mostly a pompous comedy figure in series 1. 'This ghastly way of life' is very in character.

Jenny was great in this ep, I really felt for her when she was awake in the barn. Just imagine sleeping in a barn full of rats in the middle of winter after the apocalypse when you've got a baby due any day. Survivors has brought home to me what 'winter' really meant in these latitudes when humans first came here.

Another nice character moment when Paul mentions the young woman he's noticed at Whitecross, and Greg says genially 'What are you waiting for' and they all chuckle good-naturedly.

I'm surprised Charles hasn't managed to make any kind of soap, all you need is fat and ashes.

Dating: it's January, and the 'extra year' question in 1.13 is swiftly settled by Greg saying he last met Charles about a year ago (Feb 24 1976). He acknowledges that they were too late sowing their wheat in 1.13 (June 1976). So eps 1.11, 1.12 and 1.13 must have happened within days of each other and series 1 did indeed take place in 1975-76. (We aren't explicitly given the year, but I'm continuing my shorthand assumption that the plague outbreak was in late 1975.)

Friday, April 03, 2020

I've re-watched series 1 and updated the chronology in the previous articles.