September 20, 2006: We're Not in Kansas Anymore
Or are we? Jericho's small-town ways were completely turned upside down when they saw nothing like they ever had before.... And frankly, I probably wouldn't have stood so calmly on that rooftop if I were witnessing possible mass destruction, but the fear on that child's face was enough to convince me that the cast of this drama is just as intense as the story line. Nuclear explosions lit up the distant sky like a scene from
Independence Day (well, not quite, but similar). A busload of children was stranded on a lone highway after hitting a deer. Parents panicked and the writers added the power outage in there for extra drama. And while Jake Green (
Skeet Ulrich) thought he could make a quick return to his hometown to collect on some inheritance after being away for five years, he's stuck in town now that he rescued the busload of kids and used his mysterious life-saving knowledge to become the quiet hero. But just as any good pilot will, this one left me sitting here with many questions:
Where has Jake
really been for the past five years? We're not sure what to believe as he fended off questioning neighbors with answers like, "The army." "Minor-league baseball." "The navy." Clearly he knows a little more first aid than the rest of us, as he saved little Daisy by inserting a device made of juicebox straws in her throat to help her start breathing again. And what did Jake do in his past that makes him such a failure in his father's (Mayor Johnston Green, played by
Gerald McRaney) eyes?
Did Jake and Emily Sullivan (
Ashley Scott) have a past relationship? There was something distinctively nostalgic in their reunion.
Who is Robert Hawkins (
Lennie James)? This calm, new resident who claimed to be a former cop from St. Louis seemed to have all the answers when the town turned against each other. Why wasn't he panicking?
The only one keeping me calm during this maelstrom of uncertainty was mom Gail Green, who
Pamela Reed plays with such poise that I'd want her by my side during any crisis.
So with all outside contact cut off, the news that there was another explosion in Atlanta - from Dale's (
Erik Knudsen) eerie answering-machine message from his mom who was there - and the sheriff dead (after mistaking a bus full of angry inmates for the missing class trip), Jericho is definitely in for a wild ride. There's enough fire in this show's belly to last a while, and with Jake's brooding silence spiraling within the chaos, I'm holding onto my questions while it unravels. That... and all those dead birds on the highway in the last scene freaked me out enough to keep watching.
